Cottonopolis...

Cottonopolis was the alternative name for Manchester when it dominated the world's cotton trade and it's also the name for this art installation, part of the Joana Vasconcelos exhibition in the Manchester Art Gallery. The hard part of the sculpture is covered in those blue and yellow tiles you see in old buildings in Spain and Portugal and reflect the Victorian tiles you see on the floor to the left of the sculpture. The soft part of the sculpture draped around the hard part of it, is made of vibrantly coloured cloth, velvet (known as Manchester cloth in many parts of the world), sequins, crochet and knitting. The colours echo the vibrant colours in the Pre-Raphaelite paintings that hang on the walls of this gallery.