Untapped Treasures: Art Installation "Forest Fruit" (Please DO Touch the Display)

Note: This article is from our giant store of almost-complete-but-unpublished posts. We've been cleaning up our bedraggled drafts, archived images and incomplete stories that were never quite posted due to the constant deluge of fairy tale news (it's a good problem to have) and are finding a treasure trove of un-shared things! We can't bear to hit the delete button on these awesome nuggets and are choosing, instead, to share, so are beginning a new semi-regular column titled Untapped Treasures. The stories posted under this title are all new, not re-posted or from our archives, so it's still news to many people. It's just not as current as our usual content, though we will endeavor to post any updates to the story at the bottom of the article, should there be any current news on the subject.  Enjoy!

*********************************************************************************

Described as "following a Hansel and Gretel style trail" this textile installation, which showed at the Norfolk and Norwich Art Festival in 2015, and exhibited in February this year as well, encouraged children to play and feel, find the stories hidden in the installation and to also create their own.

From the Norwich Evening News:

The installation - called Forest Fruit - is by Belgian artist Naomi Kerkhove.
It is described as an installation where “a child’s imagination is king,” and people are invited to follow the threads of Ms Kerkhove’s intricately woven textile landscape and untangle their own unique patchwork of stories.

From WP Zimmer:

In her performances Naomi Kerkhove invites the audience on a poetical trip through a black and white miniature universe stitched together with a sewing-machine. In her youngest interactive installation, the audience can enter this world of wonders by themselves. With Forest Fruit Kerkhove assembles elements out of old and recent work, touring the audience around a world that reminds us of a workshop and a playroom, towards a place where your own imagination becomes tangible. You activate the different installations yourself and disentangle a patchwork of impressions and stories by following a thread which inevitably leads back to you.

Sounds pretty neat we think!

Here's a little explanation from the artist and a festival coordinator.

You can see the full trailer for Forest Fruit art installation HERE.

Update October 2016:
From the February 2016 Exhibition in Holland (via auto-translate):

Naomi Kerkhove

Embroidery is hot and sewing is not only home industry. It may also be art. That shows the installation of the young artist Naomi Kerkhove.Naomi discovered one day that you can draw with a sewing machine. Meanwhile, she sews smooth miniature worlds.'Forest Fruit' is the place where you can see and feel all sewn stitching her wonderful white miniature world. If you are in her black and white world enters you fall from one surprise to another. 

You will be guided in a world that is a cross between a workshop and playroom. In this universe walk shapes and thoughts together and your imagination is slowly taken in tow. You can also get to work with many construction and gently unravels a patchwork of impressions and stories, along a thread which inevitably leads to yourself.An interactive, poetic and playful installation for all ages.

Naomi Kerkhove is currently an artist in residence at wpZimmer in Antwerp.