Sample Development | Kirsty Whitlock Inspired

Following on from researching Kirsty Whitlock and her work, I decided to create a plastic bag sample inspired by her work.

One of her most known pieces is a heavily embroidered old Tesco carrier bag that she's covered in bold newspaper headline style embroidery and frayed stitching.

To try my hand at this, I took my own Tesco carrier bag and began to stitch into it. I left all of the threads loose and raw just like Whitlock does with her own work and I think this looks very effective.
Whitlock's work focuses consumerism in our modern society, so I added the text "Bag For Life" underneath the Tesco logo as a kind of subtle humorous nod to consumerism and the fact we as a society are throwing away plastic bags and other environmentally harmful objects on an extreme scale.

While it was just a quick sample to demonstrate the way Kirsty Whitlock works and another opportunity to embroider into plastic bags, I really like the finished result. Again, it's a little colourless than what I want to work with but I'd be interested in taking the same techniques and applying them using more vivid materials and textiles.

I really like the nod to issues in society and while it's not something I've thought about doing within my final outcome, it might be interesting to take a deeper look at more issues within our modern world and how consumerism is harming our planet at an accelerated rate.