CTANZ Symposium 2026
RAU researchers Arielle Walker, Rachel Carley, Jennifer Whitty, and Xinhan Zhang presented papers at the 2026 CTANZ Symposium: Haerenga/Journeys, in Whanganui this May. The symposium was a fantastic opportunity to reconnect with a network of makers and researchers around all things textile.
Arielle discussed her practice-led research into narrative embroidered “tapestry” techniques, drawing from a previous textile residency experience with
Textílmiðstöð Íslands/the Icelandic Textile Centre. Rachel shared the process of designing a series of paraikete (wool blankets), with colours and patterns deeply connected through her ancestral whenua, and their connection to the complex and ongoing histories of paraikete in Aotearoa. Drawing on more than 12 years of research and practice across Silk Road contexts, including China, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, Jennifer explored ‘decolonial unforgetting’ as a practice of decoloniality in fashion. Her presentation considered how encounters across cultures, places and knowledge systems can unsettle colonial frameworks and cultivate relational responsibility, reciprocity and learning across difference. As part of a postgraduate session to bring the conference to a resounding close, Xinhan Zhang shared from her recent MDes research, Feeling of Being, exploring basket weaving as a contemplative, practice-led process that reflects impermanence, memory, and evolving notions of home.
Image: Xinhan Zhang, Feeling of Being presentation, CTANZ 2026