Winifred Nicholson: Cumbrian Rag Rugs
A rare and heart-warming exhibition has opened at Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art (MIMA). Winifred Nicholson: Cumbrian Rag Rugs displays 28 rag rugs from private collections and regional museums, mostly made by farmers’ wives between the 1920s and the 1970s. These are placed alongside Winifred and Ben Nicholson’s portraits and landscape paintings, which speak of the land, the home and the friendships that developed between them. Co-curated with art historian Jovan Nicholson, Winifred’s grandson, MIMA presents an aspect of rural life that has not been explored until now.
“I grew up with these,” Jovan tells us, pointing to a vitrine containing a hooked rug with a smiling sun and beaming moon. “I remember this in front of the fireplace in our living room. It is one of the best rugs, designed by Winifred and made by Mary Bewick.”
This show honours both designer and maker, a feat made possible by Jovan’s research and childhood memories and by the meticulous list his grandmother Winifred kept in the ’60s and ’70s when she commissioned makers to hook rugs of her designs and theirs in an attempt to revive a tradition degraded by commercial prints on hessian sold in kit form.
Sheep, 1960s. Designed and made by Mary Bewick. Private Collection
The rugs have a pleasing commonality: they share the same subject matter, usually concentrated on animals, and the same technique, that is, hooked. Loops of yarn or rag are pulled through a backing material with a hooking needle and left uncut to produce a bobbled surface, often pressed flat by the weight of feet and the passage of time. “They’re physical things which you use,” Jovan says. “You interact with them every day.” ...
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