Batool Showghi  – Meet the Artist

Mixed media artist Batool Showghi explores themes of cultural heritage, memory, identity, and loss. Her work is concerned with the experience of women and the way in which this experience relates to cultural and religious boundaries. Pieces reflect on the theme of turbulence, immigration, disintegration of the family and the experience of displacement.  

In response to the recent uprising of Iranian women, Batool has created a series of textile works around the theme of Struggle and Rise of Women. 

Join Batool as she shares the stories that inspired her work.

Batool Showghi: https://batoolshowghi.com/ 

Batool Showghi

Showghi uses family birth certificates, passports, old photographs and documents to create her pieces. Her work and writings in Farsi are a poetic reflection on her memories, the environment she grew up in, the family, and a city which was lost during the war. These visual autobiographical artworks are designed to narrate and show the beauty and sadness of this struggle which will always be there. 

Work by Batool Showghi
Work by Batool Showghi

Her figures come to life on canvas. The sewing machine and its needle are her drawing tools. She creates these heads, bodies, and hands intuitively, as if they look at the audience and question their plight. There is a sense of solidarity and movement between them. They know that they will succeed and overcome their struggle.  

Work by Batool
Work by Batool

Showghi was born in Iran and moved to England in 1985. She received a merit for her MA in Design & Media Arts from the University of Westminster in 1997. Batool’s mixed media work and artist’s books can be found at: The Tate Britain, British Library, The Royal Navy Museum in Portsmouth, The Museum of Art and Literature, Yerevan, Armenia, and in many public and private collections.  

Work by Batool
Work by Batool

Filmed at the Knitting & Stitching Show, London 2023.

For a more inspiration, please browse the ‘Meet the Artist’ collection on my YouTube Channel.

Peterloo

House of Smalls

A new exhibition at the House of Smalls called ‘Moral Fibre’ prompted me to create a new piece of work called ‘Peterloo’ for the Dollhouse gallery

The exhibition takes place at The House of Smalls, 103 Henderson Row, Stockbridge, Edinburgh EH3 5BB from 1st – 25th August 2024. Part of the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

‘A good life is like a weaving. Energy is created in the tension. The struggle, the pull and tug are everything’ ~ Joan Erikson

Artists in the Dollhouse 'Moral Fibre' exhibition
Artists in the Dollhouse ‘Moral Fibre’ exhibition

Peterloo

“If we don’t vote, we are ignoring history and giving away the future” Pat Mitchell.

Our vote matters.

Peterloo
Peterloo

With each election, I think of those who came before us. Those who fought to give us the Right to Vote. Emelia Pankhurst and the fight for Women’s Suffrage; and the peaceful protestors at Peterloo in 1819.

On 16 August 1819, 60,000 people congregated in St Peter’s Field in Manchester – the largest ever political gathering of working-class people. Folk from towns across Lancashire marched to the field carrying banners with slogans supporting political reform and the right to vote; included were workers from Middleton near Rochdale, carrying a banner of locally woven blue silk, with the words ‘Liberty, Fraternity, Unity, Strength’ in hand-painted gold lettering.

Peterloo
Peterloo

Their peaceful protest turned bloody when Manchester magistrates gave orders to disperse the crowd. The Yeomanry pulled out their sabres and charged the crowd on horseback.  An estimated 18 people died and more than 650 were injured in the chaos.

The tragic incident is known as the Peterloo Massacre. A moment when ordinary people stepped up to protest in a way that has made its mark in history and with a legacy that lives on to today.

Size 11.5 x 11.5cm. Hand embroidered cotton cloth, DMC embroidery thread.

The Middleton banner is part of the Touchstones Rochdale archives.

Credit: Touchstones Rochdale, People’s History Museum.

This piece forms part of a series of small works created for the House of Smalls.

Update August 2024:

Peterloo in the ‘Moral Fibre’ Dollhouse exhibition.

Dollhouse exhibition
Dollhouse exhibition
Dollhouse
Dollhouse exhibition
Dollhouse exhibition

2024 Harley Open

I’m pleased to announce that the Giant Cauliflower Harvest and Summer ’76 have been jury selected for the 2024 Harley Open.

Over 1200 artworks entered. After two rounds of jury selections 186 artworks were chosen for the final exhibition.

The exhibition will be on show at The Harley Gallery, Welbeck, Worksop, Nottinghamshire S80 3LW, from Saturday 27 July to Sunday 13 October.

Summer '76
Summer ’76

The jury includes guest judge Selina Skipwith, an independent art advisor and curator, who curated previous Harley exhibitions including In Good Company and John Burningham’s Bedtime Stories.

Giant Cauliflower Harvest part of the 2024 Harley Open
Giant Cauliflower Harvest part of the 2024 Harley Open

Voting for the People’s Prize will take place throughout the exhibition, with the winner announced at the end of the show. The People’s Prize is £750 sponsored by the Welbeck Estates Company.

Update September 2024:

On a sunny September day, I popped over to Welbeck to check out the Harley Open.

Please vote for my work for visitors choice – Vote here!

Harley Gallery
Harley Gallery
A visit to the gallery
A visit to the gallery

There is such a high quality of work and I feel honoured to have two artworks accepted.

Summer '76 and the Giant Cauliflower Harvest in the exhibition
Summer ’76 and the Giant Cauliflower Harvest in the exhibition
The artworks are proving popular
The artworks are proving popular