Sheila Jordan is a fibre artist with a background in ceramics; she works mainly in felt but also using stitch as a drawing medium. She creates sculptural pieces, framed work, rugs, wall hangings and wearable pieces.
She studied ceramic design in the early eighties and went on to work with Michael and Mary Jackson at Stoneware Jackson Pottery in Kilkenny for a number of years. While studying for a city and guilds stitched textiles certificate in 2005 she became interested in felting and has over the past few years pursued this interest attending workshops and seminars both in Ireland and Europe. She finds that the ancient art of felt-making offers respite in the fast moving virtual world of technology we inhabit today. It provides the opportunity to slow down and work in a very tactile way, laying down fibres, working with her hands and very simple tools to create pieces that communicate in an instinctive way, with the emphasis on colour and visual harmony.
Her work is a journey of experimentation and expression responding to the fragility and timelessness of the landscape and the human form. She is interested in the delicate balance in nature, the colours and patterns found in the everyday landscape; the passage of time and what we leave behind. She often incorporates found object in her work from the area where she lives beside the Kings River or from the coastline. A flood can rise and fall many feet in a short period of time leaving the detritus of modern living in its wake. The impact of tides and what they bring with them on our coast line and similarly our rivers and their capacity to flood and carry objects from place to place, objects left in the wake of rising and falling waters from unknown sources and faceless people their actions affecting our lives and landscape.