Free House | Digbeth | 07/08/26
An exhibition of thread and fury, a comment on the continued gentrification of Digbeth, a combination of embroidery and Live Art. Stitch’N’Bitch was my first solo outing at a Digbeth First Friday in nearly half a decade and a return to the spontaneous happenings that made me love it so much.
Right now, every single one of us is feeling it. I don’t know anybody who isn’t feeling the increases in the cost of living, who isn’t feeling despondent at the rise of reactionary voices that would have been laughed at a decade ago, who isn’t feeling increasingly powerless in the face of poorly managed AI concerns and a level of wealth disparity previously seen at the hands of despotic rulers or in apocalyptic fiction.
Sometimes, all you can do in scream into the void. Sometimes, all you can do is find somewhere to put the urge to repeatedly stab things. This show explored how I’ve been doing that.
Exhibition hand out
Stitch’N’Bitch was a way of showing the embroidered work I’ve been compiling over the past year including mythical beasts, imagined creatures, personal affirmations and a series of text embroideries made in response to my own feelings of powerlessness over the closure of Walsall Leather Museum. Despite the actions of WMBC the museum is now set to reopen, and the primary architect of its destruction has now lost his seat on the council. Despite the constant assertions of the pointlessness of the endeavour we proved that there is indeed a point to not giving up the fight.
The Woman In Black was about screaming into the void. So many of the audience members on the night felt anxious about screaming, yelling and making a noise which makes sense – when the going gets tough, the tough are advised to fall into line so as not to get hammered down. What I had intended to be some Live Art howls to the tune of Jolene, Me & Bobby McGee and Fabulous became much more personal and cathartic, and I’m so glad it did. I became more of an emissary to the void, allowing people to scream through me and share my notorious noisiness with those who needed it.
It’s extremely easy to see art, heritage and culture as a nice little frippery. A non-essential. If you’re arguing whether that £300k should go towards an arts festival or an MRI machine it’s a no-brainer. But the truth is – the arts need supporting. They don’t make money for themselves, they bring interest and money into an area. Growing up in the 90’s Digbeth was pretty much a no-go zone, now it’s a fashionable edgy theme park of a place. Every pound spent on art and artists brings twice that into the economy. We are being asked to start from scratch with no money, and once reliable funding streams are drying faster than a natural spring in global warming.
So do not let it fade gently into the night. Scream, rage and stitch. There’s never no point.
Vicky Roden 