The Caged Bird’s Song is a triptych tapestry designed by Chris Ofili and created by Dovecot over a period of three years. The exhibition will bring to life the process by which Dovecot’s master weavers transformed the colours, myths and magic of Ofili’s watercolour design.
For the first time, audiences in Scotland will have the opportunity to see the tapestry, which will form the centerpiece of an exhibition in the Studios where it was woven. Visitors will be able to immerse themselves in the medium, gaining a fascinating insight into the weavers’ work and seeing their original colour experiments, learning the process of creating a cartoon and discovering the skills required to interpret an artist’s design.
Measuring over seven metres wide, The Caged Bird’s Song took five weavers three years to create, requiring 35 kilos of wool and over 6,000 hours in total. The weavers increased the original design, a watercolour by Chris Ofili, by over 800% to draw the cartoon that guided their work. Like many artists before him who have engaged with this medium, Chris Ofili worked closely with master weavers to see his design translated into a tapestry. The imagery in the tapestry reflects the artist’s long-held interest in classical mythology and contemporary ‘demigods’, together with the stories, magic and colour of the Trinidadian landscape.
The exhibition has been made possible thanks to the loan of the tapestry from The Clothworkers’ Company, the Livery Company established in 1528 to oversee the cloth-finishing trade in the City of London. The Caged Bird’s Song was the subject of both an exhibition at National Gallery London and a BBC documentary in 2017.
Image: Chris Ofili, The Caged Bird's Song, 2014–2017 (detail). Wool, cotton, viscose. Triptych, left and right panels each 280 x 184 cm; centre panel 280 x 372 cm © Chris Ofili. Courtesy the artist and Victoria Miro, The Clothworkers' Company and Dovecot Tapestry Studio Edinburgh. Photography by Gautier Deblonde.
