ardi-ko

Biography

Graduated from the Faculty of Fine Arts at the University of the Basque Country and Specialized in Design and Installation of Art Exhibitions through the Complutense University of Madrid.

Until 2004, Yolanda Sánchez carried out her activities as a conservator-restorer of artistic and cultural heritage, as Artworks Courier and Exhibition Facilities Coordinator for numerous public and private institutions, both national and international, such as:

-Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía in Madrid,

-Fine Arts Museum of Alava in Vitoria-Gasteiz,

-ARTIUM Basque Museum-Center of Contemporary Art in Vitoria-Gasteiz,

-The National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa,

-The Fondation Pierre Gianadda in Martigny-Switzerland,

-The Instituto Cervantes in Berlin and New York,

-The Macedonian Museum of Contemporary Art in Thessaloniki, amongst others.

Most recently, she initiated a new career with a training in visual arts and handicrafts in multidisciplinary areas.

She launched her own artisan business in 2009, specialized in textile, with a production based on natural raw materials such as silk and wool.

From then on, she has been participating in numerous professional events selling her production, organizing workshops, individual and collective exhibitions alongside artists and other craftsmen, and collaborating in national and international symposiums as a speaker.

In parallel, she has been carrying out research on silk and wool as raw materials, and natural dyes, getting trained alongside professionals like Annette Quentin-Stoll and Michel Garcia among others.

She is involved in processes and ecological and sustainable production.

She is one of the founders of the association ALANE for the recovery and reappraisal of the wool of indigenous sheep living on the Cantabrian coast.

She has recently launched a new line of products, under the name "ardi-ko", the result of a craft-design collaboration project: a co-creation process between local craftsmen and designers, with raw materials such as latxa and carranzana wool, typical of the Basque Country.

Principles that apply to each object created

* Novel applications of local Latxa and Carranzana wool in artistic and everday objects.

* Merino wool is found in certain items due to its past usage and economic impact in the Basque Country. This raw material arrived from Castile region to the Port of Bilbao, where it would be shipped to textile factories throughout Europe.

* A sustainable design which gives a chance to add value to what is considered a low quality material for the production of textiles.

* A local and handmade production which promotes the collaboration between flock-owners, craftsmen and designers, thus creating objects with a more human approach.

Ecological goods

* Items produced on a small scale, which give visibility to the Basque wool.

* Objects that are produced with natural and environmentally friendly raw materials.

* Use of undyed natural wool, thus respecting the natural colour of the sheep.

* Traceability of the wool which is certified and controlled throughout the whole process.

The main method is the wet felting of the wool, thus producing a non-woven fabric.

Wool fibres have a unique surface structure which consists of overlapping scales.

Through the wet felting process, the fibres slip over one another and the scales interlock.

To obtain the textile, warm soapy water is applied to layers of overlapped carded and/or combed wool roving, kneading the surface repeatedly in order to compact the fibres. After the wet felting process is complete, the soap is finally rinsed off the felted material.