Artificial Silk creates space for the imagination. By connecting people, places and objects we find ways to understand the past in the present, and re-envisage our futures.
On this page you will find out about workshops, collaborations, events, publications and how to take part.
Welcome to our 2025 so far
The new year hails the publication of short memoir stories inspired by objects.
New writing by Smita Tharoor, Maggie Pollard, Belinda RushJansen and A.T. Boyle will launch in print, on the Artificial Silk website, through live events and audio.
Editors and designers based in England and India will guide us to publication in summer 2025.
Watch this space for news on how to join our new exObjects writing workshops and performances (in a library, town hall and arts centre).
IN PRINT
Eleven international writers met through the first exObjects anthology of memoir short stories launched at Bangalore Literature Festival in December 2024.
Shashi Deshpande
Vikram Sampath
Shinie Antony
Gajra Kottary
Jaishree Misra
Devasiachan Benny
Sauma Afreen
Ramona Sen
Jerry Pinto and Belinda RushJansen reveal the secrets of places including Ooty and Kerala and Bengaluru and southern England. A.T. Boyle writes of her experiences in Preston and Blackpool in northern England.
Thirteen international writers met through another book. The short stories in Hell Hath No Fury by Robin McLean, Shinie Antony, Anukrti Upadhyay, Okojie Irenosen, Catherine McNamara, A.T. Boyle and more explore revenge from many different angles.
Our latest exObjects workshop in a museum invited participants to bring an object with a silky texture. The two Alisons (Alison Nicholls and A.T. Boyle) showed items in the Nicholson collection and we wrote imaginatively about fabrics and their cultural history.
More about exObjects
Listen to our short story commission about the fireflies (jugnus) encountered in Uttar Pradesh, northern India by the writer Sauma Afreen:
Listen to our HuG green arts festival soundscape that melds outdoor sounds recorded in the Western Ghats, southern India (UNESCO world heritage) and in Staffordshire, England:
Email your exObjects writing and image to us: exObjects2022 @ gmail.com Find out more here
Creative Postcards
The words round the edge of the postcard are associated with evergreen plants across the world.
Karthika Sakthivel Zoomed postcard advice to us from Karnatika in the south of India.
Sauma Afreen posted a personal letter to pupils at Werrington School from Uttar Pradesh in the north of India (via the Leek Town Council offices).
Messages were shared through Leek Repair Cafe, Moorlands Climate Action and other community groups in Staffordshire.
Shinie Antony, director of Bangalore Literature Festival, Sauma Afreen and Devasiachan Benny took part in the writing workshops in person or by Zoom.
Wherever you live in the world, you can take part.
Join the conversation by messaging us on…
A.T. Boyle is writer in residence.The Typing Man book was included in the event tickets. Read more about the story and its adaptations here.
Take part in exObjects 2024 online
Choose an object and write about your connection with it. If we look closely and use our imaginations, we can find new and hopeful ways to look at the world. You can create your own exObject by clicking here.
With the curator Alison Nicholls we explored one of the oldest objects in the museum, a cup and ring marked stone found in a Staffordshire field.
We ran our fingers round the dips and elevations of a plaster model and talked about our ‘circle’ objects that we had found or bought or been given by family and friends, objects that mean something to us.
See some of the exObjects creative writing here
We asked everyone a question. Here are some of the things they told us…
The Sadabahar: Evergreen Leek project was part-funded by the UK government through the UK Shared Prosperity Fund.
On 27th April, rainy in Leek, the snug surroundings of Spout Brew House helped us explore the fact and fiction behind our objects.
Small Boat on the Mantlepiece by Alison Nicholls
‘While Losing’ by Areeba Husain
‘Akhil’s BlackBerry, our treasure’ by Uday Vijayan
‘Dancing skirt’ by Mahboobeh Rajabi
‘It’s Another Kind of Love’ by Jayshree Tripathi
‘Exercise Book’ by Dr Ailsa Holland
‘My Home and Garden’ #3 by Devasiachan Benny
‘Lost Garden of a Lost House’ #2 by Devasiachan Benny
‘Keys of a Lost House’ #1 by Devasiachan Benny
‘Pewter-covered Box’ by Dr Ailsa Holland
‘A Brief History of Cars’ by Afreena Islam-Wright
‘Baseball Cap’ by Sandra Mangan
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What is artificial silk?
Artificial silk is also a fibre made from wood pulp that is made into threads, or filaments, that can be given different colours and woven into material. Other names for it are rayon or viscose.
Filaments made in Lancashire from wood shipped from Scandinavia were formed into silk parachute canopies, sanitary pads, clothes for M&S and much, much more.
Across four decades these filaments were sold all over the world, from 1939 when the Courtaulds Preston factory opened, to its closure with the loss of 2,600 jobs.
The machines were shipped from Preston to India in 1980, extending their life. Eighty years after that factory opened, the artificial silk made there has not lost its strength, sheen or vibrancy.
Find out more here.
Terry Boyle recorded: Preston’s viscose lab, a story about the titration bench…
Read Jean Boyle’s Other lives obituary published in The Guardian on 10th February 2021.
Minds and feet return to India
Shy to be photographed and shuftied to the front by his camera-less father, who asked us to take the photograph, the boy in the purple waistcoat appeared less comfortable than the girls. The shiny Elvis trousers and waistcoat selected to be grown in to, the big green hair decoration and yellow flip-flops were radiant against the backdrop of the Jaganmohan garden fountain.
A little further down the Mysuru road, the Wellington Building, home for two years (1799-1801) of the future Duke of Wellington, is now run by the Ministry of Culture’s Indira Ghandi Rashtriya Manav Sangrahalaya.
The curators in this heritage centre have sympathetically housed amazing ironwork, terracotta and basketware to celebrate the bold craft and artistry of many tribes across India.
Further east, in Chennai, books are being digitised by the Madras Literary Society. Their display, and call to adopt a book, stood out in the gardens of Chennai’s Literature Festival.
And in Salford a giant window display at the People’s History Museum connects textile shades made in Northern England with Indian factory workers.
Engine Room window at the People’s History Museum,
in the textile exhibition linking India and England
The object below was seen up close in Mysuru’s heritage centre. It will not be forgotten.
“Finding new ways to understand the past
and reconfigure our present and possible futures.”
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