Somerset Curtain
Eva Berendes

For Intervention/Decoration, Eva Berendes created a massive cotton curtain that dominated the interior of the distinctive, light-filled volume of a newly converted weaving shed in the heart of Frome. The striking black and white abstract composition, created by cutting away sections of fabric, cut across the space in a sinuous S-shape, causing the vast composition to elude the audiences’ ability to consume it from any single point as it simultaneously obscured the interior from their gaze.

Berendes’ work imposed her continual preoccupation with the interplay of geometric abstraction in twentieth century fine and applied arts, from sources as diverse as Russian Supremacist painting to Hollywood film sets, onto Frome’s own textile history. Berendes’ work deliberately crossed the boundaries between art and design by situating textiles in direct relation to the concerns of Formalist painting and sculpture. But it also crossed the boundary between the past and the present. Her curtain gently reasserted the original function of the mill, and through overwhelming both the audience and the interior of the building subtly suggested how material can dominate us –as it would have dominated the lives of the mill’s original workers reminding us that history is never neutral.