Janet Emmanuel, recently appointed Academic Programme Leader at the University of Brighton is exhibiting her sculptural textiles the University's Gallery in January.
Using inaudible sound, Janet explores the blurring of the thresholds between science, art and technology. Industrial non-woven fabrics are welded with animal, mineral, vegetable and man-made materials towards the creation of form. A visual response to materials and process, using ultrasound welding. A process more commonly associated with mass manufacture and heavy industry.
The exhibition 'Acoustic Shadows' demonstrates the moment when inaudible sound leave shadows on the cloth, so making visible the invisible. The structures explore the space between the body and the cloth to become sculpture.
As free standing structures they are kinetic, animating manmade material. Ultrasound has been used, in this instance, to bond and mould polymer constructs that extend and create depths of space in textile, while giving plays of tension, light and form. The physical extension of the materials using ultrasound welding, creates forms that grasp space.
Janet recently participated in the Public Arts Lab project organised by the Liverpool Design Initiative with funding from the Arts Council and The Henry Moore Foundation, which culminated at the Science and Industry Museum, Manchester in 2000.
