What a tough decision for the gallery director Sandra McMahon to make to put it back to a three-year exhibition.

Another blow to the textile/fibre world.

Textile/fibre artists have been struggling for recognition within the Australian art world for as long as the Tamworth Fibre Textile Biennial has been showing, even longer for some highly acclaimed textile/fibre artists.

Textile/fibre artists struggle to get any textile/fibre exhibition into a gallery anywhere in Australia, but when a gallery exhibits textiles/fibres they report a huge increase in the numbers through the door.

In Tamworth, sport does exceed greatly in importance over any type of art, but a huge chasm exists between sport and textile/fibre art.

The value of our textile/fibre collection surpasses any other textile/fibre collection in any other gallery in Australia ... a great honour and achievement to have such a collection.

We have fought hard to get a gallery that has the potential to show the best in the world and after every Tamworth Fibre Textile Biennial there seems to be a ground swell as to whether the event will ever happen again.

As soon as one Tamworth Fibre Textile Biennial finishes, it is a herculean task to get the funding and the administration to have the next one.

It should not be made that tough for a highly acclaimed exhibition.

Having the exhibition tri-annually should not have been allowed to happen.

We are the jewel in the crown in the Australian textile/fibre world and the decision to go tri-annual is, to me, the first nail in the coffin.

Glenys Mann

TAMWORTH