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Textile Museum Of Canada

Textile Museum Profile: Melanie Egan

As part of this month’s Textile Museum of Canada Digital Residency, we’re profiling a number of artists and professionals associated with the museum and wider community. See all of the profiles here.


What’s your connection to the Textile Museum? 

Former board trustee and current member of the programming committee at the Textile Museum. Avid fan!

What do you do in your industry? 

I am the director of craft and design at Harbourfront Centre. I’m responsible for the post-graduate artist-in-residency program devoted to contemporary textiles, ceramics, glass, jewellery/metal and design. I curate exhibitions, organize events, write and lecture.

In your opinion, how can textiles tell stories? 

That is a vast question. People wear textiles – handle textiles every day of their lives, whether it be the mundane task of drying the dishes, the daily donning of a hijab or shrouding the dead body of a loved one. Textiles inhabit an intimate realm that is attached to our identity. We even use phrases like “woven into the fabric of our lives” to punctuate the importance of events. We connect “threads” of meaning and we feel “tied” to people. The many global traditions of hand-making textiles (weaving, printing, dyeing, felting) are cultural signifiers, points of pride and displays of sublime expertise. 

A quilt can tell a story through motif, pattern and colour and the women who quilt tell the stories of family and community while stitching.

What’s your favourite place in Toronto to do some creative thinking?

No one place in particular. I do my thinking while walking to work in the morning. I love the transition points in cities where you go from residential to commercial to walking under the Gardiner Expressway!

One of the Textile Museum’s current exhibitions features the works of Itchiku Kubota, whose artistic career focused intensely on the kimono. What do you think we can learn from this kind of creative dedication?

It truly boggles the mind when you investigate the technical aspects of Kubota’s work. When I encounter this kind of dedication I always think of the duality of humility and virtuosity – both take time to mature.

So much of our attention is drawn to the digital and virtual possibilities of art. Can you explain what role textiles play in your day-to-day life?

I love my linen tea towels. I love my String Theory scarves. I like the way they feel. I like knowing where they came from and who made them. I love fashion. I still regard Alexander McQueen’s 2006 Widows of Culloden collection a masterpiece. Tartan rocks! I saved my daughter’s baby clothes, like so many of us do – especially the pieces I made her.

Name one artist of any discipline and any era who never ceases to inspire you.

Another tough question. In this moment I will say Kai Chan, Toronto. He uses the language(s) of thread and making to elegantly and eloquently give prominence to the everyday. 


Visit the NOW Digital Residency: Textile Museum of Canada

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