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Michelle Stephens
Dr Michelle Stephens, FHEA, is a textile artist, lecturer and researcher based in the United Kingdom. She has established a unique area of practice through her amalgamation of digital and physical methods of working. This cross-disciplinary approach to her practice enables Michelle to pull from a variety of skill sets and discipline areas as an educator. Michelle has taught across disciplines on a variety of courses at Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU) and at other institutions as well as exhibiting her work across the United Kingdom, internationally and completing major commissions for public spaces. A defining characteristic of her work has been the sustained commitment to the conceptual synthesis of contemporary technology and historical textile sources. Currently, this involves the examination of technology as a design tool by using the coding environment of processing as a method of reanimating the traditional textile patterns of Paradise Mill, Macclesfield. Michelle’s doctoral research, entitled ‘Coded cloth: How a generative digital design process for jacquard weave design can reanimate historical pattern archives’, was supported by the North West Doctoral Training Partnership in the United Kingdom, and formed the basis of a practice-based Ph.D. within MIRIAD at Manchester Metropolitan University (2015–19). Michelle is a lecturer within the Department of Art and Performance, Manchester School of Art at MMU.
Contact: Department of Art & Performance, Manchester School of Art, Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester, UK.