FRAGILE STORIES

From 14 June 2024 to 8 January 2025
Burano, Lace Museum

Works by Mandy Bonnell and Déirdre Kelly

From 14 June 2024 to 8 January 2025, for the 4th Lace Biennial, the Museum will be hosting the exhibition Fragile Stories, with works by Mandy Bonnell and Déirdre Kelly consisting of beautiful tracery cut out of fine papers and maps using the aesthetic language of lace.

Fragile Stories expresses the desire to embrace and participate in the rich creativity of women’s hands, always attuned to the delicate rhythms of nature, often – like lace itself – much stronger than it seems. In engaging with the traditions of the Burano lacemakers, Mandy Bonnell and Déirdre Kelly have found a way to recount interlacing stories and evoke journeys by superimposing new techniques on ancient crafts.

Bonnell and Kelly are united in the joy of making and the collective energy of women’s work through translations, interpretations and reiterations of the rich collection of lace drawings preserved in the archives of the Museo di Palazzo Mocenigo and the collection
of the Museo del Merletto in Burano.

Fragile Stories presents a series of works embodied in the detailed complexity derived from nature, prints, drawings and artist’s books evoking absences and presences, alluding to the perfection of interlacing threads. A conversation with the lace makers of the past, touching on issues of fragility and durability, results in a beautiful tracery cut out of fine papers and geographical maps using the aesthetic language of lace.

Venetian lacemaking as a traditional female craft and economic activity has become the embodiment of the social and cultural heritage of the islands of Venice. The artists Mandy Bonnell and Déirdre Kelly pay homage to this in Fragile Stories, seeking to give an enduring voice to this cultural memory.

Admission to the exhibition from 14 June 2024 to 08 January 2025, with the Museum’s hours and ticket.

Mandy Bonnell’s biography >>>

Déirdre Kelly’s biography >>>