Artist Residency

Artist Statement

Kelly Rollocks’ work investigates the connections between identity, memory, and place through textile-based abstraction. She deconstructs and reimagines quilt elements, transforming familiar materials into layered compositions that explore how fabric can carry stories and reflect belonging.

Using hand-painted fabrics and hand-stitching, Rollocks evokes shifting landscapes and emotional terrains. Her process reflects a deep engagement with the tactile and symbolic power of textiles and their ability to hold both history and transformation. Each piece becomes a meditation on the stories embedded within cloth.

Rooted in both tradition and experimentation, Rollocks’ practice balances structure and spontaneity. She approaches making as a meditative process that reveals how fabric can preserve memory, invite reflection, and embody transformation over time.

Created during an artist residency at Cow House Studios in Ireland, this work translates the surrounding countryside’s ever-changing light and texture into fabric form. The layered stitching and luminous color shifts mirror the rhythms of the landscape, forming a quiet dialogue between observation and emotion.

Through this ongoing exploration, Rollocks honors the history of textile-making while expanding its expressive potential. Her work invites viewers to slow down, to feel the quiet resonance of cloth, and to consider the ways in which material, memory, and place are intimately intertwined.