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Yarn, the Movie

When I saw there was a movie called Yarn on Facebook recently, you know I had to check into it.  For starters Yarn, the movie, is a documentary; no shock there, it is hard to imagine it a RomCom or Drama.

Image from Yarn
Director Una Lorenzen and co-directors/producers Heather Millard and Thordur Jonsson have put together a film about yarn with snippets of history about it, but the focus is put squarely on four fiber artists:  ". . .Icelandic wool graffiti artist Tinna Thorudottir Thorvaldar as she engages in political protest by way of crochet, Brooklyn-based Polish artist Olek whose site-specific work is, in part, a resistance to the 'really sexist chauvinistic f@#$ing art world,' Canada-based Japanese artist Toshiko Horiuchi MacAdam of Net Play Works whose 'textile playgrounds' are a source of beauty and visceral pleasure, and Tilde Björfors, the founder of the contemporary Swedish circus company Cirkus Cirkör, for whom yarn serves as a symbol for the human condition. (Written by Elissa Strauss, in the June 27, 2016 issue of Elle online found here.)

Image from Yarn
The trailer for the movie and an interview done by Vickie Howell at SXSW totally piqued my interest.  I have followed Olek for some time but never wrote about her.  She is edgy, her work is often anti-male and at times she can be downright vulgar; all reasonable qualifications to call her an artist.  Having said that I admire her capacity to create eye-popping work where crocheting is put on display.  If you want to check out more about Olek, click here and here.  I would go to the film simply to find out more about her, but add to this the use of yarn in protests and a circus as well as to create playgrounds, it is now must-see viewing for me

An example of Olek's work from Yarn
As I searched further my heart sank when I found that Yarn has a very limited release.  Somewhere it was said only a couple handful of cities would screen Yarn in North America.  What are the odds it would be available in a place, at a time I could actually see it.  So with some trepidation I checked into the schedule.  To my amazement it will show at Vogue Knitting Live (VKL) in Minneapolis Saturday, November 5 from 7-9 pm.  Susan and I have already made plans to be there and I intend to stick around to see the show.

Yeah, I love it when a plan truly works out even better than I planned it would.  I already have high expectations of VKL and now there is even one more thing to make it better.   Serendipity is being celebrated today in my house!

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