“I hand-inlayed a naïve sad face on each figure and deliberately left them unfinished with their threads uncut to give the impression
that they were falling apart at the seams.”

The Disappeared, 2015
Machine knitted cotton and linen
Purchased by the Arts Council of Northern Ireland, 2020 
Photographs by Eva Herzog                                                                  

The Disappeared is a knitted textile installation created in response to the 2015 government cut backs in Northern Ireland. The piece specifically references thirty-six redundancies in the rehabilitation scheme at Hydebank Wood College and women and young people’s prison. It was perchance that artist Alice Blackstock found out about these detrimental measures at Hydebank as it was not publicised. She spoke with the head of rehabilitation at the prison and quickly realised that something was not right. That morning, thirty-six rehabilitation officers had been told not to come back on Monday and now this crucial job fell to just one person. The predictable consequences of dismissing a team dedicated to reintroducing vulnerable women and young people back into communities was shameful.