Earlier Work of Laura Kent Textiles

Laura Kent | Level Four and Five Textiles in Practice | Manchester School of Art

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Tuesday, 23 April 2013

Research: Strangeways

Following the idea of trying to link the City of Manchester, to our current ideas of restriction, I decided to look closer at Strangeways prison. To me, the first thought that comes to mind when hearing is 'prison' is the restriction of movement- having all resources of freedom taken away. I then think about barbed wiring, high walls, deserted spaces. All things that I consider as lonely, and dangerous. 

When wandering around the city, I gathered first responsive photographic evidence of the prison. At glance, Strangeways looks like a beautiful piece of architecture- ironic in comparison to the refugees contained inside. It's high walls and enormous amount of security give off a sense of eeriness- questioning the ideas of what it must be like inside ...






When creating our final piece, whatever that may be, I think that it would be interesting to incorporate the prison into it- whether that be through the inspiration of restrictive movement, or the fact that it was Queen Victoria that opened the prison- this vital piece of research makes the link towards strangeways and our work seem appropriate to use.