LOTTOZERO TEXTILE LABORATORIES: A CREATIVE HUB FOR TEXTILE ART AND DESIGN

Translation by Marina Dlacic

www.lottozero.org

A center for textile culture in art and design in a shed in the heart of the industrial district of Prato and one of the main industrial districts in Europe: this is the project which Tessa and Arianna Moroder – economist the former, textile designer and artist the second – gave life  inside the warehouse inherited from their Sicilian grandfather and left empty and abandoned since 1979 and which they transformed into a creative hub, a multifunctional space where textiles are at the center of research and enhancement projects, from design to contemporary art.

Lottozero textile laboratories. Photo by Agnese Morganti

400 square meters in which today design and textile consultancy offices are located as well as a co-working area equipped and also suitable for presentations, press conferences, teaching and workshops, meetings, conferences and photographic services with some workstations intended for artists and designers in residence and others on temporary lease.  Also a small library with texts on textile art, design, fashion and specialized magazines, which can be accessed by co-workers and artists and designers in residence; and, again, a textile Fab Lab which can also be accessed separately from co-working with equipped workstations, industrial machines and other textile machinery, and finally, the Kunsthalle, a real exhibition space, where the results of the research and experimentation developed by the artists and designers who work and collaborate at Lottozero textile laboratories are periodically presented.

Lottozero textile laboratories. Photo by Agnese Morganti

A multidisciplinary container where textile operators and creators can find means and professionalism to train themselves through practical workshops and seminars held by experts and professionals, or to give substance to their ideas and, again, to experiment with materials, techniques, design.

All activities filled by a single sensitivity and a vision of sustainability oriented towards virtuous practices of sharing tools, skills and resources aimed at putting quality back at the center in every area. An open and international territory for discussion and exchange of knowledge in the textile field.

A commitment that looks to the future and also translates into support for emerging talents in art and design through on-site residences which, over time, have brought several young artists to Prato or by facilitating the exchange between local and creative production companies from all over the world.

Un impegno che guarda al futuro e si traduce anche nel supporto ai talenti emergenti nell’arte e nel design attraverso residenze in sede che, nel tempo, hanno portato a Prato diversi giovani artisti oppure facilitando lo scambio tra aziende produttive locali e creativi di tutto il mondo.

 Alice Ronchi in residence, Lottozero textile laboratories, 2019. Photo by Rachele Salvioli

Furthermore, the Kunsthalle has placed the textile factor in contemporary art at the center of its research, promoting and setting up exhibition projects in which artists of different backgrounds have alternated – Luca Vanello, Robin Darius Dolatyari and Chloé Rozycka Sapelkine, Farkhondeh Shahroudi, Alice Ronchi. A path that in 2019 led to the invitation of the MUSEION Museum of Contemporary and Modern Art in Bolzano to take care of the annual programming of the Studio House, a project room annexed to the museum. A collaboration that resulted in the creation of three site specific projects united by the textile element, respectively by Luca Vanello, Margrethe Kolstad Brekke, Anna M. Rose.

A few months ago Lottozero textile laboratories joined with other international institutions giving life to the Textile Culture Net, an annual program to increase the possibilities of making art and textile culture in digital form, overcoming the geographical limit

Four centers and institutions dedicated to the textile sector – Central Museum of Textiles in Łódź in Poland; CHAT (Center for Heritage, Arts and Textile) in Hong Kong; Lottozero textile laboratories in Prato in Italy; TextielMuseum in Tilburg in the Netherlands – have undertaken, starting from October 2020, a path of collaboration in the fields of design and textile art.

Following the pandemic and the consequent social distancing, the four institutions have jointly conceived this initiative which includes a series of online exhibitions and an exchange of ideas, interpretations and approaches to textiles. Historically and traditionally, production in this sector is a community activity, as well as a collaborative effort that involves different figures and professionals – farmers, spinners, weavers, dyers, etc. – who have contributed to the development of new techniques and tools to improve the final product.The history of textiles is a history of technological evolution and industrial revolutions, and  this collaboration pays homage to the cooperative and innovative nature of textile practices , where the participating institutions are called upon to make use of contemporary digital technologies to share their original contents, works of art, art collectibles ,all the way to the human resources in order to renew the vision of the textile world and broaden the spread of its involvement in the field of creativity, art and design, introducing a new chapter in curating and artistic direction for today’s textile institutions.

The first of the four scheduled digital exhibitions, About ABOUT A WORKER, curated by Lottozero textile laboratories and published on the institutions’ Instagram channels, linked through the hashtag #TextileCultureNet, kicked off on 2 December. The online exhibition provides the different perspectives of the four institutions on the theme of work and the condition of workers through fashion and design experiences, referring to the exhibition of the same name set up in the Kunsthalle in Lottozero (until March 21, 2021), dedicated to the work of About A Worker, a French collective that combines design and social research, founded by Kim Hou and Paul Boulenger in 2017.

About ABOUT A WORKER, personal exhibition of About A Worker, Lottozero, 2020. Photo by Rachele Salvioli

“About A Worker” is an innovative project that paves the way for a new way of making fashion, where the worker is placed at the center of the creative process, with the unprecedented possibility of expressing, through design, a vision of their work and their own personal history. In collaboration with the Luigi Pecci Center for Contemporary Art on the occasion of Kim Hou’s residency at Lottozero Textile Laboratories, the exhibition curated by Elena Ianeselli and Alessandra Tempesti retraces the four previous collections of About A Worker, in which workwear becomes a field of experimentation and creativity for a fashion design full of meanings. ” (from CS)

Textile Culture Net was nominated by CIMAM – International Committee for Museums and Modern Art Collections – among the “Museum practices of excellence in a period of global crisis”.