Wearable art, local artisans and high tea this year’s Jumpers and Jazz in July promises to be very colour and very creative according to the woman behind some of the more arty events.
Julie Hockings is going to be pretty busy during JJJ this year, not that she hasn’t been in the lead up to the festival.
Julie has been busy working behind the scenes setting up three of the Js most colourful events.
Julie’s first hat is that of coordinator for the Showcasing Atelier event while she is also working on the Jazzy Crafters Pop-up Emporium and the new Warwick Wearable Art Awards..
“Yes there are really three things, that’s why it’s a bit confusing because I’m trying to juggle three things at the moment,” she said.
“There is the Jumpers and Jazz Showcasing Atelier event and that’s an all encompassing event of all the arts and crafts people that are involved in the arts precinct which is basically from the Art Gallery, Spinners and Weavers, Art at St Marks, Yarntopians, Warwick Potters and the Jazzy Crafters who are in Kings Theatre.
“That’s one part of my responsibilities this year. I kind of started this off two-three years ago as just the Showcase and its kind of kept growing. I’ve now handed the actual showcase back to Jumpers and Jazz but we haven’t got anybody to manage it yet so I’m still doing it.
“I kind of stepped back because my primary thing is to do what we call the Jazzy Crafters Pop-up Emporium. That involves basically filling Kings Theatre with arts and crafts people.
“We have workshops and stuff like that and we represent anywhere from 40 to 50 artists. That’s the big event for me at the moment.
“And then my third event, which I’m kicking off this year is the Warwick Wearable Art awards.
“That involves trying to get our wearable artists to actually put their designs into a competition and then that competition will be judged by a professional Wearable arts professional.
“This culminates in a Wearable Arts Spectacular and High Tea which we’re running on 23 July at the RSL. We will have models modelling the wearable art entries, we will have prizes and then there will be a big high tea – a mad hatters high tea.
“The Yarntopians are occupying the foyer of Kings Theatre with their Curious and Curiouser Mad Hatters display which is fantastic because they are such a crowd pleaser. People will come to see them.
“That’s sort of the three things I’m juggling at the moment.”
The Wearable Arts awards will be judged by Brisbane-based textile artist Svenja.
“Like many artists I am inspired by the wonders of nature, in particular the intricate forms of lichen and fungi,” Svenja said of her art..
“I’ve done a variety of formal studies along the way, but have learnt the most at workshops by many talented textile tutors, and in my fashion design studies.
“I felt, I dye, I screenprint, devore (burnout) print, I embellish with free-motion embroidery, I sew garments. I adore the process of making my own individual, expressive, and colourful fabric.
“I also love the related processes – sketching, researching, dreaming, moments of inspiration and eureka! moments.
“I firmly believe that life is too short not to dress up, to express ourselves, and create a visual feast in daily life, both for our own enjoyment, and for others.
“I look at my work as sculptural pieces that can be worn and enjoyed, by both the wearer and the viewer.”
Julie believes Svenja will be well-placed to judge the new wearable arts competition that had its germination in events at last year’s Jumpers and Jazz.
“Last year we realised there was no fashion parade for all of our ladies who basically design fashion as their craft,” she said.
“So, we decided last year to put on a fashion parade and high tea and that worked out really well and that was really just the people within the Jazzy Crafters group in Kings Theatre that supplied the garments and we had some models and we had the high tea. We had a fashion parade and it worked out nicely.
“This year we thought, a lot of people do the wearable art and so we will have wearable art competition. We had a lady in our group who knows Svenja through her university course that she did. So she said why don’t we do a wearable art competition and then we can have the fashion parade and really take it up a step.
“That’s how it eventuated and that gives our local Arts and Crafts people an opportunity to put their designs on the catwalk.
“Most of the artisans are from the Southern Downs and Granite Belt though we have got a couple of entries from a little bit further afield.
“This year is our inaugural event so we’re just looking to get our toe in the water and next year we will push it and promote it a lot harder and see if we can get a lot broader selection of entrants.”
Even though it is the first time the awards have been held there has been a lot of interest in the competition already.
“We have had quite a bit of interest, for some people it was a little bit late to get entries because of the time frames that we had.” Julie said.
