Photographs of Beijing’s Birds Nest Olympic swimming complex and images of structures in Singapore and Hong Kong that resemble pleated fabric gave Eliza Griffin an idea for her school textiles project.
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“I realised they had turned an object in to an architectural structure, turning a birds nest in to a pool, and came across structures that look a lot like layers of pleating and I realised you could incorporate objects in to design,” the Ballarat Grammar student said.
After much research, Eliza created a gorgeous and wearable gold, silver and bronze-plated cocktail dress that was rated highly enough that it has been included in the prestigious 2018 Top Arts exhibition at the National Gallery of Victoria – Australia.
The buildings that inspired her reference accordion pleats in their designs, and Eliza’s work features hundreds of pleats that were created using the traditional process of pressing fabric layers into a cardboard mould and steaming them for six hours.
A Melbourne pleating company helped press the fabric in to pleats before Eliza spent about 30 hours constructing the dress. That was in addition to countless hours before pleating that were spent working out fabric measurements to ensure the pieces came out the right size after steaming.
Eliza was one of 54 young artists whose work was selected from more than 2200 VCE Arts and VCE Studio Arts submissions to feature in the annual Top Arts exhibition, which opened last week at the The Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia at Federation Square.
Eliza entered her work in to the Top Arts pool on the suggestion of her textiles teacher but never expected to have her garment in the final exhibition.
“My teacher told me about Top Arts and said I should enter it, but she did tell me it’s quite rare that textile students get in. I thought I might as well give it a go as I had put in the hard work, but it was very unexpected to hear I was in.
“It was such an achievement because really I have never done anything that well in textiles. I made stuff and enjoy making it but never really took that satisfaction and achievement from it. To hear back that someone recognises my work and think it stands out is quite nice.”
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Now completing year 12, Eliza is unsure where design will take her after she completes secondary schooling.
“I’ve always liked design and textiles and creative things. I will definitely use design in my future and I’d like to look at RMIT, maybe a bachelor of fashion or architecture or industrial design or interior design – there’s so many things to choose from.”
Top Arts 2018 is on display at NGV Australia at Fed Square until July 15.
