Online/ Talk / Multiple Techniques
For textile designer Františka Benčaťová, textiles are more of a principle, a system of construction, a certain kind of architecture, as well as a vessel for stories, memory, and the present. Textiles are a timeless medium for her, a vision of the future, a platform for experimentation and innovation, a fascinating living organism that subtly and unobtrusively invades our environment. It is close at hand and yet invisible. Textiles are a ritual, a space, and a memory.
In her online lecture TEXTILES IN THE PRESENT: A DIALOGUE BETWEEN TRADITION AND DIGITALITY, you’ll gain insight into her personal observations on textiles. The designer will offer a detailed look at her textile practise, which draws on craft traditions while pushing their boundaries through industrial machinery and programming to reach a new level of innovation. She experiments with her own weaving techniques to process narrow-leaved cattail by hand. She liberates embroidery from its base material and enriches it by sewing on glass beads in collaboration with a digital embroidery machine. She views the simple basket as an archetypal textile object and, through industrial jacquard weaving, creates multiple perspectives on this object—whether as a three-dimensional form directly on the loom or through a surface-level visual illusion. All of her textile approaches are united by curiosity and experimentation across various textile disciplines, a distinctive focus on structure, and an emphasis on the construction and creation of textile objects through innovative methods.
Františka Benčaťová (1996) is a Slovak textile designer based in Prague and a graduate of the Textile Design Studio at UMPRUM (2023). Her work has been influenced by a study visit to KASK in Ghent (BE) under the supervision of Esther van Schuylenberg, as well as a work placement at Simone Post Studio in Rotterdam (NL).
Her work is characterised by an emphasis on the construction and architecture of textiles, which she uses to experiment with materials at the intersection of traditional craft techniques and industrial processing, combined with digital technologies. The playfulness and curiosity of her work are underscored by an optimistic colour palette, tactile spatial effects and a speculative conceptual approach. The designer enjoys pushing the established boundaries of how textiles are viewed and worked with. She perceives textiles as carriers of stories and emotions, as well as a structural principle for discovering and exploring the possibilities of textiles and their existence in the world (contemporary, imaginary, future). The research process is an important aspect of her work.
She currently works as a textile designer in the automotive industry, where she specializes in industrial jacquard weaving and knitting, with a focus on fibre knowledge, textile technology and innovation.