Vanessa has designed her practice as a counterpoint to the excesses
of mass-produced textiles. Porto is the epicentre of Portugal's
textile industry, and all the materials Vanessa uses come from the
deadstock of artisanal rug factories in nearby Beiriz. "I clean and
recycle the yarns, then use handmade techniques to ensure my
production is as eco-friendly as possible," she says. The process- which takes weeks to months to complete – is all about "using
conscious production methods in an attempt to fight thisnegative
mindset and improve our Earth's health".
For Vanessa, the creative process is an extension of the ocean's own
"magic flow". "Life in the deep sea is so slow and simple, yet also
vastly complex," she says. "I try to evoke that sensibility in my own
practice." Like the ocean itself, her tapestries evolve and shift over
the course of countless hours; different textures and forms emerging
in response to her own impulses and the materials at hand. Music is
one of Vanessa's primary tools for slipping into a crochet-flow state –
her current soundtrack is a collaborative playlist she's created called
‘Aquatic Rhythms: Coral Echoes’, where people can "add any song
they enjoy within a waterish genre".The rugs and tapestries that emerge on the other side are both
luminous and affecting; plush marine worlds that draw you in,
demanding to be touched and explored, even as they seem to pay
witness to their own fragility. "Ocean preservation is the main goal of
all my work," Vanessa says. "When people see my tapestries, I hope
they're inspired to create and live morally on a daily basis. Only then
can we save our planet."It can take a moment to realise what you're looking at when you
first see textile designer Vanessa Barragão'sOcean Tapestry.An
undulating mass of dreamy marine pastels, arterial lines and coral-
like mounds, you have to consciously remind yourself what you're
seeing isn't actually organic – it's just weaving taken to its extreme.
Using a combination of latch-hooking, hand-tufting, crochet,
basketry, felt-work and macramé, Vanessa – a resident of the
Portuguese town of Porto – creates art that speaks to our uneasy
relationship with the world's seas and oceans. "Ocean Tapestry
represents our planet's vast saltwater areas and the importance of
circularity in every natural environment," Vanessa says. "The ocean
is a place full of inspiration; it's literally the origin of life on Earth,
yet we're doing our best to destroy it."
Vanessa grew up in Albufeira, a coastal city in Portugal's south,
where the rhythms of the ocean thrummed through every aspect of
daily life. Learning to crochet at her grandmother’s feet, she soon
discovered a knack for the more complicated and technical aspects of
threadwork. However, it was while studying fashion and textile design
at Lisbon University that Vanessa came face-to-face with the terrible
costs of the art form she loved. "The textile industry is one of the most
polluting in the world," she explains. "The machinery uses tonnes
of energy, while also producing a lot of harmful chemical waste."
The ocean absorbs 90 per cent of all our atmospheric pollution, she
says, while global warming is blanching and erasing our coral reefs.
"Without these immense habitats, a major part of all sea life will
become extinct, and the consequences will be catastrophic."
much like the ocean, vanessa barragão’s
art has a lot going on beneath the surface.
WORDS LUKE RYAN
underwater weavıng
look what i made