Get your stitch on Edit

Kate Westerholt crosses the boundaries between grannies and rock’n'roll. How i hear you cry, by recreates classic song lyrics in sampler form and was even commissioned by British Vogue.

Kate Westerholt creates original samplers with a 21st Century twist. Her work is a kind of cross-stitch time clash - Westerholt playfully adds snippets of contemporary culture to the 18th Century colonial American embroidery motifs. Traditional pictorial scenes of figures, birds and flowers are inscribed with the vernacular of now. These are not the girl next door samplers and if they were she would be the coolest girl in the village that all the boys fancied. Normally historically such embroideries have incorporated biblical references, it’s music and pop culture that crop up in Kate’s world. Westerholt weaves song lyrics and film quotes into her work. These provide a social commentary of sorts, on topics such as the appropriation of hip-hop culture into the mainstream. Kate Westerholt’s work places the longevity of popular culture under scrutiny, posing questions like - will Missy Elliot’s lyrics endure? How will our culture be perceived in 100 years?