Karin Altmann and Allan Brown
The Flax and Nettle workshop concluded with a public artist talk with Allan Brown and a screening of his film “The Nettle Dress” in the auditorium of the Angewandte, hosted by Karin Altmann.
This event offered insights into the artist’s work, which combines craftsmanship and personal narratives, opened up university teaching to a broader audience and provided space for a discourse on slow fashion, ecological materials research, and artisanal practice.
Textile Artist Allan Brown spent seven years making a dress by hand, using only the fibre of locally foraged stinging nettles. This is ‘hedgerow couture’, the greenest of slow fashion and also his medicine. It’s how he survives the death of his wife, which leaves him and their four children bereft, and how he finds a beautiful way to honour her. A modern-day fairy tale and hymn to the healing power of nature, slow craft and textiles.
His journey and process of creating the dress is being featured in THE NETTLE DRESS, a documentary by Dylan Howitt (68 minutes / English with German subtitles).
