Wakkerstroom hosts Arts and Crafts Ramble
One exhibit, which attracted a lot of attention, was a knitting exhibition, created by Jane Harley, showcasing lace knitting using various natural yarns including silk, linen, bamboo, cotton, alpaca, cashmere and merino.
The recent long weekend saw a jam-packed weekend of events in Wakkerstroom, at the annual Arts & Craft Ramble.
The opening and street fire, on Friday evening is fast becoming a ‘tradition’ and was held outside the hotel conference room, where exhibitors, artists and visitors all gathered, to network, and enjoy the wide selection of available ‘street’ food.
Lizelle Servulo of Volksrust performed as a taster for her show to be held the Monday.
Lizelle entered three songs in Talent Africa, and received three gold awards and was heading to Talent America later the week.
Then the audience joined a guest artist from Johannesburg, Chrisél van der Merwe, who explained how she grew up in a small town, and how the smells, sounds and sights of Wakkerstroom brought back wonderful, vivid memories of her childhood.
She received her BA Honours Fine Arts degree from the University of Pretoria in 2016 cum laude, and was selected as a Sasol New Signatures finalist in both 2016 and 2017.
She participated in several group exhibitions at the Absa Art Gallery in Johannesburg, and was selected as a Top 100 finalist for the Absa L’atelier Art Competition.
Van der Merwe explained how her work is experimental in nature, and about the multiple mediums she works with, including printmaking, sculpting, painting and installation.
The widest array of arts and crafts workshops and demo’s ran in Wakkerstroom for four days.
Many visitors could not believe the selection, and many were hard-pressed to choose which of the 35 courses to do, with some courses overflowing with enthusiastic crafters, those who had not pre-booked, had to be turned away.
Happy crafters made belts, pottery plates, mosaic items, felt, art journals, crocheted pots, wire insects, and even decorated cupcakes or cakes.
The budding artists learnt how to draw from still life, in perspective, cartoons, and portraits.
The Mystery Craft Tea this year included the use of scissors, cardboard, a fork, needle, string and wool and was even at that stage, still a mystery.
But soon it was to be found to be ‘weaving’.
The arts and crafts exhibitors were set up in two halls, (double that of last year) and included a wide variety from wirework to knitted woollen items, wildlife to painting and drawing, photography to woodwork, sewing/crochet to sketches, miniatures to pottery and scrap booking to honey.
One exhibit, which attracted a lot of attention, was a knitting exhibition, created by Jane Harley, showcasing lace knitting using various natural yarns including silk, linen, bamboo, cotton, alpaca, cashmere and merino.
Other stands included the suppliers of scrapbooking and canvas materials, from exhibitors from Johannesburg, which was popular, as many people in the surrounding area do.
