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National Eisteddfod 2019 - Amgueddfa Cymru - National Museum Wales Purchase

Andrew Renton, 6 August 2019

Welsh Emergency Blankets by Daniel Trivedy

This is an age in which politics and public discourse have become increasingly and depressingly infected by xenophobia, government-sponsored hostility to refugees and asylum seekers, introspective nationalism and overt racism. In this context, Daniel Trivedy’s work can be seen as an encouraging gesture of resistance. It makes a statement about Wales as a welcoming, compassionate, inclusive nation, the first ‘Nation of Sanctuary’ that it aspires to be following the launch of the Welsh Government’s Nation of Sanctuary – Refugee and Asylum Seeker Plan in January 2019.

This is why Amgueddfa Cymru is very happy to have selected Daniel’s Welsh Emergency Blankets for its newly-instituted annual National Eisteddfod Purchase. These are silver- and gold-sided PET foil emergency blankets, so familiar from scenes of dehumanising treatment of immigrants from Mexico at the USA border or the rescue of migrants after the ordeal of crossing the Mediterranean Sea. However, they have all acquired a distinctive Welsh character after being printed on their gold (warmth-retaining) side with designs from traditional Welsh woven blankets. They are a wonderful example of the local and the global coming together.

Daniel understands that materials have a language, and that different materials have different associations which speak to us in particular ways. He wants to know what happens when these are mixed together. ‘Do they clash and collide, or sit in uncomfortable silence with each other? Do they merge and blend, starting a conversation with each other; perhaps even giving birth to new form?’

On the one hand, the mass-produced emergency blanket is designed to be cheap and effective and little more. In the minds of many us, it is associated with the pain and suffering of migrants enduring terrible conditions at sea or in refugee camps. As Daniel has said, it has associations of ‘elsewhere’ and ‘others’.

By contrast, the Welsh woollen blanket has associations of warmth, of tradition and memory, of safety and comfort. What happens when we bring these two characteristics together? I think the message is an optimistic one. We realise that ‘we’ and ‘others’ are one and the same. We can and should think and act both locally and globally at the same time. We can and should use our traditions not to separate ourselves from others but to come together in mutual support.

Daniel Trivedy (born 1975) is of Indian descent, grew up in south-east England and is now based in Swansea. In addition to working as an artist, he lectures at Coleg Sir Gar, Carmarthen, and is Regional Officer for the Arts Council of Wales, Carmarthen. Following a first degree in Geology with Palaeontology at Imperial College, London (1993-1996), he later studied Fine Art at Swansea College of Art (2010-2013).

 

Andrew Renton
Keeper of Art

 

http://www.danieltrivedy.com/welsh-emergency-blankets.html

Andrew Renton

Head of Design Collections
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Comments (1)

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Ted clarke
7 August 2019, 14:57
Beautiful