In Conversation: The Conscious Sisters on Ganseys, Sardines and Plymouth’s Fishing Heritage

What’s On Plymouth Culture Reporter and Fashion Designer Victoria Lammie caught up with Karen and Fiona Evans from The Conscious Sisters CIC to find out more about their art practice and latest project ‘The Gansey Gathering’.

Could you tell me more about The Conscious Sisters CIC and what you do?

The Conscious Sisters is a CIC that was set up six years ago. It just so happens we are actual real life sisters! We are socially engaged contemporary artists working in the sector for decades. We only became a CIC about six years ago. Our work is interested in identity, we like to be sustainable and we’re interested in permaculture. We are also actively anti-racist. We connect people to places and that's really important. Our vibe is making high quality contemporary art projects for everybody. 

The Gansey Gathering is your latest project, could you explain how the project started?

It started with The Gathering which was a project we did a few years back funded by the Arts Council, exploring how to create  an event  or ritual which could help us connect Plymothians to the sea.  During this time we spent a whole year collecting ideas from people and we came across the concept of the ‘Gansey’ jumpers. Karen tells me "I had a large sardine that people wrote ideas on, and this chap asked me if I’d heard of ‘Ganseys’ and I said do you mean ‘Guernseys’? To which he said no, no they’re quite different. We then went down a rabbit hole finding out about them and the legend is that every port has its own pattern. Which made us think, where's ours? Which led us into its heritage. We feel that it’s not celebrated in Plymouth so much, the working class fishing heritage”. Our first iteration was funded by The Heritage Lottery Fund a couple of years ago, and we taught sixty people to learn to knit and now we have an Arts Council funded larger, expanded piece of work where we are teaching another forty people to knit. But also a coastal event, an art work called  Adrift  which is contemporary Ganseys we’re designing and a digital hook up. We’ve just gone Gansey mad! It  took us about a year or two of research in the Box archive and The Fisher Collection to find this iteration of the Plymouth Gansey pattern.

Andy Lawson of Beejay Tapper. Gansey Knitted by Maya Izumi

Having attended one of your Gansey workshops, what really stood out was the incredible community of knitters you’ve brought together. How did you go about selecting the people involved?

We have a Google application form, with questions such as ‘What have you knitted previously? Do you have any connection with the fishing heritage locally? Also how much commitment have you got? You have to be able to knit continuously for three months. Also can you attend all the sessions? These are all the parameters. We’ve  had many more applications than we have been able to accept. Overall two hundred and fifty applications for one hundred places.

(Image) Fiona Evans

The Gansey Gathering Sardine Festival is taking place in Plymouth later this month. What can visitors look forward to on the day?

It has three parts to it with a parade of Gansey Knitters starting from the National Marine Aquarium to Commercial Wharf at around 10.30am on the 20th of June which will launch the event, we will then be having a photograph taken of all our Gansey knitters.

On Commercial Wharf we will have gazebos and marquees down one side where we will have sustainable craft such as fishing craft heritage, crab pot making, fish skin tanning, flax making. We have also got a seaweed tasting and Gansey knitting of course! We also have some archecology from a dig of a fishing site on the wharf and we’ve also got heritage walks and all of this is free.

Then on the other side of the wharf we have entertainment. Including sea shanties from the Seagals and Seaweed in the Fruit Locker,  The Plymouth Community Choir, Freedom Fields Ceilidh Band we’ve also got Ocean Rituals which Gin Farrow-Jones has been producing with the Scouts. We do have a massive amount of community engagement for this, it’s basically a free day with free sardines!

We would also like to say that our festival is based on the story of the sardines that saved Plymouth. During the civil war Plymouth was starving and they were under siege, for three years we had no food coming in until a shoal of sardines came in up the Cattewater and saved Plymouth from starvation. It's a miracle really.

(Image) Fiona Evans

What's next for the Conscious Sisters?

We are continuing our work with women and the menopause called ‘Orcas and Us’ which is all about eco creativity which will continue into next year.

Later on in the year we are going to do a digital Gansey hook up internationally. We are really interested in working with Veterans and people with PTSD around Gansey making. We only currently work with two men and the Conscious Sisters generally do attract women but we would be very interested in creating a Gansey course for men! Maybe next year that's something we will look at.

Also our Gansey teacher ‘Tina Barrett’ is going on the ‘Game of Wool’ so we are hoping that Tom Daley can be persuaded to knit a ‘Janner Gansey’. Also selling Ganseys in The Box, we’re selling knitting patterns at the moment but we are really hoping to sell the jumpers and get a cottage industry going for the women who have learnt how to knit them.

The Conscious Sisters CIC is an extraordinary creative force, bringing to life inspiring and distinctive projects. Their passion for community-based art shines through in everything they do and is a genuine joy to experience. 

Be sure to go and find out more at The Gansey Gathering Sardine Festival, Saturday 20th June on Commercial Wharf, The Barbican, Plymouth 11am - 4pm.

https://www.theconscioussisters.com/about-the-conscious-sisters

@theconscioussisters