About

Grayson Perry’s iconic Essex House tapestries are being shown in Leicester this summer as part of The Gallery at De Montfort University’s program. The exhibition opens Saturday 29^th July and will run until Saturday the 2^nd of September.

Julie Cope is a fictional character created by Grayson Perry – an Essex everywoman whose story he has told through the two tapestries and extended ballad presented in the exhibition. The Essex House Tapestries: The Life of Julie Cope (2015) illustrate the key events in the heroine’s journey from her birth during the Canvey Island floods of 1953 to her untimely death in a tragic accident on a Colchester street. Rich in cultural and architectural details, the tapestries contain a social history of Essex and modern Britain that everyone can relate to.

The tapestries are shown alongside a graphic installation, and specially commissioned audio recording of The Ballad of Julie Cope, a 3000 word narrative written and read by Perry himself that illuminates Julie’s hopes and fears as she journeys through life.

These artworks represent, in Perry’s words, ‘the trials, tribulations, celebrations and mistakes of an average life’. Historically, large-scale tapestry provided insulation for grand domestic interiors; Perry has juxtaposed its associations of status, wealth and heritage with the current concerns of class, social aspiration and taste. To write Julie’s biography, he looked to the English ballad and folktale tradition, narrating a life that conveys the beauty, vibrancy and contradictions of the ordinary individual.

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Inside Out: An exhibition of furniture from the Crafts Council Collection
29 July to 2 September 2017

Inside Out features 24 pieces from the Crafts Council’s Collection representing significant makers from four decades of the Collection. The earliest piece is Chair by Alan Peters OBE made in 1978 and the most recent Sarah Kay’s Helga chair from 2007 with work by Richard La-Trobe Bateman, Floris van den Broeke, Tom Dixon, Tomoko Azumi and Wales & Wales representing furniture through the 80s, 90s and the 2000s.

Furniture making traditionally considered function and ergonomics yet some of these pieces ignore such considerations including Fred Baier’s extraordinary display unit Megatron – Whatnot – Etagère (1985) made using then pioneering free-form bending and Michael Anastassiades’ playful Bedside Table (1996) made of industrial felt and able to muffle an alarm clock if more sleep is required.

The pieces cover a range of materials including recycled plastic bottles, corrugated cardboard, acrylic, ash, glass fibre, oak and metal with an equally diverse number of processes on display.

29 July to 2 September 2017

Opening times

Monday to Saturday – 12.00pm – 5.00pm

Address

The Gallery,
Vijay Patel Building,
De Montfort University
Mill Lane
Leicester
LE2 7PT

For more information about our outstanding collections please visit:

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