The Matters of Time

Joint exhibition with Geert Van der Vossen at Tidaholm Art Gallery, Sweden

15.08 - 13.09.2026

It has been a while since The Matters of Time came together in Tidaholm, and I’m finally getting a chance to look back at the exhibition and think about the journey that brought it there.

The exhibition began with a connection made when Swedish textile artist Karin Hurtig invited Geert and me to exhibit together in Tidaholm, where the local art organisation has a beautiful gallery in the old water mill. Karin and I are both members of Nordic Textile Art, and I’m very happy that this connection was made. What started with a conversation eventually grew into an exhibition bringing together two very different materials and practices — textile and metal. Geert van der Vossen is a Dutch metal artist living in Sweden, who is making three-dimensional art installations out of metal industry waste material.

As both Geert and I work with discarded materials, I wanted to explore the traces that time leaves behind on materials — on wool, silk and metal, but also in the process of making.

The works grew from my fascination with material memory. When working with leftover materials, they already carry traces of their previous lives. My own wool has a very direct connection to place — to the sheep, the landscape and the environment around me. The old metal objects I used for rust dyeing came from around our farm and studio. Some belonged to my grandparents, while others came from our own surroundings. Each object carries something of the places it has been and the lives it has been part of.

I was interested in bringing these different materials and their histories together and seeing what would happen.

For the rust-dyed works, I placed silk and yarn in contact with old metal objects and slowly, their shapes, surfaces and perhaps something of their histories were transferred into the fibres, leaving traces rather than exact impressions. The objects themselves became part of the process rather than simply tools for creating colour. In the felted and woven works, fibres were layered, compressed, woven and worked over time. Surfaces changed, patterns emerged, and decisions made along the way became part of the finished pieces.

Nothing happens instantly. The materials need time. I am fascinated by how materials can hold on to what has happened to them — and how textiles can register the past. When the metal and fibres meet, one leaves something of itself in the other. A new material memory is born.

Another important source of inspiration was the natural world — its textures and surfaces, shaped and transformed over enormous periods of time. Erosion, sediment, stone, cracks and layers all carry evidence of what has happened before. I became interested in how these traces could be translated into textile surfaces and how they can also hold a sense of time.

Creating this exhibition gave me a lot of time to think about time itself — how we remember things, how memories become fragments, and how some things slowly disappear while others remain with us. And perhaps this is also what the exhibition has been about for me on a more personal level.

Working alongside Geert became an important part of this process. His work with discarded metal and his use of shapes, repetition and patterns influenced the way I began to look at my own materials. I found myself thinking differently about form and rhythm, and about how two very different materials can still speak to each other.

Bringing wool and metal together was a new challenge for me. There is something fascinating in the contrast between them — one hard and seemingly permanent, the other soft and constantly changing. Yet both carry traces of their past, and both can be transformed into something new.

This journey has brought remarkable people into my life. Conversations that have inspired me, friendships that have grown, and opportunities I could never have planned. I’m grateful for the way one connection can lead to another, and for the unexpected places that art can take us.

It has reminded me that perhaps one of the most meaningful parts of being an artist isn’t only the work we create, but also the connections we make along the way.

Seeing everything finally come together in the gallery was a special moment. The works had existed separately for so long — in my studio, in boxes, on tables and walls — and suddenly they were part of one space, in conversation with each other and with Geert’s work.

We often think we create exhibitions, but perhaps exhibitions create us too.

For this exhibition, I allowed the materials to guide me more than I usually do. They took the work in directions I had not planned, leaving me with more questions than answers.

I am truly grateful for this experience. Thank you, Geert and Karin, for this new chapter in my art practice.

Until next time,

Reena