The Shape of Desire: Knitwear and the Body

Abstract

If the body is the starting point for an unlimited journey of sharing signals of communication and recognition, it is also a point of arrival for desires and sensations that we live and share in our personal and public sphere. This article aims to address the theme of body communication over time and its sharing with the textile knitted materials that throughout its development have helped to shape the objective and subjective factors that allow building a language of seduction and power. This paper will present an overview of three different moments, throughout human history, where knitting and its characteristics were adopted as an integral part of the exercise for the development of aesthetic renewal and where technique and visual intersect in an exhibition and body projection.