Artist Entry: Ele Carpenter

Open Source Embroidery

At first coding and embroidery seem like they have absolutely nothing to do with eachother. Code is processed by machine. It is strict, it is functional, and it is very new. Embroidery is very old, it is an oral tradition, and it is purely decorative. But code and embroidery have very interesting similarities, as well and juxtapositions. Programming is a male dominated activity in which one produces hundreds and thousands of tiny snippets of code to build a larger program. Embroidery is dominated by women and is constructed by hundreds and thousands of tiny stitches to build a larger image. The principles of Open Source coding also resonate with embroidery - "principles of 'freedom' to create, modify and distribute, within the cultural and economic constraints of capitalism".

What the Open Source Embroidery project does is to shed light on the unique connections between the two ideas. They exhibit dozens of textile works of art that depict open source software and ideas that resonate with their materials. Knitted telnet lines on a knit computer, woven network diagrams, quilted HTML color charts, cross-stiched code, and more line their exhibit halls prompting discussion and further exploration of just how similar embroidery and open source really are.

I think that these exhibits are extraordinarily successful. Both really do rely on very similar principles. Even if you look at the very simplest example they provide the connection is clear: the first programmer, and the first program. Lady Ada Lovelace wrote the first program for Charles Babbage's theoretical Analytical Machine, and as he said: "the Analytical Engine weaves algebraical patterns just as the Jaquard Loom weaves flowers and leaves." The Jaquard Loom was the first device that used punch card programming - a similar system to the cards that FORTRAN used that still exist today.