Ella Robinson

Orange, Yellow and Green, 2006
Balsa wood and poly-cotton
12 x 15.5cm

Ella Robinson is a talented young artist whose work celebrates vibrant colour, pattern and unexpected textile materials. She is a recent graduate of the Royal College of Art, London.

Working with both found and purchased media, she creates one-off hand crafted pieces inspired by the colours of the urban environment and the charm of the coast.

Cream and Brown, 2006, polypropylene and poly-cotton (shown flat), 35.5 x 42.5cm

Cream and Brown, 2006, polypropylene and poly-cotton (shown curved), 35.5 x 42.5cm (when flat)

 Red and Blue, 2006
Balsa wood and poly-cotton (shown curved)
37 x 46.5cm (when flat)

Biography

Ella Robinson was born in Brighton (UK) in 1984, and her passion for art was first realized during experimental A-Level lessons, where numerous found materials were used to create works: ring pulls from drinks cans, large pieces of wood found in skips, scraps of materials and ribbon. She found it more exciting to work three-dimensionally with found materials, discovering their unique properties, rather than to paint or draw.

Formal study

Robinson studied Multi Media Textiles at Loughborough University, where the same principles of re-use and the embracing of the everyday were encouraged. Here too began 

Turquoise and Black Fabric Design, 2006,
Ribbon and poly-cotton
36 x 29cm

her love of marrying vibrant colors to striped imagery.

After graduation Robinson was selected by Texprint as one of the best 24 graduating textile designers in the UK, going on to exhibit in Paris and Hong Kong, and was awarded the Texprint “Colour Prize”. As a result of this, she then spent three months in Como, Italy, undertaking an internship in Product Finishing at Ratti, an international luxury textiles company.

From 2007 to 2009 she undertook a Master’s Degree at the Royal College of Art, London, where she studied Mixed Media Textiles. 
Her summer show featured the more concluded and larger-scale results of one year’s experimentation with both bought and drift wood, used in conjunction with purchased materials such as rayon thread, stranded cotton, and plastic tubing, to create vibrant and striped decorative objects and sculptural pieces.

Black and Transparent, 2006
Polypropylene and poly-cotton
15 x 18cm

Canoe Cocktail, 2009, stranded cotton and driftwood

Professional work

Since graduating, Robinson has continued to combine found wood with more traditional textile media. 

She has also launched “Driftwood Accessories”, a range of necklaces and brooches made from embroidered and wrapped wood fragments. These were previewed at The Knit and Stitch Shows (2009) in both London and Harrogate after Robinson was selected to exhibit within their Graduate Showcase.

Spinning Turtle, 2009, rayon thread and driftwood, 42.5 x 20.5 x 5cm