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reate/Elevate builds upon Harewood’s reputation for bringing world class arts and crafts to all our audiences across Yorkshire and beyond.
Darren Pih - Former Curator and Artistic Director for Harewood House Trust
Darren Pih, Former Curator and Artistic Director for Harewood House Trust continues: “It presents works created through community engagement while taking a global perspective to reflect upon Harewood’s history and our extraordinary art collections and decorative interiors.
Craft is a skilful expression that can be beautiful and illuminate our current times while providing models for living, learning and thriving together.”
The contemporary exhibits provided new ways to engage with the centuries of craft artistry embedded within the interiors of Harewood House.
In an interview with Financial Times, curator Ligaya Salazar says work shown as part of the Biennial includes practices that are on the verge of becoming extinct.
Addressing Harewood’s difficult history
Some of the work presented was by makers from the global south, included Nigerian artist Temitayo Ogunbiyi’s manila rope sculpture, and Antiguan and Barbudan Botanique Studio’s tamarind seed jewellery. Rosa Harradine’s pieces celebrate Welsh brush and broom-making, an endangered practice.










In looking to the past, one topic that is addressed is Harewood’s difficult history. Edwin Lascelles used money generated by the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved People to build Harewood House.
In response to this, Modular by Mensah’s installation “Onipa ye de” (2024), named after a proverb in the Ghanaian Akan language meaning “human being is sweet”, translates Adinkra visual symbols into playful modular furniture that shares language, heritage and creates a space to be with others.
Founder Kusheda Mensah sees the work as a positive act by a Black woman in the present, in contrast with the house’s “dark history”.

Promoting social equality
Create/Elevate showed how artists and makers work collectively to affect societal change and promote social equity. Exhibits encouraged fresh ways for audiences to engage the spaces and gardens of Harewood House.
In an article by Stored Honey, Laura Davis wrote
“Most striking is Rasad, by Dhaka-based artist collective Britto Arts Trust – a full-scale small town Bangladeshi street market erected “below stairs”, where the produce is made of ceramic or fabric.
Most items are bleached of colour – bright white ceramic bags labelled Tilda rice, bright white ceramic jars of Branson pickle. Then, the occasional splash of colour – yellow sweetcorn kernels, burnished orange (real) spices, and the bold red labels of embroidered Campbell’s soup cans (surely a nod to Warhol).
On second inspection, the exhibit becomes menacing – the fish have the tails of missiles, the artichokes are exploding out of handguns, the bottles of apple juice bear the warning ‘£Brexit€ Food inflation’.“
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asad is a piece that symbolises the whole Harewood Biennial - witty, inventive and created with great skill, and you’re rewarded for looking more closely.
Laura Davis - Stored Honey
Make it Harewood
Alongside the exhibition, we offered a summer of dynamic craft workshops. During weekends in August, Make it Harewood offered accessible hands-on Biennial-themed activities and engagement opportunities.
Workshops included Model Making with Jim Parkyn, one of the talented model makers behind many classic characters including Wallace and Gromit, Shaun The Sheep, Creature Comforts and animated feature films and commercials. Flag Making with Biennial artist Rebecca Chesney was inspired by Conditions at Present – Chesney’s installation of 25 windsocks made from reclaimed tent fabric salvaged from music festivals.
With thanks to everyone involved
Rachel Crewes, Chief Executive Officer, Harewood House Trust said:
“Harewood Biennial is a showcase for the Trust’s vision to commission and collaborate with exceptional artists who engage with Harewood’s history in a contemporary way, provoking different perspectives and conversations.
Darren Pih and Ligaya Salazar’s bold curation in Create/Elevate accentuates and highlights Harewood House and its collections giving us all an opportunity to explore the skills and knowledge of these global and visionary creatives.”
Exhibiting artists, makers and collectives: Arabeschi di Latte, BEIT Collective with Hamza Mekdad, Botanique Studios, Britto Arts Trust, Rebecca Chesney, Emefa Cole, Common Threads, Jakup Ferri, Rosa Harradine, Jan Hendzel, Mani Kambo, Hew Locke, Kusheda Mensah, Temitayo Ogunbiyi, Lucia Pizzani and Xanthe Somers.
Curated by Ligaya Salazar and Darren Pih the exhibition ran from June – October 2024.
Exhibition design by Instruct Studio, Manchester.
The Common Threads and Rebecca Chesney installations were co-commissions with the British Textile Biennial.
Create/Elevate was generously supported by Arts Council England, British Council, and the Henry Moore Foundation.
A celebration of global craft practices

















