Mar 09 - Italian designer draws for charity

Italian designer draws for charity

We are at the stage of the Thai-British project in which we are working on improving methods and designs as prerequisites to wider craft training and marketing for the beneficiaries. So when well known Italian designer Giorgio Turino and his partner sculpter/ photographer/ language teacher Ganora Maurizia walked into the Haadyao Nature Resort as a guest, we immediately took this opportunity to invite them to join our project in creating new designs for batik.

It was a wonderful experience working with Turino with Rita acting as English translator. Turino is a two time first prize winner of the International Comics Contest and provides private tuition for young talented artists. Specializing in textiles and comic illustrations, he has been interested in art since he was eighteen. Both he and Rita live in Alexandria (one hour away from Milan) with their two cats Motter and Puppet. His designs are inspired by the nature of Libong Island. We have attached some (there's many more!) original designs for you to see. Aren't they lovely? When we showed them to the rural women’s batik groups, they were so excited and could not wait to start making pieces of batik cloth from these new prints. Turino and Rita are thrilled at their response and are looking forward to seeing their designs on local batik products in the near future.

On behalf of Lifelong Learning Foundation and Transrural Trust, I would like to thank both Turino and Rita for their contribution to our project. We wish them the best of luck as they continue on their travels and a safe journey back to Italy at the end of the month.