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Urban Fabric: Orain Luaidh

Waulking songs, Orain Luaidh, were labour songs sung by women as they thickened and fulled the cloth known as Harris Tweed. The waulking of the cloth holds a special place in the history of the Hebridean people, its practices were steeped in ritual and localized folklores, varying from island to island and even in their breadth, from the one end to the other. The waulking’s accompaniment by singing lightened the load while unifying the beat of the hands that felted the fabric, passing from one singer to the next in a sun-wise direction, its very web absorbing the marks of a great oral tradition.

While the practices of waulking have waned, so too have those of stenography, the translation of corporate oral lore, the capturing of edicts, the taking of letters, in the phonetic script of shorthand. Text itself is textile as philosophers and historians remind us, for in Latin textum means 'web', and textus 'to weave'. 

Urban Fabric: Orain Luaidh is presented here as a stenographer’s pad, an embroidered collection of waulking songs stitching together urban business practices and rural oral traditions in shorthand.

DETAILS: Calico, cotton and thread (30 x 27.5 x 2.4 cm). Embroidery by Ursula Hill. Stenography by Leanne Mullins, Margaret McGoldrick, and Sharynne Durbidge. Photographed by Danny Colombo.

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交织都会：ORAIN LUAIDH

踩布歌（Orain Luaidh ）是苏格兰妇女们在编织哈里斯粗花呢布料的过程中，脚踏缩绒时哼唱的劳动民谣。踩布缩绒的过程在赫布里底人的历史中占有特殊的地位，其做法充满了仪式性和地方性的民间传说，每个岛的做法不一，甚至在宽度上也有所不同。通过歌唱的轻快节奏而减轻了劳动的负担，双手伴随着节奏揉搓着布料，劳动中的妇女们顺时针轮流哼唱着，编织着象征了伟大传统的歌谣。

随着踩布歌的逐渐失传，速记法、口耳相传传说的翻译、法令的书记以及信件的抄写也随着速记的音符脚本逐渐消失。正如哲学家和历史学家所言，文字本身就是一种交织物，起源来自拉丁文 “textum ”意指“网络”，而“textus”则指“编织”。

《交织都会：踩布歌》在此以速记员的笔记本的方式呈现，一系列踩布民谣歌词的刺绣通过速记法拼接城市的商业化与农村民谣传统。

详细说明：印花布、棉布和线（30 x 27.5 x 2.4厘米）。刺绣：Ursula Hill。速记：Leanne Mullins，Margaret McGoldrick和Sharynne Durbidge。拍摄：Danny Colombo。

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