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Pastoral Futures. Wool Migrations

In a collaborative exhibition at Disseny Hub Barcelona, Claudy Jongstra teams up with Tornen les Esquelles (The Sheep Bells Are Back) — an initiative dedicated to revitalizing the vestiges of pastoral culture in Barcelona’s Sierra de Collserola Natural Park — to examine the potential for wool to shape alternative futures, from the pasture to the museum. Focusing on the revitalization of shepherding practices, the show addresses the interconnected lack of environmental, cultural, and economic sustainability associated with the disappearance of shepherding, ranching, and transhumance across Europe.

Jongstra's monumental tapestry 'Tangible Transformation I' takes center stage in the exhibition, with a message of hope and healing for the future, rooted in collective action. The piece is a sequel to Jongstra’s powerful visual manifesto, 'Guernica de la Ecología'. The exhibition also features one of the sculptural coats created in collaboration with Viktor&Rolf for their 'Spiritual Glamour' Haute Couture Collection.

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The first piece in Jongstra's 'Tangible Transformation' series, this artwork references the enlarged scale and proportions of sixteenth-century botanical 'verdure' tapestries representing fantastical, wild landscapes. Foregrounding foliage in our contemporary context of ecological degradation and climate crisis, Jongstra's vibrant landscape adapts this historic compositional tradition to shift our anthropocentric consciousness, centering nature and the urgent need to restore and protect biodiversity. Challenging the green-dominated colour palette of traditional landscape tapestries Claudy Jongstra uses a nuanced palette of plant-based colours to express biodiversity — We think we know what we mean when we say “green,” but nature really contains an infinite world of colour.

Presented by Materfad, in collaboration with Eina Obra, the exhibition highlights the vitality of artists and collectives mobilized around it, underlining its value as a raw material and providing a platform for research being conducted to find new applications for wool and strengthen its environmental, artistic, and ethical implications.

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Exhibition Title: Pastoral Futures. Wool Migrations

Location: Disseny Hub Barcelona

Duration: 24 November 2023 - 14 January 2024

Photography: Xavi Padrós

Press

The Sibarist | Claudy Jongstra, long life to wool

Disseny Hub Barcelona | Interview with Claudy Jongstra

Web

FAD Talk | Interview with Claudy Jongstra (Video)

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Claudy Jongstra, 'Tangible Transformation I' (2023)
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