Ginny Staniford – portfolio

Contact the artist

https://singeandsalvage.co.uk
07766 710523
ginnystaniford@gmail.com

Exhibition information

I’ve always been a fan of colour, texture and making the most of what I have, whether it’s fabrics, leftovers, or anything else lying around.  My 30 year old kids still tease me about the “creative concoctions” I’d put in front of them for supper!  That same love of reuse and reinvention has shaped the way I live, work, and make art. Before fully surrendering to my creative life, I taught for many years and then started a children’s leisure business as well as an online party bag sending orders all over the country.  I finally hit my limit with single-use plastic and thought… nope, not for me.  So I happily retired and I finally gave my art the time it deserved.

By then I’d amassed a serious fabric stash — some pieces decades old, some brought back by my father from his travels across Asia — and as a lifelong experimenter and risk-taker, and lover of colour and texture, I was ready to see what would happen if they came into contact with a heat gun or soldering iron.  At the same time I discovered Kim Thittichai and her book Hot Textiles as well as moving to a tiny rural village on the Northamptonshire/Oxfordshire border, surrounded by fields, hedgerows, flowers, colour and texture in abundance.  They are all there outside the window of my work space.  Everything clicked.  Burning, melting, and sewing fabric to create truly sustainable art became my new obsession. I never quite know where a piece will go—many are reinvented multiple times, building layers and textures. I still don’t have a single style that defines my work, and that uncertainty is part of the joy.

At Easter and Christmas, I make baubles from smaller scraps, turning leftover pieces into colourful decorations. I am always interested in commissions – from tiny baubles to large-scale artworks, especially when they incorporate someone’s own meaningful fabrics. More information can be found on my website www.singeandsalvage.co.uk

Artist information

This is my first year as a member of Oxfordshire Artweeks, and I am excited to be exhibiting at St Peter and St Paul’s Church in King’s Sutton with eight other artists. I am also a member of the Banbury Artists’ Co-operative, based at Church Lane Gallery in Banbury, and I organise the Culworth Christmas Shopping Trail, an artisanal shopping event that winds through our small rural village, celebrating the creativity of about 50 local makers.