Waterfall began as a way to release a sense of soul sickness that felt too heavy to voice. I cut felt teardrop forms, coated them with gesso to distress their soft, pliable surfaces, and blanket‑stitched them together in a slow, methodical process. Arranged in a waterfall‑like descent, the drops begin in a steady pattern before bending into a more dynamic flow, gathering energy as they wind down the wall. A domestic kitchen scale sits beneath them, quietly measuring an impossible weight.
The work responds to my sense of helplessness when human rights are violated in livestream and the structures meant to protect them fail. As I stitched, the gesture became both ritual and a suture, a yearning for repair. The process generated its own transformation as I stepped back and noticed the shift in the pattern, like the mobilised energy of ordinary people rising together in acts of courage.
2026
Felt, gesso, rayon thread, kitchen scales.
2055mm x 570mm x180mm
Photos: Rachel Apelt
Rachel Apelt 