Maria Walker Tech Styles

The articulation of the unwritten narratives of ordinary working class people has underpinned Maria Walker's textile-based practice for a number of years, so she was delighted by her discovery of an Indenture which was drawn up in 1795 between the apprentice Ann Bates and Samuel Greg in the Quarry Bank Mill archives. Her textile installation relies on the neutrality of the actual text from the Indenture to invite the viewer to 'fill in the gaps' about the rest of Ann Bates' life. The inclusion of the typewriter, which was not invented until 60 year after this Apprentice Indenture was written, alludes to the ever-changing technologies at the Mill.