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As part of the Curatorial Ethics Network (CEN) Talk Series 2026, Rachel Dedman (Jameel Curator of Contemporary Art from the Middle East at the V&A) will give an online lecture, recounting the process of curating the exhibition Thread Memory: Embroidery from Palestine at V&A Dundee (2025—2026), following over a decade of research, writing and curatorial work on this subject.

Beginning with the rich history of tatreez and the diversity of traditional Palestinian dress, the exhibition traces the evolution and politicisation of embroidery beyond the Nakba of 1948, examining relationships between dress and resistance. For its showing in Dundee, the exhibition examined the historic twin-city relationship between Dundee and Nablus, and brought the work of contemporary Palestinian artists and designers into conversation with historical material. It also shed a vital spotlight on Gaza, ending with a special loan from the Rafah Museum. Thread Memory was made in partnership with the Palestinian Museum in Birzeit, Palestine, Hayy Jameel in Jeddah, V&A Dundee and V&A South Kensington, and this network of organisational support underpins the project. Rachel will reflect on the responsibility of museums and curators to address the urgencies of the present, and the practical, emotional and ethical challenges that come with work on this subject.

Biography

Rachel Dedman is the Jameel Curator of Contemporary Art from the Middle East at the V&A, London, where she curates the triennial Jameel Prize and the Jameel Fellowship artist residency programme. Recent exhibitions include Embroidering Palestine, MoMu, Antwerp, 2025; Thread Memory: Embroidery from Palestine, 2025, at V&A Dundee and Hayy Jameel; Counter-Monuments, Beirut, London Design Festival at the V&A, 2025; Jameel Prize: Moving Images, 2024, for the V&A, touring to Bradford, Jeddah, and Gwangju; and Ties that Bind: The State of Fashion Biennial 2024, in The Netherlands, Brazil, India, and Kenya. Between 2013 and 2019, Dedman was an independent curator based in Beirut where she curated projects for the Palestinian Museum, Ashkal Alwan, Beirut Art Center and Sursock Museum among many others. She is the author of three books on the political histories of Palestinian dress, and holds degrees in the History of Art from St John’s College, Oxford and Harvard University.

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