Scottish textile designer Sara Keith has won the Silver Prize in the Fiber Works category at the 4th Cheongju International Craft Biennale 2005 which opened in Korea on 30 September until 23 October.

There were six UK makers among the 264 selected to exhibit and Sara was one of these, and the only one from Scotland.  Work was selected from the fields of ceramics, metal, wood, fiber and glass with 882 artists from 42 countries participating in the competition.

Sara won the award for her work ‘Silver Wishes’, a large wall hanging of metallic textile panels made using a combination of resist techniques and electrolysis, a technique she has developed with support from a Creative Development Award from the Scottish Arts Council. 

The whole idea and inspiration was based on research during a visit to Japan in 2004 when she became intrigued by the prayer motifs written on strips of paper which hang outside Japanese temples.  She then discovered similar Scottish traditions in a local forest in Stirlingshire where people write messages on fabric and tie them to the trees.  She wanted to use the idea of putting down wishes and letting the elements take them away, but didn’t want to have it in text or Japanese characters, so she used a shibori technique to make little marks and each was different across the piece.

Sara, who visited Korea to accept the award, said “It was very nice to be recognised for a new phase of my work and the prize is encouragement to keep going.  It’s given me the confidence to take part in international shows and it’s a bit of a turning point in terms of the type of work and scale that I do.  I’ve had lots of very encouraging comments and been asked if I’m interested in doing a big installation for another show.”

Sara spoke to craftscotland about the whole experience of attending the 4th Biennale 2005 and this interview will be published later this month.