Sass Tetzlaff MSDC

Stitched & Constructed Textiles

About Sass
Sass’ work is largely figurative and uses a dense form of machine embroidery combined with fabrics to create images and tell stories. She is curious about the way human beings interact with each other either as individuals or as groups or “bodies”, how their beliefs, wishes and preconceptions impact on each other and the chain of events that can ensue from seemingly meaningless encounters, habits and jobs. She responds to statements in conversations, newspaper reports, personal research, social quirks and interesting images that come from a variety of sources.
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Biography Back to top

The technique Sass uses was developed as a way of combining her two greatest passions: drawing and stitching. She will use ordinary sewing threads and pieces of fabric as a palette to create heavily stitched “portraits of people” in situations sometimes real, sometimes not. Whilst the stitches have a painterly effect the technique distorts the fabric which she views as a reminder of our connection to cloth as both protection and decoration that goes back to the dawn of mankind and continues to this day. It is mankind's obsession with garb as a non-verbal language and cultural signpost through stereotypical "tribes" that interests her most, providing an ample seam to mine for inspiration to highlight what she describes as "the visual politics of the self"

Resumé Back to top

BA (Hons) Embroidered Textiles

C&G Level Three Fashion

C&G Level Two Textile Decoration Techniques

Stephen Mayer award 2011

Embroiderer's Guild Hardhome Embroidery (Game of Thrones)

Featured in Mary Schoeser's book "Textiles - The Art of Mankind

Freelance Couturier since 1990

Regularly exhibiting with SDC and Prism Textiles since 2011

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