Pasabit! is an exhibition by Tāmaki Makaurau-based weaver Esther Toclo (Igorot-Filipino). Weavings and loom-like structures adorn the space, perching, dangling, weighted, and floating. Pasabit! is a verb–to hang up, to hinge, hook on, hitch a ride–and this show resists ideas around weaving’s perceived stillness. Esther’s mahi is active and changeable. Pasabit! explores the lively, wiggling side of fibre and its potential as a social, cultural, and material connector.
Near the centre of the gallery, a bamboo grid is suspended from the rafters by string, metal rings, a velvet bow, and plastic chain. The grid is made sparkly with silver tape and tassels. It references a game from Esther’s childhood that involves a crowd of excitable bodies leaping and grabbing at treats jerked above their heads. In this case, the treats are small weavings made by gallery visitors at the opening event. The grid is raised and lowered so participants can attach their woven offerings. Soft wool jostles against the slippery tassels.
Nearby, a tapestry-in-progress is attached to a branch, which has been tacked across one of the gallery window frames. The warps are backlit by the window. They travel down to the floor where they are held in place by two notched lengths of wood from Esther’s backstrap loom. Traditionally, the notched lengths are held snug across a weaver’s lower belly by a sling or backstrap. The weaving ascends from the weaver’s body to an anchor point high up in a tree, and tension is applied by leaning. Esther’s piece adapts the backstrap setup for the gallery. The backstrap’s connection to environment and sense of place is remembered in the tilt of Esther’s warps and their choice of weaving materials. Plant matter collected from city berms and wildings on walks wiggles through the threads. Again, visitors are encouraged to participate in the weaving of this work as they pass through the gallery.
A single finished weaving floats on the facing wall. It is feather-light and fluffy, roughly the size of two hands laid side by side. It is made from loosely spun white wool and individual strands of tī kōuka (cabbage tree) fibre which run through the piece like spines. Esther was recently introduced to mahi tī kōuka by Brook Konia (Ngāti Porou, Kōtimana, Pākehā) and Louie Zalk-Neale (Ngāi Te Rangi, Pākeha). This sampler is Esther’s first attempt to bring these materials and their different histories together, while thinking about her own relationship with textile craft in Aotearoa as a migrant learning mostly from Pākehā makers. The weaving is flat, though some breaks in the wool speak to its delicate nature. The fibres have been balanced with care.
Pasabit! speaks to temporary rest, to wandering, improvisation, and exchange. The exhibition makes its home in a train station and invites others in. It speaks to the echo of motherlands in diaspora, picking up pieces from new soil, and weaving a sense of belonging in the tumultuous process of migration. Pasabit! welcomes many hands to revel in materiality, celebrating and reclaiming domesticity as an important place to heal and expand ancestral knowledge into the future.
About the artist
Esther Toclo (she/they) is a weaver and librarian based in Tāmaki Makaurau. Her craft practice is centred on healing the bittersweet effects of migration from the mountains of Baguio, Philippines to the cool tropics of Aotearoa. Toclo researches and practices loom weaving methods with lightly foraged plants and recycled materials. Playful tapestries unfurl and burst from the warp, emerging from seasons of slow textile making that map and expand the layers of their Igorot heritage.