The Knitting Pilgrim in Muskoka, and KP Talks Episodes 107, The Five Hands Of Peace, and 108, Tikkun Olam

Hello, friends,

It has been almost a month since my last blog — which just happened to coincide with the Hamas attack on Israel. So much has transpired in the world since then, and so much hateful rhetoric has been flung about that it is difficult to hear voices of reason and hope. There can be no doubt that the actions of Hamas were indefensible. While the occupation of Gaza may have been flawed, it in no way justifies the terrorism inflicted upon Israeli civilians. Similarly, while the Israeli campaign into Gaza may remove the threat of Hamas, it will result in terrible casualties among the innocent Palestinian population. The challenge for us all is not to allow one wrong to become the justification for another. And as with all such dilemmas, the answers are elusive, and we are left with the difficult questions.

In our recent tour of The Knitting Pilgrim to the Maritimes, where we did shows in Florenceville-Bristol (New Brunswick), and then in Liverpool, Antigonish and Cole Harbour (Nova Scotia), in the post-show audience chats I was invariably approached by audience members who spoke of their anxiety and concern over what is happening in the Middle East, and how it is affecting the rest of the globe. In each instance, they told me that the The Knitting Pilgrim was a beacon of hope, shedding light on the common ground we all share, and offering the possibility of a way forward together, in peace. We look forward to bringing that same message to our next shows in Muskoka on Nov 4th and 5th, 2023.

the knitting pilgrim talks

episode 107: the five hands of peace

We continue to release new episodes of The Knitting Pilgrim Talks, which explore the imagery of The Stitched Glass Tapestries in conversation with faith leaders.

KPT 107: The Five Hands of Peace

We continue to release new episodes of The Knitting Pilgrim Talks, which explore the imagery of The Stitched Glass Tapestries in conversation with faith leaders. In Episode 107, Imam Jamal Rahman explains to me that the word “Islam” literally means to surrender in peace. In the upper left section of the Islamic tapestry, inside the outline of the crescent moon, we can see five hands making the peace symbol, meeting at their extended fingertips. The five hands represent the five continents, and their five different skin tones represent all peoples. While Islam has its roots in 7th century Arabia, for Muslims it is a modern faith through which racial differences can be overcome.

“Islam literally means to surrender in peace. And if one reads the Qu’ran, the insight is that if one can surrender their attachment to the ego… one can bring a heart turned in devotion to God.” -- Imam Jamal Rahman

Episode 107 is available on Youtube here: KPT 107 The Five Hands of Peace

Or all of the podcast places, like KPT on Spotify , if you’d rather listen

episode 108: tikkun Olam

KPT 108: Tikkun Olam

In Episode 108 of The Knitting Pilgrim Talks, Avrum Rosensweig, founder of the charity Ve’ahafta (@ve'ahavta) (Hebrew for “you shall love”) speaks with @kirkdunn about the Judaic tradition of “Tikkun Olam” evoked by the section of the Judaic tapestry within the top centre point of the Star of David, which features an image of the globe cradled by a pair of hands. Avrum explains that while Tikkun Olam may not be mentioned specifically in the five books of Moses, it is fundamental to the Torah.

"God Says I am your God. And in order for you to come close to that, you need to do my mitzvot, my commandments. And many of them have to do with repairing the world." -Avrum Rosensweig

Episode 108 is available on Youtube here: KPT 108 Tikkun Olam

Or all of the podcast places, like KPT on Spotify , if you’d rather listen

The Knitting Pilgrim: Episodes 105, The Christian Soldier; and 106, The Sabbath

Episode 105: The Christian Soldier

Hello, Friends,

The 5th episode of The Knitting Pilgrim Talks looks at the section of the Christian tapestry depicting the paradox of the Christian solider, a vocation often held up by society as hero, having paid the ultimate sacrifice of giving their life for their country. And yet, the vocation of soldiering is about as diametrically opposed to the example set by Jesus as one can get. Living in a country ruled by an occupying army, Jesus advocated non-violence and turning the other cheek. The Rev. Dr. Stuart Macdonald, Professor of Church and Society at Knox College, helps me look at how the life of Jesus informs our response to the violence and war that we see in our world today.

"From everything we know, Jesus was indeed a pacifist. The question that Christians have though, is: does that mean we have to be pacifists?" -- Rev. Dr. Stuart McDonald.

Episode 105 is available on Youtube here: KPT 105 The Christian Soldier

Or all of the podcast places: KPT on Spotify if you’d rather listen than watch.

Episode 106: The Sabbath

In episode 106 of The Knitting Pilgrim Talks, I chat with journalist, author, and spiritual advisor Ralph Benmergui (check out his excellent podcast, Not That Kind of Rabbi ) about the value of one day of being, after six days of doing. This was inspired by the section of the Judaic tapestry that explores the Sabbath, or Shabbat, featuring images of a loaf of bread (challah), a pair of candlesticks, and a goblet of wine--all items that are a part of the meal that begins Shabbat. But Shabbat is much more than just a dinner – it is a day of rest, contemplation, and re-creation. It is one of the true gifts Judaism has given to the world, and it is a gift that most of us don’t really take the time to understand, appreciate, or enjoy.

“Sabbath is building a fence around the sacred part of your life so that it reoccurs. I tell people: ‘Make yourself a Sabbath. I don’t care what day of the week it is.’” – Ralph Benmergui

Episode 106 is available on Youtube here: KPT 106 The Sabbath

Or all of the podcast places: KPT on Spotify if you’d rather listen than watch.

If you have any questions about this episode of The Knitting Pilgrim Talks, let's talk! Please feel free to reach out to me at www.kirkdunn.com.

The Knitting Pilgrim Talks, Episode 104: The Torah

Hello friends, Episode 104 of The Knitting Pilgrim Talks celebrates a section of Stitched Glass's Judaic tapestry featuring the Torah, the holy book of Judaism, on the shoulders of which both Christianity and Islam stand. Rabbi Elyse Goldstein takes me through the importance of these texts in Judaism, how they are incorporated into the Sabbath service, and gives me a new appreciation for what I as a Christian had always thought of as "the first five books of the Bible."

Check it out on YouTube The Knitting Pilgrim Talks or wherever you get your podcasts https://open.spotify.com/show/56EUPqQLyI6jnobbA3ilIT

If you have any questions about this episode of The Knitting Pilgrim Talks, let's talk! Please feel free to reach out to me at www.kirkdunn.com.

Introducing The Knitting Pilgrim Talks

It’s been a long time since I’ve sent out a newsletter, and now seems a pretty good time to reignite that effort.

Over COVID, with the help of an Ontario Arts Council grant, my wife Claire Ross Dunn and I made a thing.

It’s a podcast and digital series called The Knitting Pilgrim Talks.

At the beginning of the pandemic, we thought, what should we do while we can’t tour The Knitting Pilgrim?

There was one thing audiences had always asked us about after the show: they wanted more detail about the imagery in the tapestries themselves. We were often asked where the ‘exhibition catalogue’ was to accompany the artwork—you know, the kind of book they have in museums and galleries.

So, we came up with the idea of a digital version of what audiences were asking for. We used each segment of each Stitched Glass tapestry—40 segments in all—as a jumping-off point to engage in conversation with someone who was really knowledgeable about that topic (way more knowledgeable than I).

Here, I’m sharing links to the first 3 episodes of The Knitting Pilgrim Talks.

Episode 101:  Women and Judaism

This first episode is an interview I had with Rabbi Jennifer Gorman, who is National Director of Outreach & Programming at CJPAC (The Canadian Jewish Political Affairs Committee), themed on the section of the Judaic tapestry about women and Judaism. It was a fascinating chat, and I learned a lot of things.

Episode 101 is available on Youtube here: KPT 101 Women and Judaism

or all the podcast places: KPT on Spotify if you’d rather listen than watch.

Episode 102:  The Lion and The Lamb

This is a great conversation I had with Rev. Michael Coren about the irony that Jesus -- whom Christians now call 'The King of Kings'-- was actually an anti-establishment rebel.

Youtube: KPT Ep 102 The Lion and The Lamb

Or all the podcast places: KPT on Spotify if you’d rather listen than watch.

Episode 103: Jihad and Peace

In Western society, “Jihad” may be the most misunderstood word of the Arabic language. In this third episode of The Knitting Pilgrim Talks, I chat with Imam Jihad Turk. We take a look at the true meaning of the word (and his name) and discuss the link between the adjacent sections of the Islamic tapestry depicting Jihad and peace.

Youtube: KPT 103 Jihad and Peace

Or all the podcast places: KPT on Spotify if you’d rather listen than watch.

A giant thanks to our supervising editor, Alex Fensham, Deb Sinha for providing the opening and closing theme music, and the Ontario Arts Council for funding the project.

We’ll be rolling out episodes for many weeks to come. If you’re interested in visual art, knitting, interfaith empathy and just listening to good, interesting, unpolarized conversations, I hope you’ll enjoy The Knitting Pilgrim Talks.

If you'd like to chat about any of the episodes, please reach out to me at www.kirkdunn.com.

All the best,

Kirk

And the Golden Knitting Needles go to...

A Knitting-Themed Oscar Quiz in honour of the 91st Academy Awards on Feb 24, 2019

(see below for answers…)

1. Which legendary actress (and great knitter) has been nominated for the most Academy Awards (21), has won three Oscars, and was nominated for 18 more? Hint: She recently played a role in “Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again.”

2. This kind, funny, down-to-earth actor who is also a knitter won the 1988 Best Supporting Actor Oscar for “Good Will Hunting” (which by the way was shot in Toronto, my home town).

3. Which one of the two Ryans (and btw they are both Canadian, like me) is also a knitter? This Ryan has been nominated for two Oscars, and has had roles in “La La Land,” “The Notebook,” and “Crazy, Stupid, Love.”

4. Which actor/knitter won an Oscar for his role in “Gladiator” in 2001, and was nominated for his roles in “A Beautiful Mind” and “The Insider?”

5. This iconic actress and two-time Oscar winner was seen knitting between takes on the set of “Breakfast at Tiffany’s.” Who is it?

6. This American actor, film director, producer, screenwriter, fashion designer, and professional wrestler learned to knit from his grandmother. He has never been nominated for an Oscar, but his sister Patricia has been. Who is it?

7. Which actress, known for her roles in “Eat Pray Love,” “Ocean’s Eleven,” and “Notting Hill,” knits so much on set that she taught co-star Tom Hanks to knit too?

8. Okay, so this actress hasn’t won an Oscar, but she did win a 2007 Emmy for her role in “Grey’s Anatomy” and loves knitting so much, she contemplated opening up a knitting shop. Who is it?

9. Getting her big break as Rey from “Star Wars Episode VII - The Force Awakens,” this actress, who is a self-professed knitting extraordinaire, has worked with Academy Award-nominated director Kenneth Branagh in “Murder on the Orient Express.”

10. Which star of MARVEL’s “Jessica Jones” co-starred with Oscar-nominee Bryan Cranston in “Breaking Bad”, and has also been interviewed by Interweave, Mollie Makes, and Vogue Knitting?

11. Bonus Question: Which Canadian actor played an 8-ft tall green dragon in “The Adventures of Dudley the Dragon”; was featured in the short film “The Mario Lanza Story”, which screened at the 1989 Cannes Film Festival; and hand-knitted three 9 ft x 5.5 ft tapestries called “Stitched Glass” that took him 15 years to complete? (Oh, and no, he hasn’t won an Oscar - but he will be seen in the one-man play about the tapestries called The Knitting Pilgrim, and he did write this Oscar knitter quiz…)

Answers

1. Meryl Streep

2. Robin Williams

3. Ryan Gosling

4. Russell Crowe

5. Audrey Hepburn

6. David Arquette

7. Julia Roberts

8. Katherine Heigl

9. Daisy Ridley

10. Krysten Ritter

11. Kirk Dunn (hey, that’s me!)

To All the Yarn Makers Out There: Thank You

Not long after I started knitting Stitched Glass, and the number of yarn balls on our living room floor grew exponentially, my wife Claire started saving the discarded yarn labels. She stuffed them in a clear plastic bag, and put the bag in a chest, and kept them. I remember asking her what she planned to do with them. She shrugged. “I dunno,” she said, “but I’m not going to throw them out until I’m sure we won’t miss them.”

The number of yarn labels grew, of course, because Stitched Glass is such a giant project. You can collect a lot of yarn over 15 years – and believe me, I did. I bought yarn in Canada, France, the UK, the United States, Thailand, Switzerland, and Italy. I don’t have labels for some of the wonderful stores where yarn was sold by weight. But this photo gives you a sense of how many labels we accumulated for Stitched Glass alone.

 It makes me marvel. And mostly, it makes me want to thank all the wonderful people out there making yarn so people like me can enjoy it.

 And enjoy it I have.

 Thank you, yarn makers of the world. You make knitters like me very happy.

Craft Blog: Working with, and Learning From, Textile Conservator Ada Hopkins

Working With, and Learning From, Textile Conservator Ada Hopkins

While on my incredible continuing journey with my tapestry exhibition, Stitched Glass, and the accompanying piece of theatre, The Knitting Pilgrim, I thought it would be interesting to take a peek into the creative process of some of the people on our team, prepping the show for Ergo Arts Theatre. Here, textile conservator Ada Hopkins writes about her process mounting the finished Stitched Glass tapestries onto backing for future framing. Ada has worked as a textile conservator at the Bata Shoe Museum in Toronto, Canada, for the past 30 years, specializing in footwear made from animal skins and textiles. She has also performed treatments for private collectors and public institutions, including mounting large and small textiles, fabricating mannequins, and conserving elements of clothing for display.

 My profound thanks to Ada for the work she has done on the Stitched Glass tapestries. Take a peek into her process here:

Ada Hopkins

Ada Hopkins:

The Project

When Kirk approached me about working on the mounting and preservation of the Stitched Glass tapestries, I was intrigued. It was different from anything else I’d done in my textile career. Kirk was facing several challenges in his goal to not only display the knitted tapestries, but mount them and tour them. Knitting, like all textiles, is subject to gravity (which can pull on the fibres), changing environments, travel, exposure to light, pests and moisture.

The first goal was to get the tapestries mounted and ready for framing. We’d deal with travel next.

Preparation of Three Knitted Tapestries for Display

Preparing the Under-Padding

The black lines – the “cames” in stained glass window speak – had more depth than the pictorial panes, because this was where Kirk joined the tapestry sections together (the tapestries were too large to be knitted in their entirety on a single set of needles). We decided to place padding underneath each pane in order to give the tapestry a smoother appearance.

A colour photograph of each panel was printed onto an 8 ½” x 11” piece of paper, which was overlaid with a sheet of thin polyester film. The individual panes of the tapestry were traced onto the film and each section was numbered to determine its location, as each one is a different shape.

Next, a very large sheet of clear plastic was placed over the tapestry. The outline of the individual panes was traced and the appropriate number, transposed from the template, was written on each pattern piece. The numbered sections were placed on polyester batting and cut to size.

The knitted tapestry was flipped over onto a drop sheet on the floor. The individual pieces of padding were basted to the back of the corresponding panel between its surrounding cames.

In this photo, you can see the knitted tapestry, flipped face down on a drop sheet on the floor. The polyester film templates for the padding are piled on the side, and the black polyester batting, cut into sections, matches the sections of the tapestry.

Attaching the Knitted Tapestries to the Support Fabric

The next step was to attach each tapestry to a black wool panel, so that when the tapestries were vertical, they would have support, and gravity wouldn’t pull on the knitting.

First we had to measure the tapestries. And measure again. And remeasure. The knitting has give, so we needed to make sure we felt certain about our measurements to pass along to Ontario Staging, a company in Toronto that has been manufacturing stage drapes for over 30 years, supplying film, TV, schools, churches, and special events across Canada. 

We visited with Natalie Smith and Maria Physentzou at Ontario Staging, and described what we needed. We decided together to have them build three black woolen panels for backing, with grommets every 6 inches apart, so that the tapestries, once sewn to the backing, could be laced to the frames.

Each black wool panel is composed of two vertical sections to provide the overall necessary width, with the seam down the centre. Grommets are equally placed around all four edges through which nylon thongs are laced.

Attaching the Wool Panels to a Wood Frame

The next step required a large wood frame that was 12’ x 8’ to which the wool panels could be tied, using the laces provided by Ontario Staging. Joel Robson kindly made the tapestry assembly frame for us. Joel is a Toronto-based designer/maker assisting museums, galleries and private collectors with their display furniture. He is currently head of installation at the Textile Museum of Canada and former head of installation at the Gardiner Museum. It had to be something we could easily take apart, transport into my studio space, and then disassemble again once I was done working on the tapestries. Joel did a great job.

The measurements to locate the centre of the width and the centre of the length were determined. These coordinates were transferred to the wool panel with butcher’s string, held onto the frame by pushpins. The margins, around the perimeter of all four edges, were calculated and marked using the same technique. The central width and length of the knitted tapestry was determined; string was then attached with safety pins to make sure tjat the tapestry didn’t move when it was laid over the black wool. All these lines made sure the knitted tapestry was centred properly.

Here is Joel’s frame, with the Christian tapestry attached to it by laces.

The perimeter of the knitted tapestry was hand-stitched with nylon upholstery thread and a tapestry needle. This stitching followed the interior and exterior edges of the black outlines of the Christian and Judaic tapestries. (The Islamic tapestry did not have the same border treatment, so a single row of stitches was used to attach it to the wool support.) This held the knitted tapestry centered on the black wool support, keeping it centered when the entire unit was untied and placed on the drop sheet that was spread out underneath the frame. The frame proved too wide to work from the sides of the frame while seated.

Large sheets of mat board were slipped between the knitted tapestry/wool support and the drop sheet. This prevented them from becoming accidentally sewn together when the curved upholstery needle/nylon thread passed through the tapestry/support. The boards also provided resistance so that I knew when the needle passed through the three layers: knitted tapestry, padding, wool support.

The knitting was covered with quilted tablecloth under padding and bed sheets. This protected the knitting, as I needed to work directly on top of the entire panel with only the area to be stitched exposed. Working from the centre outwards, the stitching progressed, image by image. The section being worked on was pressed with a steam iron through several layers of damp toweling to ease out any ripples. The first set of stitches was made along the edge of the black came of the selected image.

Here’s an example of one section of the Judaic tapestry after steaming and stitching around its perimeter cames.

Once that was accomplished, a stitching grid was established using butcher’s string held in place with straight pins. A horizontal grid was set up every 10 – 15cm, followed by stitching along these lines. Then the vertical portion of the grid was established in the same manner.

The mouting of all three tapestries took approximately a month, working in the evenings and on weekends. It was amazing to see the smoothed-out, finished tapestries once all the stitching was complete. They really ‘pop’ visually against the black background.

I’m excited to see the next steps: getting the tapestries, now attached to the backings, into frames.

Yossi Klein Halevi, Interfaith Empathy, Knitting and Me

As part of my interfaith journey with Stitched Glass and The Knitting Pilgrim, I am trying to spend time with people of several faiths, especially Judaism, Islam, and yes, my own faith, Christianity.

On Saturday, November 24th, Claire and I attended a compelling session at Beth Tzedec Congregation with author Yossi Klein Halevi.

This was an especially meaningful moment for me because, 10 years ago, when I was just beginning my research on Stitched Glass’ Judaic tapestry, I met a Rabbi in one of the one-on-one interviews I was doing to discuss the tapestry’s imagery. He asked me if I had read At the Entrance to the Garden of Eden: A Jew’s Search for Hope with Christians and Muslims in the Holy Land by Yossi Klein Halevi. I hadn’t. He suggested I read the book and come back when I had read it.

The Rabbi was right. Yossi’s book turned out to be a seminal one for me.

So much of Yossi’s book has stuck with me. Here is one passage that I have often quoted:

“If God is literally one, and all of creation is a projection of that unified will, then every living thing exists within the same organism, is in effect a cell in the divine “body,” as mystics insist. I am implicated in all of creation, nothing alive is extraneous to me. And so all love is ultimately self-love; all hatred, self-hate. For the radical monotheist, empathy is the only possible state of being: Human oneness isn’t a philosophical notion or a moral imperative but simply a fact.” (pxvii, At the Entrance to the Garden of Eden)

On Saturday night, I realized that Beth Tzedec’s Rabbi, Rabbi Baruch Frydman-Kohl, had also kindly spoken to me during that research period. So I approached him with Claire at the end of the talk to thank him for his help, to tell him about my connection to Yossi, and to also let him know that, after 15 years, Stitched Glass was finally finished.

I showed him photos of the tapestries on my cell phone. He lifted his glasses onto his forehead and looked at them closely.

Then he insisted we introduce ourselves to Yossi, so that he would know the impact his book had had on my work. Rabbi Baruch told us that At the Entrance to the Garden of Eden was supposed to have its book launch on Sept 11, 2001. The terrible tragedy that day prevented the launch from happening, and Yossi thereafter, in the light of 9/11’s events, had ambivalent feelings about the book as a whole. I told him how much it had affected me in a strong and positive way – how much it had contributed to my journey. One I am still on.

Yossi offered to sign my copy of his book, which Claire thought to bring along. I passed it to him, and he thumbed through it. Well-used he said. Yep, I said.

Yossi told us that At the Entrance to the Garden of Eden is being reprinted in a new edition soon. Which is wonderful.

Yossi has written more books since then: Like Dreamers: The Story of the Israeli Paratroopers who Reunited Jerusalem and Divided A Nation (2013), and Letters to My Palestinian Neighbor (2018), which I cannot wait to read.

Now that Stitched Glass is finished, I finally have some time.  

Coming together in solidarity with Danforth Jewish Circle

I’ve been fortunate enough to attend The Danforth Jewish Circle twice in the last month – both prompted by the recent terrible anti-Semitic events in Pittsburgh on October 27. I can’t say that the reasons we came together are positive – but the act of coming together is positive unto itself. 

On Nov 2, the Danforth Jewish Circle held a “ring of peace” Solidarity Shabbat Service. While the service unfolded inside, the Danforth community, people of all faiths, surrounded the building in a ring of peace. It was profoundly moving.

In this time of polarized opinions about seemingly everything, not just religion, it is good to come together. To remember that we have the same wants and dreams: to live in peace and harmony. It sounds clichéd, but it’s only a cliché because it’s what we all think about and wish for.

On Nov 20, I attended a session at the DJC, which was a chance for reflection and discussion about what happened in Pittsburgh. To discuss our own connections to anti-Semitism, to understand how we feel in a world where this is still a problem, and what to do about it.

Even though I am not Jewish, it felt vital to participate in the conversation about this alarming problem. I am an ally. I am part of the solution. The coming together is part of that solution. Thanks to Olev, the Third Space committee and Rabbi Miriam for the event and their warm reception to me and Claire.

Coming together with friends from all walks – as well as Christians, Jews and Muslims – is the journey that Stitched Glass and The Knitting Pilgrim continue to take me on. I am grateful for that.

I keep thinking of the image of the dove of peace – a common symbol in all three Abrahamic faiths –and one that appears in each of the three tapestries of Stitched Glass:

Dove of Shalom

Judaic Tapestry

Dove of Peace

Christian Tapestry

Dove of Salaam

Islamic Tapestry

Peace is the thing we all want. Where we fall down is how we try to achieve it. Those who try to achieve peace through violence will find it elusive. The best they can hope for is a victory resulting in a temporary cessation of hostilities. Real peace can only be achieved through justice, communication, patience, and compassion. Much more difficult work than violence.

Stitched Glass at the Toronto Knitters Guild

On Wednesday, May 16, I had the pleasure of talking to the Toronto Knitters Guild at the University of Toronto’s Innis Town Hall about my installation of knitted tapestries, Stitched Glass.

The last time I did a talk to the Knitters Guild about the installation, I think only the first Stitched Glass tapestry was complete. So that was a while ago.

Knitters Guild President Carol Mather Miles was kind enough to introduce me. 

Other than talking about Stitched Glass and the play we’ll be touring with the installation, The Knitting Pilgrim, there were three things I really enjoyed about the evening.

One – it was so great to be amongst so many knitters, everyone steadfastly knitting their projects, chatting about knitting (one of my favourite things, of course) and solving each other’s pattern or stitch problems. It made me realize how much I’ve knitted alone these past few years – okay, past lots of years – and how much fun it was to get out amongst my peers.

So the first thing I’ll be doing is renewing my membership. It’s been far too long with me knitting alone in my living room.

Two – it’s always fun to meet yarn suppliers I don’t know about. The evening’s supplier was Viola Yarns – they had beautiful skeins of hand-dyed wool on offer.

And three – I really enjoyed getting feedback from my fellow knitters about how to get Stitched Glass out into the world. People had great ideas and I so appreciate all of them.

It’s great to feel part of a community. So I’m coming back as soon as I can, and when I do, I’ll have a much smaller project on hand to knit. Much smaller.

How Stitched Glass Gave Birth to The Knitting Pilgrim

How Stitched Glass Gave Birth to The Knitting Pilgrim

After fifteen years – a long, long time – of knitting Stitched Glass, my installation of tapestries looking at the commonalities and differences amongst the Abrahamic Faiths, things have started moving fast. Never thought I’d say that about knitting.

Needless to say, that’s meant I haven’t had time to blog about it all – so I have a bunch of blogs stored up. Here they come. February first.

The long-held purpose of Stitched Glass was to create an opportunity for conversation. Conversation, hopefully, among disparate groups of people – so that they could find common ground, rather than seeing the other groups as ‘the other.’

But as I approach the end of knitting the last tapestry, I’ve wondered how to do that. And off and on over decade and half of knitting, my wife, Claire, has wondered how to get the installation into textile museums and other galleries so that I could participate in that conversation. Claire would, in fits and starts between writing jobs, try reaching out to textile museums and the like, and get very little uptake. Granted, I’m not a trained visual artist – I didn’t get a Material Art degree from OCAD University (although that sounds like a really good time) – and I’m not represented by a gallery, and I don’t have a long history of solo and group exhibitions, because apparently I bit off way more than I could chew with Stitched Glass, and it’s taken a lot of time, alongside my day job and raising our kids with Claire, and doing the laundry. All very worthwhile and time-consuming things.

So one day about a year ago, knowing that I was over half-done the last tapestry, Claire discusses this problem with our good friend, Tracey Erin Smith. Tracey is the Artistic Director of Soulo Theatre here in Toronto, and she and Claire have often tackled artistic problems together, musing ways to keep moving forward despite the obstacles. At the time, Tracey’s theatre was producing a show called The Clergy Project which shares some themes with my textile installation – namely, interfaith empathy and focusing on what brings us together, not pulls us apart. Tracey, who is a great lateral thinker, asked if maybe she could use the tapestries as a backdrop for The Clergy Project – or as an exhibition that travelled with the show. Claire said that my last tapestry wasn’t finished yet, and also that I’d worked on the installation for so long, it really needed its own platform. So then Tracey said, why don’t you and Kirk write a show for him to perform alongside the tapestries, and use them as his set?

This, of course, was an ingenious idea, classic of Tracey. Because the reason I hadn’t attended OCAD U was because I’d attended the York University Theatre Performance Programme instead, where I’d trained as an actor. I was a full-time actor for 25 years or so, until my kids and Stitched Glass came along… so this idea of combining acting, writing and my knitting work created a new opportunity to get Stitched Glass out there.

Claire is a full-time writer, working primarily for film and TV, and we have often collaborated on writing projects over the years, so I asked her if she’d like to work with me on this project. I feared if I wrote it alone, it would never get done, because a half-tapestry still needed knitting. We pulled together our ideas, wrote 20 pages, applied to the Toronto Arts Council and were lucky enough to receive playwriting funds to develop the project (thank you so, so much, TAC). We called the show, The Knitting Pilgrim.

We asked our good friend Anna Pappas, Artistic Director of Ergo Arts Theatre, to produce it. She jumped on board right away because the play, and Stitched Glass, deal with themes like interfaith empathy, understanding of ‘the other,’ and conflict resolution – all themes she tackles in many Ergo Arts projects. A good match. 

We did a variety of things to prepare for, and develop, A Knitting Pilgrim. Claire and I continued to write. We brought on the wonderful playwright Beverley Cooper as our dramaturge to help us with the script, and we also brought on three faith consultants to work with us at both script and workshop stage: Reverend Janet Ryu-Chan, Presbyterian Minister at Morningside High Park Church, was our Christian consultant; Sarah Margles was our Jewish consultant; and Farheen Khan was our Muslim consultant.

I’ll pause here to say that even just the process of talking about this project with those three consultants was so stimulating for me. After all my research into the Abrahamic faiths over the length of knitting the tapestries, to meet at the same table with Christian, Jewish and Muslim friends and work through how to talk about the Abrahamic faiths, and how we were all feeling about the status of getting along in today’s world – interfaith or otherwise – taught me so much.

Then I took Tracey’s Soulo Theatre course to get my acting feet wet again, and get comfortable with the idea of talking out loud about the ideas that I’d been living with, stitch by stitch, row by row, over the last 15 years of knitting. Meanwhile, of course, I was feverishly knitting. Yup. That’s me. Always feverishly knitting.

Eventually we had a script we felt we could workshop – and that is how we spent this past February.

We rehearsed at The Small World Music Centre in Artscape - a cultural hub in the west of Toronto. Anna Pappas directed the workshop.

We brought on the fantastic Nick Bottomley as our projection designer.

Nick produced some amazing images to project onto multiple screens to give people a sense of what the final show could look like.

Here, for example, in the show, I’m talking about when I went to apprentice in Kaffe Fassett’s studio in England with Kaffe and Brandon Mably.

Here I am at the part of the show where the Christian window, or tapestry, is complete. At that point in the story, I’m only 5 years into my 15-year experience.

Bev Cooper, our dramaturge, worked with us on the script. 

Claire worked with us as the in-room writer, and Georgia Kirkos from jorjas photography captured the workshop with her beautiful photos.

We held a presentation to show the work in progress, mostly to solicit feedback from our trusted colleagues. My brother Marc came to see the show, as did our 3 faith consultants. 

We had a really interesting debrief after the presentation about the show and its themes, and we got lots of ideas about how to continue developing the work toward a tour.

And that is how Stitched Glass gave birth to The Knitting Pilgrim. Ergo Arts Theatre will tour the two shows – the exhibition and the play – together in 2019. And yes, we’ll use the Stitched Glass tapestries as our set – but some venues, like museums and galleries, will also show Stitched Glass as its own exhibition. We’ll perform the play, which runs about 65 minutes, and then give the audience a chance to see the tapestries up close, have an informal discussion, or a Q&A and panel discussion – whatever our bookers desire.

If you know of a venue – a theatre, museum, gallery, place of faith, organization or knitters’ guild – that would like to book the show in 2019, please contact Ergo Arts Theatre and click on touring info.

I’m pretty excited about it all. I have a lot of people to thank: Tracey Erin Smith, for the initial seed of an idea that has already grown into such an interesting tree, my wife Claire who continues to go on this long journey with me, Anna for agreeing to produce the show, everyone associated with the workshop, and our three consultants.

I’m still learning. We’re still writing. I’m still knitting.

Knitting the Faiths Together

I was lucky enough to have Presbyterian Connection – the quarterly publication of The

Presbyterian Church in Canada – ask me to write an op ed piece about Stitched Glass, my

installation of three hand-knit tapestries in the shape of stained glass windows, looking at

the commonalities and differences of the Abrahamic faiths.

They asked me to do this because I am on my last segment of the project’s third and final

tapestry (pretty exciting stuff, because it’s taken me 15 years of knitting to get here), and

also because I am in the midst of preparing, with my wife Claire Ross Dunn and the

wonderful folk at Ergo Arts Theatre, to premiere a one-act play called The Knitting

Pilgrim that will accompany the Stitched Glass exhibition on tour. That will all be

happening soon.

So I’m sharing the Presbyterian Connection piece. Happy reading. And if you’re curious

about how to book the play and the exhibit of the textile work, please click here.

The Cover of Time Magazine, No Less.

This.

Knitters and Marchers, be very very proud of yourselves.