Sarah Allen

About

My practice has historically centered around the home as a site of resistance, delving into themes of unpaid domestic labour childhood, motherhood, and care. Recently, my focus has shifted towards the strand of my practice involving care, specifically relating to my aging mother, her dementia, and her subsequent death from covid.

I have made an installation to reflect this multifaceted exploration of grief, loss, and memory, inspired by the process of unravelling my deceased mother’s clothes. This work integrates various mediums, including performance, spoken word, and film, to convey the intricate emotions surrounding my relationship with my mother and evoke personal reflections on mourning in the viewer.

The film, Yard of Pumpwater,central to the piece, narratively mirrors the gradual decline of dementia, structured episodically to transition from my mother as a caregiver to my role as her primary carer, and eventually, the care home setting. I consciously excluded my mother’s image, instead using personal references and passed-down knowledge, highlighting the unrecorded traditions of female and working-class lineages.
To emphasise intimacy for the viewer in experiencing the subject matter, I opted for a more personal viewing experience by showing the film on an iPad, a choice reflecting its personal and intimate nature, reminiscent of communication during Covid, but in no way tying it to this period of time.

The installation also features enlarged scans of tiny repairs my mother made to her clothes, symbolising hidden and undervalued feminine labor. These enlargements challenge traditional associations of stitching with domesticity, using them to explore themes of grief and personal suffering. Inspired by Angela Su, I see stitching as both a metaphor for healing and a marker of trauma.

A reupholstered Parker Knoll armchair, using fabric printed with these repairs, serves as a sculptural centrepiece. This chair, reminiscent of domestic and institutional settings, embodies emotional significance and connects to the absent body. The installation includes a floor covering printed with a plain knit, creating an infinite, floating illusion in the gallery space, further emphasising the intersection of domestic and institutional realms.

Collaboration with fellow textile artists revealed commonalities in our textile-based works, rooted in personal and cultural histories. This synergy was explored in our group exhibition, where the placement and interaction of our works prompted meaningful discussions about working-class histories and diverse cultural experiences with parents.

In my current residency in Jaywick, Essex, I work with Karen, who lost her son to Covid. Together, we unravel and remake textiles into performance costumes, integrating our shared experiences of loss. Our performance on the beach, accompanied by Karen on drums, uses the rhythm of waves as a metronome. The costumes, initially complete, unravel in the surf, symbolising transformation and the ongoing process of unmaking and making.

Through these various components, my work delves into the depths of personal grief, seeking to create a space for collective reflection and connection, challenging viewers to engage with their own experiences of loss and memory.