May it be written down, drawn, engraved or spoken out loud, the art of storytelling has been around for as long as humans have walked this earth. A unique art form, storytelling can be used as a means to relate past events, to travel to other realms and dimensions or simply to capture a moment in time. The latter is precisely what French artist and designer Sarah Espeute aims to portray through her work.

From her studio in Marseille, Espeute uses embroidery to capture the mundane, transforming it into what she calls her ‘œuvres sensibles’ (sensitive pieces of art). Halfway between fine art and craftsmanship, each piece translates emotion and sensitivity through a story, a glimpse of the everyday or a family memory.

Espeute’s incline for illustration, interiors and 3D objects saw her artistic practice naturally shift over time from the digital realm to a more tangible form of art. If textile is her medium of choice, table-scapes are what made her gain in notoriety. Tablecloths, napkins, tea towels and table runners come to life under Espeute’s poetic and minimalist thread and needle work. Confronting the surface of her embroidered illustrations ‘en trompe l’œil’ with the volume and scale of the displayed tableware, Espeute offsets one from the other without loosing sight of their original purpose. Layer by layer, story by story, food gatherings take on another dimension. A series of suspended moments in time that in turn become eternal.

Written by Domitille Boulin & published on DesignTellers - https://designtellers.it/food-design/the-beauty-of-storytelling-through-embroidery-with-artist-sarah-espeute/