Peggy Longlegs by Donna Wilson, 2005. Lambswool, polyester stuffing, machine knitted. Courtesy of the Crafts Council.

Kristen Bailey casts on at Knit 2 Together: Concepts In Knitting, an exhibition of contemporary knitted art. It is at the Crafts Council until May 15 2005, when it will begin a tour of the UK.

Knitting has been the new rock ‘n’ roll for over a year now. ‘Guerilla’ knitting groups such as Cast Off have been knitting in pubs, on beaches and even on the Circle Line, and the ‘Crafts Rocks’ event at the V&A Museum last spring saw the place full of knitters knitting while a DJ span the tunes.

As this model or that actress has ‘confessed’ to being a fan, the press has been excitedly reporting knitting’s newly acquired cool. And at last, here’s an inspiring showcase of the knitted art being produced by 15 contemporary artists from around the world.

As an unskilled but enthusiastic knitter, knitting is my default activity when I’m watching telly. It’s apt for me, then, that Canadian artist Janet Morton should knit a living room, complete with a TV, standard lamp and houseplant. It’s a domestic setting – not an office or a factory – reflecting knitting’s perceived place in the home.

Blue Knitting (detail) by Celia Pym, 2001-2. Yarn, handknitted. Courtesy of the Crafts Council.

Also picking up on a domestic theme are Shane Waltener’s Out There and Over Here, two large white doilies made of shirring elastic, pinned to two tables, with the pieces’ titles just visible in the lacy pattern. They make me think of spider webs, dreamcatchers, and the intricate doilies my Nanna used to crochet.

Moving away from home, there’s Celia Pym’s Blue Knitting. It looks like what most novice knitters start with – a stripy scarf. Knitted as Pym spent nine months travelling around Japan, it grew to 24 metres long and is a record of her journey, its many shades of blue echoing the colours of the skies she saw in Japan and making reference to Japan’s traditional indigo-dyed textiles.

Knit Uncensored by Kelly Jenkins, 2003. Machine knitted. Courtesy of the Crafts Council.

Donna Wilson’s Picknit is a fantasy scene of weird and wonderful machine-knitted creatures sitting on knitted grass around a knitted picnic. Cuddly they may be, but not all these creatures look entirely friendly - you can imagine them popping up in a Roald Dahl book.

Fantasy of a very different kind can found in Kelly Jenkins’ huge machine-knitted works which draw on the imagery and language of the sex industry. Knit Uncensored gives advice on how to, ‘Turn your partner on with 22 new and uncensored knitting positions’. I blush. It’s the raciest knitting I’ve ever seen.

In The Beginning Was The Word by Stephanie Speight, 2000. Book pages, knitting needles and chair, hand knitted. Courtesy of the Crafts Council.

The knitting potential of a wide variety of materials is explored. What can be knitted with? How will the finished cloth behave? For her piece, In The Beginning Was The Word, Stephanie Speight has used the fettuccine attachment of her pasta machine to shred old books and produce a chunky recycled paper yarn which she has handknitted.

In stark contrast is Susie MacMurray’s delicate Maidenhair - a long piece of french knitting (knitted cord) made from human hair. It is barely visible as it hangs from the gallery ceiling, and sways in the breeze if you breathe on it.

Maidenhair (detail) by Susie MacMurray, 2001. Human hair, french knitted. Courtesy of the Crafts Council.

Freddie Robins is probably the best-known knitting artist, renowned for subverting the form to produce thought-provoking pieces such as Knitted Homes of Crime, a series of knitted miniatures of famous houses where women have committed high-profile crimes.

Here she has created a wall piece made of bits of machine knitting whose shapes were decided randomly by throwing dice, gloriously (and honestly) titled, How to make a piece of work when you’re too tired to make decisions.

How to make a piece of work when you’re too tired to make decisions by Freddie Robins, 2004. 4-ply woollen yarn, dress pins, machine knitted. Courtesy of the Crafts Council.

Visitors can get involved – there are giant needles and yarn to have a go with, and an oversized knitting dolly with a huge length of french knitting in progress. There’s also a wall where you are invited to record your memories of knitting.

Some of the stories which previous visitors have already written are funny – tales of first attempts at knitting resulting in bizarrely shaped, unusable pieces of work. Others are touching – recalling the person (usually an older woman) who taught them to knit as a child.

In the midst of all this exciting contemporary work, it’s a reminder that passing on a craft skill from one generation to the next is a very important part of our creative heritage. Once someone has learned to knit, who knows what they might make?

...and cast off, knitwise.