Hyperbolic Elevation: An Artographic response to Queensgate Market

Hyperbolic (of language) - adjective - deliberately exaggerated. Elevation - noun - the action or fact of raising or being raised to a higher or more important level, state, or position Hyperbolic Elevation is a curated exhibition documenting the results of an A/R/Tographic engagement with Queensgate Market, Huddersfield.As Queensgate market approached its 50th anniversary, 1st and 2nd Year students of Textiles/Textile Practice at the University of Huddersfield were asked to create responses, initially through drawing, but potentially though other media, to the market as part of their taught curriculum. The market was used, in broad terms, as a primary resource that inspired drawings capable of initiating further Textile, Surface or Craft activities.First and Second Year students of Textile Practice were introduced to the topic and each responded to strategies proposed by the project tutors Matthew Taylor and Nicola Perren. Samples were developed in taught sessions and independently throughout the term, these drawings were later expanded upon though workshops in print, knit, weave and embroidery.At select points in the term the students came together to work collaboratively. During the term they were introduced to the research methodology A/R/Tography (Irwin & Springgay, 2008) allowing for student/tutor collaboration that may activate and explore the spaces in-between art making, research and teaching.Students were directed to an example of post graduate research that explored the theme, the 2012 Master of Arts by Research thesis “An Exploration of the Development of Huddersfield's 1970 Market Hall: Architectural Decoration with Cheap Greens; An Architect's Dream?” by Christopher Rolfe Marsden (http://eprints.hud.ac.uk/id/eprint/18045/1/cmarsdenfinalthesis.pdf) which explored amongst other things the origins and development of Queensgate market, hyperbolic, paraboloid shell roof engineering and civic art which provided many alternative launch points for a drawing related project.Forms such as the hyperbolic paraboloid (a form where a surface made when straight lines join two skewed lines) were considered alongside works produced by artists from the Constructivist art movement who utilised this form, allowing for models to be constructed that could then be used as a primary resource object utilised in the process of drawing for textiles. Participants were also asked to consider whether the customers, stallholders and products sold in the market could generate alternative narratives around the lives that have inhabited the space which may also inform the work.It was hoped that this engagement with Queensgate market and through a process of working for an exhibition alongside academics that the unique drawing qualities of textile students would be deliberately exaggerated raising both them and the status of the Textiles course to a higher or more important level, state, or position.The concluding works were edited, selected and curated by Taylor and Perren, arranged to draw connections between the work produced by emerging designers that work with a broad range of textiles and professional practice specialisms in order to bring attention to the Universities Textile community and the to the forthcoming anniversary of a historic building.