Rug Hooking Demo with Jamie Girouard

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The image is a background pattern featuring a creative art motif with various colors and a quilt-like patchwork design. It could be used as an art piece or rug.Cost: Free
No registration required

Come and try your hand at rug hooking! This is an old craft where woolen strips or yarn are pulled through a mesh backing to create beautiful, functional rugs. Local artist, teacher and established rug hooker Jamie Girouard will demonstrate the basic methods and techniques and answer questions. Displays will show completed rugs and what can be created with more devoted efforts.

Artist bio:

Jamie Girouard is a Vancouver-based rug builder. His work attempts to reimagine technological subjects like artificial intelligence and electromagnetic wavelengths and how they are intertwined with human evolution, past and future.The image is a self-portrait of Jamie Girourard wearing glasses. The person is indoors, wearing a red shirt and the photo focuses on their face. The image also includes a tartan or plaid pattern.

Primitive rug hooking is an old method of hand-building rugs. Jamie builds the frames, stretches the burlap base, lays out the design, washes, cuts and dyes materials, and pulls each strip of colour through by hand.

Jamie is deeply committed to reducing consumption and reusing materials. Rug bases were once coffee bean sacks, wool materials are second-hand, washed and coloured with mostly natural dyes. Even the hook he uses was once a screwdriver that he smithed into the perfect shape. He is proud that the rugs he creates are nearly 100% organic in content and while they may last for a very long time, are completely biodegradable.