Gleb Maiboroda: Shuttling Bodies
Automated Rhythms and the Somatics of Weaving
Shuttling Bodies: Automated Rhythms and the Somatics of Weaving examines the contemporary construction of the modern weaving loom within the context of colonial ideologies and extractive economies. In the first chapter, the ontological nature of a digital weaving loom, such as Jacquard, is explored through the Western history of metrification, and other capitalist colonial structures that came to its full potential during the industrial revolution; as a result, the division between the production of fine art and craft occurred in a strict cultural sense, as well as, in the art academies and art education methodologies worldwide. Drawing on experience of weaving, listening to music and movement therapy, the second chapter investigates the disconnect between the weaver’s body and their work at the loom, proposing somatic weaving to restore embodied connection, intuition, and improvisation in the processes of artistic making. The rhythmic movement of the weaving shuttle emerges as a central element in this somatic approach.
The publication addresses the capitalist regime of making that is enforced on the body of a maker and their craft. By critically examining this topic within the realm of arts education, the author seeks to cultivate a deeper understanding of the ways in which weaving can be reimagined and meaning can be generated in the present-day arts landscape.
