Idris Khan creates a unique work for Fine Cell Work’s Human Touch exhibition and sale

This exhibition (Sotheby's, London, 26 February-3 March 2020; bidding from 12 February 2020) and sale of works a ground-breaking collaboration between international contemporary artists and stitchers working in prisons, trained by the leading charity and social enterprise Fine Cell Work.

All proceeds will go to Fine Cell Work, working to enable prisoners across Britain to build fulfilling and crime free-lives by training them to do high-quality creative needlework, and thereby helping to foster hope, discipline and selfesteem.

Speaking about the collaboration, Khan said:

'I made a photograph called "Numbers" in 2016. The image was intriguing to me because I used tally marks on a chalk board and kept erasing them over and over again. Almost marking the time whilst the photograph was being made.

There is a long history and images of tally marks made in prison to mark the length of time someone is in a cell. I really thought it was an exciting idea to make a stitched relic to represent the time it took Ben in his cell to make the artwork. I believe it took him 180 hours to stitch on top of the screen-printed fabric. In the end we are looking at one thing; time.

Fine Cell Work is an exceptional charity and it was a pleasure to make this work with Ben.'

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Image: Idris Khan, Numbers – A Hand-Sewn Photograph, 2019

180 x 210 cm

© Idris Khan