Meet The New Quilt Artist: Julie Haddrick

Name of Artwork: Blue Specimen

Julie Haddrick’s art tells the stories, expresses her feelings and it is the driving force in her life. Art comes from a deeper place inside her and central to this is expression that is grounded in naturalism. With a love of fabric and stitch, Julie’s arts practice is underpinned by the Fine Arts; of drawing painting and printmaking and the disciplines of Design and the Crafts of textiles have shaped the ways she uses stitch, threads, colours and cloth. They are disciplined, sparse, refined and without elaboration.

Julie embraces the Japanese aesthetic of “Wabi Sabi’” that values transience, imperfection and the impermanent. She finds greatness in the overlooked details; the grace of ageing, imperfection and of beauty in decline. Julies’ Wabi Sabi is outdoors in quiet, insignificant and inwardly oriented places and her treasure is in the discarded; a feather, a stick, a shard of china. She hand dyes, prints and paints fabrics, often combining/ layering them with vintage cloth or recycled Japanese silk fabric. Studying indigo dyeing techniques in Japan under Bryan Whitehead’s tuition has greatly influenced the fabrics Julie works with and is this is pertinent to her current quilt ‘Blue Specimen’. 

Her stitching is measured, decorative and purposeful and her thread rich textiles are complex and quite unique, with layers of meaning concealed in her beautiful machine quilting. Julie believes that her Art is about making space – both physical and mental – for listening, searching, and expressing one’s unique position in the world. Art cultivates the ability to imagine a future and so transcends the present moment. Julie Haddrick’s art is inherently hopeful

Julie Haddrick online: Webpage  Facebook 

The New Quilt, on exhibition at Hawkesbury Regional Gallery, Windsor, NSW from 5 February – 11 April 2021. 

Gallery hours: Open 6 days a week Monday, Wednesday-Friday 10am-4pm Saturday-Sunday 10am-3pm. Closed on Tuesday and public holidays.