Every thread in this corset was left behind by someone learning to sew. You may have helped Danielle create this piece!
For the upcoming group exhibition WORN at Untether Gallery, Danielle has created a sculptural textile work created from the remnants of everyday making.
The piece takes the form of a calico corset covered in clouds of loose threads. Rather than being newly produced materials, every thread has been collected from the cutting tables and sewing machines at Thread Den over the past few months. These are the small remnants usually binned during the sewing process — left over bobbin threads, unpicked seams and stray fibres left behind as your projects take shape.
In this way, the work quietly holds the presence of many makers. Each thread carries a trace of a maker learning a new craft, an item being made and the hands that produced it. Students attending classes at Thread Den have unknowingly contributed to the piece simply through the act of sewing.
Responding to the exhibition theme WORN, the work reflects on what remains after making. The corset, a garment historically associated with shaping and endurance, becomes a foundation for these accumulated fragments. Instead of a tightly structured garment, it is enveloped in soft, drifting layers of thread, suggesting the investment of time, labour and repetition.
The piece also explores the idea of being “worn” through creative practice itself. Over months of teaching, sewing and guiding others through their own projects, the workshop naturally produces a landscape of offcuts and threads. By collecting and re-presenting these remnants, Danielle transforms the overlooked by-products of making into a record of shared activity.
What is often discarded becomes a form of collective memory, evidence of garments and items made, skills learned and the quiet persistence of craft.
In this work, WORN is not only about erosion or exhaustion, but about what builds up through care, repetition and community.
Worn will show – 19 March – 4 April
At Untether gallery – 5/132 Little Malop St Geelong VIC Australia 3220
Opening hours – Thursday 11am-6pm, Friday + Saturday: 11am-4pm