From The Feminist Project for Rural Arts
Performative Art Installation in Stroud
An immersive experience with Vienna based artist Monica C LoCascio
This is the moment we’ve been waiting for … after six months of growing the Gloucestershire SCOBY, which has “given birth” to hundreds of babies, it’s almost ready to be transformed into a living artwork through a performative art installation.
In the next phase of The Feminist Project for Rural Arts, Monica C LoCascio harvests the Gloucestershire SCOBY to weave together memories of the area, the textile history of Gloucestershire and the ‘dirty-work’ of the women workers in the mills.
We’re excited to be holding the performance at the Museum in the Park (Stroud) that holds a collection of interesting objects relating to the local textile industry.
When & Where?
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Sunday 29th September
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Drop in at any time between 12:00 – 15:00
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The Pavilion, Museum in the Park, Stroud. Directions here.
“I’m interested in hierarchies of power, particularly from anti-patriarchal and non-anthropocentric value systems. By engaging with local materials and ecologies, the performance will highlight the global necessity of examining and valuing reproductive labor” (Monica C LoCascio).
Within this performative installation, Monica C. LoCascio will wash, preserve, and stretch mother SCOBYs (Symbiotic Culture of Bacteria and Yeast) — a fermented biofilm created by generations of billions of bacterial and fungal collaborators — over samples of fabric from local Gloucester textile producers. Monica will use the transformed SCOBY to create an embroidery work for the Heroines Collection.
In February 2025, the new work will be unveiled at Nailsworth Mills in February, where it will form the centrepiece of a photography exhibition that brings together heritage photographs from the area with work by local photographers who have incorporated babies from the Gloucestershire SCOBY into their practice.
The performative art installation references the textile industry that was vital to the local economy, especially Nailsworth, which – unlike other towns in the area – didn’t have a farming industry. Even before the industrial revolution there was a high employment rate of women in the industry, with hand spinning having 100% female employment. The workers would collect raw materials from a merchant and take them home, proceed to spin or weave the textile, and once a product was complete the finished work would be returned for a piece-rate wage. As the process industrialised, women still made up the majority of the workforce in textile factories. Monica’s tactile processes echo the physicality and talents of these workers.
This project has been made possible through the generous support of The Ampersand Foundation
About The Ampersand Foundation
The Ampersand Foundation is a UK grant-awarding charity that exclusively supports the visual arts. The Foundation supports high-quality exhibitions and projects, provided they are free to the public at least one day per week. It also supports public collection expansion. The Foundation is focused mainly on supporting institutions and projects within the United Kingdom.
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