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Scary monsters and crocheted creeps: The knitted brutality of Tracy Widdess
06.20.2018
08:20 am
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A knitted mask by artist Tracy Widdess.
 
In an interview included in the 2014 book Strange Material: Storytelling through Textiles, British Columbia-based artist Tracy Widdess says she began knitting nearly twenty years ago. Somewhere along the way, Widdess recalled that she found herself working with a group for a charity project charged with re-creating knitted masks from the 1970’s. After conducting some research for inspiration, Widdess came across a 1992 issue of Threads magazine and an article called “Snow Fooling” by Meg Swansen. Swansen was a protege of her mother Elizabeth Zimmermann, the founder of old-school crafting and knitting company, Schoolhouse Press. The images in the article struck a nerve with Widdess and her contribution the project would land her on the front page of the great, now sadly defunct website Regretsy. The exposure would inspire Widdess to create her own brand of sewing calling it “Brutal Knitting.”

Widdess would pursue various creative arts in school including sculpture, teaching herself to knit along the way. Soon her monsters and other strange knitted characters came to be by way of commissions—each taking 50-100 hours to complete. She is currently accepting commissions, so, if you have always thought how much better your life would be if people would just stop talking to you in public, then something wicked from Widdess is just what you need for your next walk around the block. Examples of Widdess’ wild work follow.
 

 

 
More after the jump…

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Posted by Cherrybomb
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06.20.2018
08:20 am
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Hilarious & cringeworthy knitted sweaters of the 1980s
11.04.2016
09:42 am
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It’s November, and the temperature in my neighborhood in northern Ohio reached 77 just two days ago. It felt like the start of September really, just a lovely day to be outside. Not at all cold.

One of the benefits of the balmy winters brought on by catastrophic climate change is that there’s no risk someone will trick us into donning one of the absolutely amazing sweaters featured in a remarkable book of knitting designs from the fashionable 1980s. Wit Knits, which presented “lively and original” knitted sweater suggestions by George Hostler and Gyles Brandreth, came out in 1986, and the photographs showing off the finished designs are simply jaw-dropping in their silliness.
 

 
There’s a website devoted to these pictures, but its proprietor, rightly sensing that the visual impact of these doozies is the primary appeal, therefore “won’t post patterns, buy the book if you want to make them.” Harrumph. The book is, like everything else, available on Amazon.

The really peculiar thing about Wit Knits is that virtually all of the models are well-known figures from 1980s British television. I don’t know how Hostler and Brandreth were able to sucker such famous personages into agreeing to be involved with this, but perhaps it was simply a paid gig like any other. Maybe they got to keep the sweaters?

For instance: I can remember watching, on WNET Channel 13 in New York back around when this book came out, a delightful British show called Good Neighbors (it was known as The Good Life in the U.K.), and Richard Briers, here wearing the light blue sweater with the “wee Scottie” on it, was the lead actor on that show. Meanwhile, Joanna Lumley—then perhaps best known for her stint in The New Avengers, who later became an icon of decadence in Ab Fab—here is shown wearing a ridiculous sweater with a horsey; she also has a different one with what is most likely an owl on it. Lizzie Webb, who presented morning exercise routines on TV, is wearing a sweater with a kittykat on it. Most of the people here are like that.
 

 

 
Much more after the jump…......

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Posted by Martin Schneider
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11.04.2016
09:42 am
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Cuddly and gross knitted dissection specimens
10.05.2015
10:23 am
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Emily Stoneking says, “If my hands aren’t busy, I’m not happy.” Currently studying German and History at the University of Vermont, Stoneking has an Etsy store featuring crocheted jar cozies and knitted whimsical anatomical studies has allowed her “the freedom to not work for someone else full time, so I can attend school.”

Here we can see Stoneking’s knitted versions of dissected frog, lab rat, earthworm, little alien dude, fetal pig as well as two anatomical studies.
 

 

 
More after the jump…

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Posted by Martin Schneider
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10.05.2015
10:23 am
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Clean, cute and cruelty-free knitted dissection specimens are cuddly and gross!
11.07.2014
12:29 pm
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frog on dissection tray
 
I seem to remember being one of the kids that refused to dissect a frog in Biology class, but I wonder if I could have swung a passing grade if I had offered to do a mock-dissection with one of these beautiful knitted specimens from aKNITomy. Look at those lovely little felted innards! My first concern was actually that I might not be able to remove the creatures from their mounts for fun pranks, but no!

He comes pinned into his actual dissection tray (never used!), but he is not glued down, so you can take him out and cuddle him if you wish.

Fantastic! In addition to hiding one of these ghastlies in your infantile roommate’s childhood teddy bear display, you can actually cuddle with these disemboweled stuffed animals! A cute touch I noticed was the dead-as-a-doornail “x’s” over all the eyes ... all except the alien.. who stares at you, all blank and lidless. The description says “alien autopsy,” but are we dealing with knitted extraterrestrial vivisection here? Because I just don’t think I can ethically support yarn-alien cruelty.
 

rat on dissection tray
 

fetal pig on framed cork
 

bat on framed foam core
 
More, including the alien autopsy, after the jump…

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Posted by Amber Frost
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11.07.2014
12:29 pm
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