Illustration: Ann Macbeth. Rug design, 1905.
Ann Macbeth is well known as an embroidery designer, teacher and author. She succeeded Jessie Newbery as head of the embroidery department at Glasgow School of art and was a pivotal member of the later Glasgow movement headed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh and Margaret Macdonald. She was also the author of a number of popular and influential books mostly concerned with the practical aspects of embroidery, needlework and dressmaking. These books are listed in the reference links section at the end of this article.
However, as the illustration above shows, she was also interested in a number of other aspects of textile design and in this case that of rug design. It is often hard to appreciate or even discover, how wide ranging and inquisitive many artists and designers have been through their individual creative careers. It is often the case that individuals are tagged with a descriptive heading so that their work is then encased inside that description and any work in other mediums is trivialised or ignored.
This is not to say that this rug produced by Macbeth in 1905 is unknown. However, it does reflect a certain amount of pigeon-holing, whereby the broad and general work of an artist or designer can be manipulated and engineered so that aspects that could possibly reveal another dimension to that individual are seen as superficial, when in fact these examples of work outside of the usual remit can say much about the creative direction or journey of that individual.
Illustration: Ann Macbeth, 1900.
The actual design of the rug looks very different from what we would expect from Ann Macbeth. As far as embroidery was concerned, part of her work was very much locked into the style of the Glasgow School with typical Mackintosh rose motifs being used repeatedly. However, there was also a much more personal and flowing style that she tended to reserve for work that used fairy tale imagery as compositional narrative.
There is little abstract geometrically conceived ideas in her work so it would be interesting to know where the idea for this rug originated. It would be a fair guess to say that it could well have derived from a study of original and traditional carpet design from Middle or Central Asia. This was a relatively common practise at the time and was not considered plagiarism as such, but conceived to be more of a study of a traditional design in order to understand the way that design works, and perhaps even gain a little understanding as to thinking behind the original designer. This could well be the case with this example as it looks as if it is possibly an enlarged version of a single motif. However, this is only supposition and not fact, it could well have been an original idea entirely, or a partial inspiration from a traditional carpet.
Either way it is interesting to see the expansion that some artists and designers have made into other genres and mediums and how they interpreted and even reinterpreted their own ideas as to design and decoration given the different parameters that were present in seemingly unfamiliar mediums.
Further reading links:
Educational Needlecraft (1911)
The country woman's rug book (Paragraph Press reprint series of craft & hobby handbooks)
SCHOOL AND FIRESIDE CRAFTS
Embroidered and laced leather work
The playwork book
Glasgow Girls
The Flower and the Green Leaf: Glasgow School of Art in the Time of Charles Rennie Mackintosh
Textile Treasures at the Glasgow School of Art
The unbroken thread: A century of embroidery & weaving at Glasgow School of Art
GLASGOW SCHOOL OF ART EMBROIDERY, 1894-1920.
Glasgow School of Art: The History
Glasgow School of Art: a History
The Glasgow Style: Artists in the Decorative Arts, Circa 1900 (Schiffer Book with Values)
Hand, Heart and Soul: The Arts and Crafts Movement in Scotland
