Colonial Dress
2016
Colonial Dress is in the series of Sculptural Garments that Stockwell has been making since 2000. Crafted from 1920's world maps that feature British Empire claimed territories in pink, it is loosely based on a style that reflects women's fashions in the 1880's. It is concerned with claiming female territory, mapping the female body, social and colonial histories and their ongoing impacts. Examining how patriarchal forms of dominance spread with and through the empire and how European colinizers often dismantles pre-existing femaile authority and land rights replacing them with patriarchal systems.
‘In the 1920’s one-quarter of the globe was pink, which struck me as obscene. I used the maps to make an extended world on the skirt, a sort of world map in itself. At this time, I was drawing comparisons between maps, country and continent shapes and human anatomy. I had a scan of my liver and was struck by its resemblance in shape to Brazil, hence Brazil is placed where the liver is, Africa in place of the stomach and Manchester (my hometown) is placed where the heart is.’ Susan Stockwell.
Exhibitions:
Postcolonial? House of Europen History, Brussels, Belgium Exhibition exploring the long lasting effects that colonisation and its ending have had in Europe over the last 70 years.
Facing Europe's Colonial Past March 2026–January 2027
Exhibition exploring the long lasting effects that colonisation and its ending have had in Europe over the last 70 years. The House of European History Brussels, Belgium
Maastricht Art Fair 2019 with Patrick Heide Contemporary Art, NL
First Cut Manchester Art Gallery & Platt Hall, Manchester UK 2011
Contemporary Interventions York Art Gallery, UK 2009
Paper Tiger One Canada Square, Canary Wharf 2008 UK
Body Talks The Florence Nightingale Museum, St Thoma's Hospital, London, UK
Collections:
The House of European History, Brussels, Belgium
Publications:
The Art of Map Making BBC News
The First Cut Manchester Art Galleries catalogue 2013
The Yorkshire Post Its The British Empire Story: After a Fashion 2010
Crafts Magazine Altrered States Carol Tulloch 2007
