Charlie Lewin - environmental campaigner and textile artist

Charlie Lewin is an environmental campaigner and textile artist and has been working with recycled fabrics and second hand clothes for the past 15 years. She is based in St Levan and the main themes that drive her work are social and environmental issues and the expectations on women in society today.

She recently helped Stina Falle curate “Women’s Work” at the Museum of Cornish Life in Helston, an exhibition championing women, which launched in March on International Women's Day. It showcased collaborative work and art by celebrated women from Cornwall and was inspired by Denny Long. 

This May Charlie is part of both Open Studios in Cornwall and PZ Studios showcasing her intriguing and offbeat hand-felted jugs, vases and images made from hand-felted wool, reclaimed fabrics and found plastic waste decorated with machine embroidery and appliqué.

We are also delighted to announce that, during June, we are displaying some of her work including exhibits from the Women’s Work exhibition at our Women in Word bookshop for visitors to view.

“In the past 18 months I have found myself drawn more and more towards working in 3 dimensions. For the most part I’m still using wool to felt with but I am really enjoying experimenting with shape and form. Gleaning from my mother’s ceramics a joy of structure, proportion and balance but without the clay and firing! 3D wet felting has its own complications – not least the shrinkage necessary to create something substantial enough to stand up – let alone hold water – and yes these pots can hold water – for a while anyway!!

Social and environmental issues continue to direct the themes in my work, and I’ve been exploring the use of lettering, Celtic knot-work and ancient imagery with which to decorate these pots with my ideas and concerns, I also enjoy the challenge of sewing in 3 dimensions! 

I have begun to explore using other materials in my work too – plastic waste found on the sea shore, old torn clothing, waste packaging… it’s certainly not as pleasant as working with fabric, but interesting to investigate! I'm really lucky, my studio is set in beautiful surroundings close to some of the best beaches in Cornwall, the Minack Theatre and Porthcurno Museum are close by.”

Open Studios Cornwall 2024 will run from 25 May to 2 June 2024.
www.openstudioscornwall.co.uk/participant/charlie-lewin-felt-at-sea/

PZ Studios runs from 25th May to 9th June, at Unit 7 Wharfside Shopping Centre, Penzance

What do you consider your greatest achievement?

Well, I’ve hung out the laundry! I say that jokingly but actually part of me thinks that this is kind of key. I’ve spent a lot of my life since marrying doing the drudgery and that is an achievement, but it’s so rarely recognised. And I was just hanging out the laundry this morning and thinking, here I go again.

I’ve been a Mum. And that has been an amazing privilege… 

Physically, I’ve given birth without any conventional medical intervention, which felt quite powerful at the time.

Emotionally, I dealt with my Mum dying suddenly and without warning.

And mentally, well, is to keep going every day. Despite being fully aware of the catastrophic environmental crisis that we all face.

What motivates you to do what you do?

Well, I think there is still time to address the climate and ecological crisis. Some people say that we’re all going to die anyway so what’s the point? But I wonder what gives us the right to destroy all other life on this planet? And that’s where we’re heading.

We are so out of balance, we’re so out of kilter. And this is what’s causing this massive destruction of the planet. We’ve had this patriarchal system that has not been tempered by listening to the feminine side. And if we just redress that balance.

Men have a huge role to play, it’s not a male versus female thing. It’s this heavily dominating, patriarchal system - the very suppressing of the feminine or the Mother Earth if you like. Chris Packham recently said; “We’ve not lost species, we’ve destroyed them. There have been mass extinctions in the past but this isn’t extinction. This is extermination”. We are acting like Daleks! And we have to change direction. It doesn’t have to be this way.

We really can turn things around if we just allow nature to breathe, there is a potential beautiful future and so that’s what motivates me.

I think having children puts some perspective on to it. But it’s not just human children. It’s all life - at peril because of patriarchal action.

What do you owe your mother?

Well, she was amazing. She was also stuck in this patriarchal system and followed it so much. She was a housewife. And she was very gentle and hugely loving and so with that, I learned a softness and patience and a frugality. She had an infinite capacity to love; and somehow love keeps coming…

She taught me my sewing skills. She was a potter, and I realise I am intrigued by vessels too.

I think probably the most important thing was her creative energy and she showed me that creativity can heal. When there’s a problem, a difficulty, a depression, a loneliness, it’s creativity that can take us out of it. And I think that’s very powerful.

She gave up work when she got married. And she had children, and was a housewife. And it took a long time for her to stand back up and find herself. She just sort of gave up for us constantly. And I think children need that. You know, children need somebody to be constantly loving and giving, otherwise they get caught up with trauma. We need a strong, safe and loving grounding. And it’s extraordinary actually, when you have children, how that loving just keeps coming out of us.

When mum gave up her work, I think it was difficult for her - I’m not sure it was a choice. I think it was an expectation that she fell into - possibly, happily. I never had that conversation with her.

Which women inspire you and why?

I am inspired by passionate articulate politicians and leaders like Caroline Lucas, Mhairi Black and Jane Goodall. If we would only listen to them, if they weren’t criticised for what they wear!

We do not stop to listen to powerful women speakers as a society. In particular, women politicians that have heart at the centre of their work. Other women politicians who have a strong patriarch - if you like - they haven’t done us service at all.

I’m also hugely inspired by my daughters, Rose and Holly Lewin. They have a very clear love, it just shines out of them. They’re understanding, they’re sensitive, they’re strong, and they’re calm. And I’m inspired when I’m around them.

And the last group of people that really inspire me are the other women who continue to work for social and environmental justice. I’m thinking of people like Greta Thunberg, but also people like the West Cornwall Extinction Rebellion Group, who are mostly women and they meet every Saturday at 10 o’clock at the Redwing Gallery, Penzance and work out how to make change happen. They are really inspiring.

What are you reading?

So I’ve got a fantastic book on at the moment, called the Great Cosmic Mother; Rediscovering the Religion of the Earth, by Monica Sjöö and Barbara Mor. It took them over a decade to write, and it’s riddled with the most excellent research. It’s actually like an alternative to the Bible; I know some lovely Christians but I feel that much of Christianity suppresses women and so I struggle with it as a religion.

I’ve got a stack of other books by my bed to re-read;

Braiding Sweetgrass, by Robin Wall Kimmerer
If Women Rose Rooted by Sharon Blackie
The Patriarchs by Angela Saini
Finding the Mother Tree by Dr Suzanne Simard
Women Who Run with Wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estes

Also waiting to be read:
The Enchanted Life by Sharon Blackie
Sorry for the Inconvenience, But This Is An Emergency, by Lynne Jones
Grandmothers of the Light by Paula Gunn Allen
Doughnut Economics by Kate Raworth

What gender barriers have you had to hurdle?

Well I’m white, and middle class, so I’ve had almost every privilege and comfort. But being female I have been left, well, deeply frustrated without a voice and without any expectation on me. I was told to accept an unjust world and that a woman’s place is in the home. I was brought up not to have any ambition whatsoever. I was taught fairy tales; you know helpless maidens and handsome princes.

At secondary school, all the girls were taught home economics. And I remember very clearly being told that we would get married and we would have children. I just remember thinking ‘how is that definite?’ It was expected and accepted. In the meantime, all the boys had access to the most amazing machinery and the wood workshop and the metal workshop. I guess I’m hugely jealous that the boys had the most amazing tools and equipment. You know, we just had the ovens!

I was expected to help my mum and my grandmother. And I’ve got two older brothers who I love dearly but they weren’t expected to help so much - the patriarchal system we are so fully plugged into it without even questioning it… I think if I’d been born male, I would have achieved much more than I have, but I feel that my place is to is to work to redress this balance. So I’m pleased to be a woman.

I don’t regret any of the things that have happened to me, but being a woman has constrained me. I wasn’t expected to do anything more than have my own children.

There’s a classic punch cartoon by Riana Duncan (1988) of five men and a woman around the table. And the comment is “That’s an excellent suggestion, Miss Triggs. Perhaps one of the men here would like to make it.” That’s how things were in my earlier years, before I was married with children.

How can the world be made a better place for women?

I’ve been thinking about this - we’ve had 6000 years of history, haven’t we? That’s eradicated the previous 200,000 years of Herstory! The achievements over that period just dismissed as myth.

The patriarchal system that we live in, has exploited our planet - using its resources without thought for anything other than profit and domination. And we’ve got to redress this balance. We need to start with language, it’s so male orientated. Repatriate, expats etc. If we support something we patronise it. We need to change the focus of our language entirely. We need matrifocal systems and matrilineal societies, and matriarchs who are listened to, and old wives tales believed, rather than dismissed.

• We need reciprocity over ownership, we need intuition to be valued

• To value process over having a goal, the doing of something rather than the achieving of something

• We need community at the heart of our society and creativity at the centre of our work

• To give thanks for what we have and not hold on to excess

• And we’ve got to put love into our every action

Describe your perfect day.

So my perfect day I would wake up to a green power sharing coalition. Where decisions are advised by citizens assemblies, on health, transport, energy, ecology and carbon neutrality.

My day would involve being creative with women and children, teaching and sharing the chores with everyone.

We’ve noticed there really aren’t many, if any, statues of women around Cornwall. Who would you like to see remembered?

I don’t know of that many statues but there is a miner statue at Geevor and there ought to be at least a Bal maiden beside him. But I think my choice would be a carer, or a cleaner.

What is your top tip?

My favourite phrase at the moment is: Put love first - before doing anything, make your actions loving actions. If we just put love first the world would be a very different place…. 

Oh yes and there’s a fabulous tree planting group at the Bosavern Farm. It’s a great group and they’ve planted 1000s of trees but it’s not just tree planting, it’s tree care as well. There are 1000s of young trees there that need weeding and looking after. So it’s tree care too. If there’s anyone local who wants to do that, it’s something fun and the best thing for our environment.