I Have No Thoughts On This Matter, 2020.
Hand-stitched textile.
35cms x 35cms, unframed.
Private Collection.
Copyright: Alison Aye, 2024.
It’s about ‘good girls’ putting up and shutting up.
‘I have no thoughts on this matter’ was my mantra during 2020. At the age of 53, I had moved back to my childhood home, sharing a bed with my mother, in what turned out to be the final year of her life. I left my husband and kids and went 300 miles north. A place where I am undervalued and underestimated. Everybody else's time is more valuable than my own. It was expected of me, and I did it, losing both my jobs, pretending it didn’t matter.
For the 18 months I was there, hand stitching kept me on the right side of sane.
As always, the materials are recycled.
A friend was binning the tea towel, describing it as embarrassing, the way the middle-classes do.
The orange and blue are my husband’s old clothes.
The blue, a shirt I remember him wearing at my cousin’s wedding. I was a Bo-Peep inspired bridesmaid. The evening cèilidh was a riot. We laughed and danced our socks off, except Mr S, who sat on the side-lines, unable to make a fool of himself.
The orange, boxer shorts I bought on Christmas Eve 1991, from the Next near Charing Cross Station, London.
The red fabric, used for my signature, is an old National Portrait Gallery uniform. I worked there for 12 years. Undervalued and underestimated. The date next to it was cut from Amnesty International Magazine, Issue 206.
I Have No Thoughts On This Matter is now available as a limited edition print. The original was bought by a French woman, which I took as the greatest of compliments.
Photo by Ian Bruton.
Copyright: Alison Aye, 2024.