GÖZDE İLKIN UNVEILS NEW TATE ST IVES INSTALLATION
Opening on 10 October 2026, Those Who Remember Their Births brings together sculpture, painting and embroidery in a new commission developed during İlkin’s two residencies in St Ives earlier this year.
Photo Credit: Gözde İlkin, Those Who Remember Their Births, 2026 © Gözde İlkin
Inspired by the dramatic coastline of West Cornwall, the Istanbul-based artist looks at the landscape as a kind of living archive, one continually reshaped by waves, wind and tides, and layered with both geological and human histories.
At the centre of the installation are vintage family bedsheets, transformed through batik, embroidery and wire into flowing sculptural forms that appear to move like waves through the gallery. Painted and stitched details emerge across the fabrics, turning familiar domestic objects into vessels for personal and collective memory.
The work also draws on archival photographs of women whose labour played an important role in the history of St Ives, from fishing and mining to textile production. These images are woven together with motifs inspired by the plants, stones and coastline surrounding the town, connecting generations of local life with the natural environment.
Photo Credit: Gözde İlkin, Those Who Remember Their Births, 2026 © Gözde İlkin
Found textiles have long been central to İlkin’s practice. Working with domestic materials including bedsheets, tablecloths and curtains, she is interested in the traces of everyday life they retain and the stories that can exist beyond traditional written histories. Through embroidery, painting and sculpture, these objects become a way of exploring care, labour, belonging and the passing of memories between generations.
Community collaboration also plays an important role in the exhibition. Working alongside St Ives-based textile artist Jo McIntosh and local participants, İlkin has explored family histories, local knowledge and collective memory through a series of workshops. Participants created embroidered textile coverings for stones gathered from the surrounding shoreline, which have been incorporated into the final installation.
The exhibition forms part of the ongoing Artist Residency and Commissions Programme between Tate St Ives and SAHA, supporting artistic exchange between St Ives and Türkiye.
Born in Kütahya, Türkiye in 1981, İlkin lives and works in Istanbul. Her multidisciplinary practice frequently brings together found textiles, embroidery and painting to explore relationships between people, nature and place.