Carola van Dyke is a contemporary textile artist, and creates free-motion embroidered artwork, which she uses to explore her fascination with colours, textures, layers and light. Machine stitching is used in a contemporary instinctual and impressionistic way, her accomplishment in her embroidered tapestries lies in the seemingly effortless drawing with thread. Tactility is at the heart of her process and her work is inspired by the relationship between fragile and rough, hand and machine, traditional and modern; through this interplay, her artworks unite craft and decorative fine art.
She creates wall hangings with floating tiny individual stitches, where colour is the driving force. The embroidery artwork is made with thread and have a dramatic, curious quality and represent nature in a rough and vulnerable manner. She wishes to achieve a delicate result with fine threads by pushing the boundaries of embroidery, bringing a more refined and unexpected outcome.
Her current work focusses on nature: insects, wings, flowers & plants and their preservation. Beauty has always been important in her work, and she is fascinated with the exuberance of Dutch 17th century vanitas paintings.
Commissions include a series of mini embroideries for the Textile museum in the Netherlands for their Royal Embroidery exhibition, embroidered insects for Bergdorf Goodman NY .
For the past decade her Textile Taxidermy has been part of the British interior scene and have sold worldwide. The success of her brand is evident in the extensive international client list which includes the likes of House of Fraser buyer Mary Portas, Anthropologie US, Knoll Textiles, Joseph Abboud and Liberty London with whom she has collaborated on a unique collection, as well as private collectors and international celebrity.
Carola van Dyke studio is based on the south coast of the UK and focusses on designing the more unique and one of a kind art pieces for galleries, private residencies and the hospitality industry.
Bespoke commissions, private and commercial, taken.
