By Liilian Saksi

Editor’s note: Liilian Saksi lives and works in Skotterud, in rural eastern Norway. She attended the Oslo National Academy of the Arts (master’s degree, 2017). She was born in Norrköping, Sweden, so she uses the Swedish word, språngning, for the technique known in Norway and the U.S. as sprang.

The Core of my Artistic Practice

My works start with wool as the raw material, and they become textile surfaces mounted on walls or free-standing sculptures. They function as variations on consistent themes: interaction with the material and the interplay of color.

My primary interest lies in the optical perception of color we experience. I often work with shades that have an equal value, so that a kind of flicker or friction occurs. I work largely according to self-defined limitations and then allow the work to change, sometimes intuitively and sometimes systematically.  The work process begins when the wool is cut, continues through spinning and dyeing, and finally constructing a textile surface through the twining technique språngning [sprang].

I work with my own flock of sheep at home on the farm and at my parents’ house. Rooting the work in a specific place and life situation, and not least in my relationship with the sheep, springs from my interest in the human relationship with other species. I am interested in how daily contact with animals affects us psychologically, but also in our conflicting attitudes towards different groups of animals and the animal’s intrinsic value.

Working with Wool

Animals. I have always been very interested in our relationship with animals. I look partly with a broad evolution perspective — how we as a species began to domesticate other species and breed them, and how society has developed into what it is today, with rather grotesque differences in life and status between, for example, farm animals and pets.

This is closely related to what it means to work with wool. Wool production is a giant industry with terrible living conditions for the sheep in many places. My sheep and I live in a rather secluded situation. We have our own cycle, an existence without the production of lambs for slaughter. The sheep I have live a whole life. It sounds romantic, and it is, but at the same time having a working farm and producing our own hay can be physically hard. Life and art go hand in hand.

But really, perhaps the motivation is primarily personal – as for many others, having close and happy daily contact with animals, preferably pets, has a lot to say for my well-being. It keeps me in the moment.

Color. Wool as a material is fantastic. Apart from the usual qualities people describe, I love how it renders colour. It both radiates at the same time as it takes the viewer into the material, it has a shine and a depth in it. That wool is easy to dye, and not least of all relatively easy to shape by felting or spinning, of course makes it even better. In my case that is essential as the dyeing and spinning are what take up the most time during my work process. It needs to be work that is fun and manageable. It is important to have parts of my work that do not require a lot of thinking – it allows me to work a lot and energetically. Sitting and spinning is a kind of relaxation, but also a process that promotes mental activity, a bit like jogging. Being physically busy often allows for very clear thoughts or ideas, and sometimes solutions.

By working with a traditional material and the most basic textile techniques I experience greater motivation. It is almost dizzying for me to think how for millennia people have sat and worked like me – of course with a less modern spindle, and under completely different circumstances and living conditions. But still, it makes me feel a kind of connection.

My Interest in Sprang

My artistic training began with weaving, and in a way I have always been interested in textile structures and connections. But I found that the complicated weaving structures became too technical for me and made me lose touch with the material. When I started spinning yarn during my MFA, I was looking for a technique that was airy so that the shape and character of the yarn could come through, where the yarn itself could have prominence within the work.

I found språngning quite casually on the internet, after watching many online videos.  I learned språngning via YouTube. Pretty quickly I got hooked on the interlaced binding because it has such a clear direction diagonally in the work. I like the idea of it being a line for the material throughout the work, it adds a kind of movement. The thread is interlaced so that it moves to the right and left for each turn.

 

The textile surface is perceived as woven, but with the difference that the threads cross each other on the diagonal and that it is a continuous line, compared to warp and weft. In recent years I have focused on the interlaced binding and worked with color compositions within it. The seemingly small variations in the distribution of threads in the warp give clear results in the composition. By concentrating on a fixed, pre-determined format I can work my way up to precision in controlling, for example, when and how many times the colors in different color fields meet each other, within a grid pattern.

For future work in Språngning, I see great potential to bring in two other variations: a twisting technique and a chaining technique, especially the chaining that is braided in zigzag, back and forth, constructing an elastic textile that becomes tight in a relaxed state.

There are so many possibilities with språngning, and I think I’m going to explore this technique for many years to come. I plan to have a larger flock of sheep over time. I will work with individual sheep on my own farm, something that can clarify and demonstrate the core of my artistic practice – closeness to both the animals and materials they provide..

Liilian Saksi, February 2023 
www.liiliansaksi.com
Instagram: @liiliansaksi
liilian.saksi@gmail.com

Liilian Saksi recently finished a public commission for Ila prison and Detention Center, Oslo, through the Norwegian public art program, KORO, and has an upcoming commission at Dragvoll Helse- og Velferdssenter, Trondheim (2025). 

Her works are scheduled for several upcoming exhibits:
Hovedøya Kunstsal, Oslo, August 2023. A group exhibition of textile artists in dialogue, arranged by Ingrid Aarvik Berge and Thea Urdal. The artists are Kari Steihaug/Sebastian Rusten, Anne Stabell/Ingrid A. Berge, and Brit Fuglevaag/Liilian Saksi.
KRAFT Bergen, Solo exhibition, January 2024.
Kunstnerforbundet Oslo, Solo exhibition, 2025.