ConnieLene – KnitDesigner

On the weekend of June 4/5th 2011 there will be an installation of 490 houses with knitted facades in the market place of Gunzenhausen.

Stephanie has mobilsed people from Europe including Germany and the Netherlands to knit the walls of the simple miniature houses and so create new homes for the displaced and forgotten lost souls of Gunzenhausen’s Jewish community. The white walls of the 490 houses will be delicate and translucent, ready and waiting to accommodate the souls. But the foundations will be solid, as strong as the determination of the artist to fill these houses with life, to present the forgotten souls with a shelter in the here and now.

The 490 knitted houses on the market square are to commemorate all the Jewish people who for centuries, had their homes here until 1934, 77 years ago.

A time to knit – a time to reflect. As if the knitting itself loops and weaves itself into our memory of the many men and women of Gunzenhausen who were once content to go about their lives within the Jewish faith, contributing to life within this little town on the banks of the river ‘ Altmühl’ . They knit themselves into memory; releasing the chains of the forgotten past with every stitch. So too, do they break the threads of false ways of thinking.

Stephanie Rhode has a way of making her artworks interact with us on different levels and this one does it too:

She says ‘‘My subjects are all about reflecting our present, about reflecting the society we live in. It’s an interaction between what I see around me and the response I get from my environment. The faster and more hectic everything is, the simpler and calmer my pieces are. It’s all about giving back, reflection and reduction. I’m always working with contrasts and opposites”.

Interaction is brought to mind in the knitted house project: between the artist, her ideas and the knitted objects on the one hand, and between the objects and the Jewish citizens on the other.

Throughout the installation, the artist’s knitted works tell of her view of the history of her town, her home – or simply stories about knitting. The different places where the events took place are vividly documented. The placement and display of the 490 knitted houses is another bridge is built: between the participants, those who come to view the exhibition, and the former Jewish inhabitants of Gunzenhausen.

The installation will continue to have an effect, even when the knitted houses have been taken down because every house will rest on a purposely positioned piece of gold leaf on the ground of the market place. As the remaining outlines of the gold leaf, reminiscent of the houses, will be worn away in the everyday life of the market place, we will be reminded that something used to be there.

Website link here

The installation, the knitters community as well as phrases from conversations between the artist and participants during and after the exhibition will documented and projected against a wall in pictures and quotations. There will also be photographic documentation about the people who have knitted for this art installation as well as the history of the former Jewish community at the Gunzenhausen town museum

Appeal:

Stephanie is looking for knitters willing to knit one or more houses or a house can be adopted for 100 euros.

Info Link to the knitted houses project it includes a registration form. I hope you join with this project as I have done. Stephanie will provide you with white yarn, pattern and a metal house frame.

Glass Houses

Sand Houses – installation

Why did we meet Stephanie at Ikea? Well I wanted to buy Swedish herrings and it is the only place here where we can buy them that we know of.