Camila Barvo

This gesture anthology documents the embodied knowledge there is when manipulating and caring for hair. It exalts the relationship between hair and hand movements that are equally performed when manipulating fibres. Hair filaments, just like textile fibres are combed, entangled, braided, and unbraided. By crafting quotidian hair gestures, this video magnifies the synergy between the hand and the filament when braiding and knotting to express the deep connection hair holds with the body’s memory, femininity and identity. 

The braid as a sculptural form carries a dialogue between the filament and the body. Having the power to hold, it grips the fibre with both strength and softness. Hair, as a storehouse for emotional memory, has the power to reveal our lifestyle, our deepest emotions, where we come from, our cultural roots and DNA.  These soft sculptures explore weight, volume and movement with wool dyed with henna and natural products used for hair color enhancement to create a relationship between hair filaments and textile fibres.

This research  revolves around exploring textile fibres with hair manipulation gestures. It consists of three handcrafted pieces made with knotting and braiding. A video piece that collects performed hand hair gestures in carded merino wool. In which the hands perform tying, untangling, brushing and braiding as sculptural expressions using wool previously dyed with natural hair color enhancement products. ‘Braid Warp’ piece used in the video, was made of wool used for doll hair, weaved with braided wool previously dyed with henna. And ‘Sculptural Braids’, also used for the video, to magnify the act of hand braiding and the volume of curls was made with a stuffed yarn with wire within to create a defying gravity form, that was then hand stitched with the carded wool to create the hairy wool aspect personality.  The soundscape of the video was recorded in a quotidian context, documenting the sounds made when I brushed my hair wet, dry, tangled and untangled to create an immersive and soothing landscape of what intimacy with hair sounds like. 

This project was created with natural materials with the aim of supporting sustainable practices, the main insight regarding this was when dying with henna. It required a lot less water than regular natural or synthetic dyes, and it could be reused several times for colour enhancement.