Adelaide Butler

How do we understand Early Modern English women today, over 400 years later and on the opposite side of the world? Their histories are constantly shaping our lives, and our current perceptions change the way we look back through time. So how can we ensure that their history is not relegated to irrelevance, nor blindly celebrated through nostalgia? Portraits of Early Modern women are recreated stitch by stitch using techniques that have persisted through time, reflecting on women’s labour and power. The Early Modern women’s embroidery practices, long overlooked and ignored, have been reimagined as they come together to animate the motion of sewing. Through the embodied act of stitching, their stories are carried into the present. Within this body of work, past and present communities collide and are connected through a persisting thread of shared experiences.