Education and Early Development

Mann studied Textile Design at Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design in London, earning a BA with honors, before completing an MA in Constructed Textiles at the Royal College of Art. She began exploring abstraction through hand-dyed and woven works in 1992 and established her independent studio practice in 1997.

From the beginning, Mann approached weaving as a contemporary visual language rather than solely as a functional or decorative tradition. Her training provided an exacting understanding of material, structure, and construction, while her interest in painting and architecture encouraged her to consider woven cloth as a spatial and pictorial surface.

Weaving and Chromatic Minimalism

Mann’s woven artworks are made through a slow and highly controlled process. She dyes individual lengths of thread before weaving them on an upright Dobby loom, embedding gradations of color into the fabric as it is constructed. The completed cloth is stretched over a frame, producing a taut, refined surface whose luminous transitions can initially appear painted.

This method allows Mann to determine the placement and movement of color before the cloth exists as a finished object. Individual threads function like painted lines, while the repeated structures of warp and weft create rhythm, depth, and architectural order. The term “Chromatic Minimalism” has been applied to these works, which balance formal restraint with an intense and often emotional experience of color.

Painting and Thread Paintings

After decades of working primarily through dye and thread, Mann began developing large-scale paintings on watercolor paper and canvas. These works introduced a more immediate process in which liquid pigment, acrylic, and watercolor could spread, pool, and intersect across the surface. Vertical and horizontal bands recall the underlying language of weaving, but the speed and spontaneity of painting stand in deliberate contrast to the methodical construction of the woven works.

Mann subsequently brought these two approaches together in her “Thread Paintings.” Acrylic paint is applied directly to her hand-dyed and woven surfaces, allowing gestural marks to bleed into, hover above, or partially conceal the underlying cloth. Structure and surface become inseparable: woven threads suggest brushstrokes, while painted gestures enter the physical architecture of the textile. These hybrid works challenge conventional distinctions between painting and weaving while preserving the particular qualities of both.

Color and Influences

Color is the central subject of Mann’s practice. She is interested in the relationships between colors, their affective potential, and their ability to generate light and atmosphere. Optical effects and natural phenomena inform her exploration of dye, thread, paper, paint, and time. Whether color is applied rapidly in the dye laboratory or developed slowly through weaving, it remains both material and experiential.

Her work is grounded in the principles of Bauhaus design and shaped by a sustained engagement with architecture, color theory, and Abstract Expressionism. The chromatic fields of Mark Rothko and the gestural freedom associated with Joan Mitchell and Helen Frankenthaler are important points of reference. Mann absorbs these influences into a practice that moves between control and spontaneity, precision and emotion, construction and gesture.

Architecture and Collaborations

Mann has completed numerous architectural and site-specific commissions for public, corporate, and cultural settings. In 2019, Tate Modern commissioned Circadian Rhythm, a monumental woven triptych conceived in response to the daily movement of light. The work brought her investigation of color, time, and architecture into direct conversation with the museum environment.

Her wider collaborations have included projects with the NHS, Cunard, KPMG, British Land, The Open University, Hilton Hotel Group, Sotheby’s, and architectural practices including Stanton Williams and Allies and Morrison. In 2024, she collaborated with RIMOWA on a limited-edition interpretation of her Threshold paintings, translating layered color and gestural marks onto the company’s Essential Cabin suitcase.

Exhibitions, Recognition and Publications

Mann has exhibited internationally since the late 1990s. Major presentations include The Architecture of Cloth: Colour and Space, a touring exhibition held across the United Kingdom in 2011 and 2012; Woven Colour at Dovecot Studios in Edinburgh in 2024 and 2025; and Significant Colour with Findlay Galleries in 2025. She has also participated in exhibitions at the Royal Academy, Chatsworth House, Maison Louis Carré, Ruthin Craft Centre, and the House of Finn Juhl in Copenhagen.

Her first monograph, Thread Painting, was published by Hurtwood Press in 2024. Bringing together more than 140 images, the book examines the development of her woven works, paintings, and hybrid Thread Paintings, with contributions by Ann Coxon, Chloë Ashby, Es Devlin, and the artist. The publication was shortlisted in the Best Art and Architecture Monograph category of the 2024 British Book Design and Production Awards.

Mann lectures internationally, writes for Selvedge, curates, and has received three grants from Arts Council England. Her woven work Solstice (Golden Dusk) was acquired by the Victoria and Albert Museum for its permanent collection in 2026. Findlay Galleries represents Ptolemy Mann in the United States.

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