Louise Gardiner, British artist and illustrator, grew up on a Dairy farm in the village of Styal, Cheshire. She has become well known for her world of weird and wonderful characters and creatures and you may recognize her work from the Woodmansterne card range ‘In Stitches’. Louise and her embroideries have entertained a wide variety of people at exhibitions and talks resulting in an established career as an international artist and teacher. She has helped push this niche art form in new directions and has continuously promoted stitch as an exciting, rich medium, with strong associations with drawing and our cultural heritage.
After an art foundation at Manchester Metropolitan University, Louise then graduated from Goldsmith’s College, London with a Textiles BA (Hon’s) 1994 and later in 2001 she completed an Illustration MA back at Manchester Met where she did her art foundation. After yo-yoing between the big smoke and the North West, Louise secured a studio in Bristol, enabling her to develop larger scale, more ambitious projects and work full-time in an artistic community where she was also studio manager for 5 years.
She has developed a widely diverse and interesting portfolio, showing evidence of growing creative confidence, successful projects in the community, variety and emotional maturity. Her work is ever developing and she hopes to create work, which will enhance our environment, delight others and push her own creative boundaries.
Louise combines the exciting and intricate medium of free machine embroidery with her passion for drawing and says she can drive a sewing machine like an ‘Aston Martin!’ She creates figurative, floral and flamboyant pieces of artwork using a combination of rhythmic drawing, intense and intricate free machine stitches, paints, appliqué and inks. Every work is unique and labor-intensive, planned yet spontaneous. These original and energetic embroideries celebrate the rich and colorful medium of thread and illustrate her sensitivity to her surroundings, lust for life and cheeky sense of humor.
The Embroiderers’ Guild awarded Louise a scholarship for her embroidery in 2005 and she continues to exhibit internationally. She has been selected for ‘Art of the Stitch,’ ‘ORIGIN’ and the ‘PFAFF’ Embroidery awards, has sewn live on ‘Woman’s Hour’ R4 and in 2010 taught a master class on ‘Kirstie’s Homemade Home.’ Louise regularly works to private commission producing one off bespoke pieces across the UK for a variety of clients. She has completed several large scale public commissions including ‘The Wacky Races’ for ‘The Gloucester Royal Hospital’, an interactive project ‘Birds of Paradise,’ with the women’s’ ‘PICU’ Unit at Blackberry Hill, Bristol and now a large embroidered 'Tree of Life' for Oldham Hospital and the Acute Pennine Trust.
Louise has completed many embroidered illustrations for books and editorial, including The Guardian, Selvedge magazine and BBC4. In 2008 she received a Parliamentary award for 23 embroidered illustrations for the book ‘Saggy Boobs and other Breast Feeding Myths’ with LIME ARTS and the NHS to promote breast-feeding in the UK and in 2010 Louise was commissioned by LIBERTY of London to create a 2 metre quilt for their flag ship store window display, Regent street, in conjunction with the festival of Quilts at the V and A. Her next ambitious project is a sequence of 'exploding embroideries' for the Project Space at COLLECT, The Saatchi Gallery in May this year, 2012.
Louise teaches and speaks about energetic machine embroidery at Universities, Museums and Guilds worldwide including a three month lecture tour for the New Zealand Embroiderer's Guild in 2010. She has a reputation as a lively and passionate speaker her aim is to promote free-machine embroidery as a rich and cutting edge medium, to push her own creative boundaries and possibly one day … win ‘The Grand Prix’ on her sewing machine!
