Article about Trude Owen: 'Busy Fingers - Charitable Fingers', featured in Cardiff News Synagogue newsletter, September 1985

Disgrifiad

An article about Trude Owen: 'Busy Fingers - Charitable Fingers' featured in September 1985 newsletter published by the Cardiff New Synagogue. It highlights the popularity and far reaching importance of Trude Owen's embroidery. It also contains biographical information to show how her life informed her work.

The author describes the presence of Trude's work in the Cardiff New (later Reform) Synagogue: The Ark Curtain, the Torah-mantles, the pulpit cover, and of course the items worn and carried by the congregation itself.

They then paint a picture of how her work spilled into other synagogues and Jewish organisations as far reaching as America.

When asked about the beginnings of her creative impulse Trude cites the Six Day War of 1967 as a terrible time that she needed to find a refuge from (two of her cousins were in the Israeli army): this turned out to be the making of some tallit-bags and challah-covers for friends.

Trude Owen (1926-2003) was born in Brno, Czechoslovakia to observant Jewish parents. Having heard many of his speeches on the radio, Trude's father Hans anticipated danger from Adolf Hitler in 1938 and began to plan a move of his whole family to south Wales where he had the opportunity to set up a factory due to the South Wales Development Agency.

While twelve-year old Trude and her older sister fifteen-year old Ilse were able to take the trip from Nazi Germany to Britain in early 1939, their mother Hilda was almost left behind in Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia. Hans had to claim that one of their daughters was seriously ill to convince the German authorities to let her leave for the United Kingdom.

Trude first discovered her skill at textile production due to her mother's own ability as a needlewoman and her encouragement that Trude and her sister busy themselves with hobbies. Her parents' acquisition of an embroidery factory in Treforest also likely fuelled her interest. When she was nearing forty, she took a ten-week needlework course which allowed her to perfect her ability. Trude went on to make over twenty-five curtains for Arks in Synagogues including the one in the Cardiff Reform Synagogue, of which she was a member.

Depository: Glamorgan Archives.