Turning Over A New Leaf...

or, in this case, turning a leaf into a book...books are made from leaves, right?   I've been contemplating making shaped accordion books, and decided to make a couple of small ones, just to be sure it would actually work... well, you know how it is...  A leaf shape seemed a good idea...

Not only did it work, they actually stand upright...though, given that they're yellow, they're more reminiscent of lemons, than leaves...so...

That's a bit better...  This has potential, I think... so I went from the leaf, to the tree... drawing an outline first, and then following it...roughly...with the scissors... well, I don't colour in the lines, so why would I pay attention to the lines I've drawn...

Mind you...these have been cut from card; I'm not sure that making them in fabric, other than in Lutradur XL, would actually allow them to stand up... but the principle is good.  Perhaps if they're stitched intensely, and made from the heaviest Lutradur other than XL... Hmm...

Playing With Cara...

...as I did on Monday (school holiday), resulted in Granny's Magic Crayons.  She likes drawing...here's my favourite of what she produced. 

So, when she got fed up, and moved on to something else, I had a turn.  'Oh, that's beautiful, Gran', she said, 'It's awfully big, though'.  Err...it's A4... everyone's a critic...

It's really just a doodle....so, when I wanted to refresh my memory as to how to make a slightly different folded book, this was what I used.  First, though, I had to draw on the reverse...

You can see the difference adding water makes; it softens the lines, and spreads the colour over the piece.  So... folded once down the vertical centre line, and three times, equally, across the horizontal, then flattened out, plus a single cut down three quarters of the central line...and hey presto!  a folded book.

I find it intriguing, how the pattern, already abstract, becomes even more so, once folded.  It's unpredictable.  I have to say, I prefer the blue side, rather than the yellow, but they sit well together.  Shall I add words?  Probably not...not convinced I have anything to say about this piece, just a bit of frivolity, really, to remind me how this particular book sits. 

Fossilised.

Back to hand stitch, and the piece I showed you here... The advantage of working small (this piece is roughly A4 size), is that it can lie beside me on the sofa, while I decide what to do with it.  Of course, the disadvantage is that the cats lie on it, don't they, Merlin?  I found myself drawn to the random marks I could see, and stitched them :

That was the easy bit... deciding what to do to create the whole of the shape, which reminded me of a fossil (hence the title), was a bit more challenging.  Another hard line didn't seem to be appropriate. Mainly because 'that purple morass', as I called the area to the right of the figure, was still there, and needed to be worked with, to minimise its impact.  I finally decided to use blanket stitch.

It gives the firm line I wanted to delineate the area, but pulls the eye in to the mass, rather than outwards.  The whole area reminds me of a fossil we have, somewhere, Orthocerus Nautiloid.  I love fossils, I find them fascinating.  I've made one or two pieces based on fossils, but this was a surprise...

And I'm going to leave it at that.  No more stitch.  I don't think it would add anything, to stitch the background, which is quite interesting as it is, plenty of texture and visual interest.  Anyone who has attended one of my printmaking workshops, will know that I talk about 'leaving space for stitch'.  There needs to be a strong visual justification for adding stitch to a print, not just, because it's a textile piece, or, because that's my style... and in my view, there just isn't one here. 

Another one bites the dust....on to the next hand stitch piece...

A Pleasant Surprise...

when I decided to rake about in the book with the more complex dyed fabric....I found a piece that, whilst not perfect (what ever is?), works really well with the piece of fabric that has two goddesses printed on it...

It was originally stitched to another piece of fabric, but a bit of judicious unpicking, and I could tear it into strips.  It is, in itself, an interesting piece of cloth...it had been dyed twice, and then discharge dyed, which is particularly clear on the strip to the left hand side.  As you can probably tell, there is Just Enough, and no more.  I did consider narrower strips, but only after I'd cut them... the secret is to think it first...  I think there will be a poem for the central area, perhaps printed onto paper and cut into individual words, rather than a strip of fabric to divide them.  Yes, indeed, making a virtue of a necessity... And, rather than using the strips to their full width, I will use them as binding, which will be enough to showcase the goddesses, but not so much that they are overshadowed by the stronger colour.

The reason I went into the box in the first place, was to see if I could find some fabric to go with the other prints I've talked about recently...and I did...

The paler colour to the left of the upper selection aren't quite as pale as they appear.  I will add at least one more fabric to each of them, I suspect, and aim to make three pieces from each combination, six in all, of which two will combine fabrics from both selections.  That's the theory, anyway; things change as the work progresses.

So...a happy ending to a frustrating day, in the end. 

Growl.

Having a frustrating day (and it's not even 11 am).  Woke very early, around 5am, and couldn't get back to sleep, so read a bit, got up around 6.30am, which lots of people do routinely (like Robin, for example), but I'm so not a morning person...  Thought I would do a bit of stitch on the book from last time...here's the image of the reverse of  one of the first pages that I promised you...it works fairly well.

So, finished the second of the two leaves on that spread, which I had left half done, and started on the second spread.  I admit, my heart sank somewhat when I realised what I had to stitch.  One side is another one of these leaves...but the other...isn't...sigh...it's a good deal more fiddly...

So, I did one, and left the other two for another day, as my energy had dropped considerably after that.   Here's the reverse...

So...I thought I'd have a wee browse. I came across these fairly abstract goddesses while browsing through the box I showed you a few days ago...

They are rubbings of an original lino cut, using metallic Markal paint sticks, or Shiva sticks if you're in the US.  Not overly keen on the green one, but the other two seem to work quite nicely.  These were done a very long time ago, probably when I was demonstrating for Colourcraft; the fabric is a bit of my hand dye.  I was going to stitch them individually, or as they are in that pairing, ignoring the green one altogether (or cutting her up, perhaps)...but I did think, they would be more interesting 'framed' with a contrasting fabric.  Did I have a suitable fabric?  Of course I didn't.  Well, actually, I do have one that would work, but there's not enough of it.  Hey ho.  Frustrating?  Yes.  Do I really know what it is I want?  No, not really....sigh.  A batik, maybe. Do I have the energy to dye something suitable?  Oh, don't be silly...  So no, I won't be doing anything with them, anytime soon. 

So...I may not have achieved much, but I did achieve a bit.  I'm not going to consider why I'm not overly enthusiastic about the leaf book; that's altogether too big a topic for today.  Nothing seems to be working as planned at the moment. Dammit
.

Back To The Books...

You might remember that I made some linocuts based on a piece I made that featured spears and shields...or trees and leaves, depending on how you thought about it... see it here .  I can't find a post about the book I made through printing the blocks on Lutradur... but it has been lying around the studio, waiting for me to generate energy... reader, I started... this is the 'cover'.

I have to say, this is much more my kind of stitch.  I'm colouring outside the lines again... it matches the fairly rough and ready nature of the prints.  Here's a closer look...

Proof, if proof were ever needed, that I couldn't do a straight line if you paid me for it.  Partly that's to do with the lutradur (like I need an excuse...).... I'm used to working with at least two layers of cloth, one of which is normally wadding, or maybe velvet; this is a single layer of lutradur, and the foot is levitating above the cloth.  Every twitch of the hand shows in the stitch because it's so light, it moves in a disproportionate manner.  My hands are clearly very twitchy.  Overall, though, I don't think it detracts; it's unusual to look so closely at one particular section, like this, divorced from the whole.  And had it been a big deal to have straight stitch, I would have used a walking foot, rather than a darning foot, and all would have been...errr...regular...and probably boring. 

Note the distortion, too, again to do with the weight of the cloth.  I think it'll iron out to a great extent, and I think it gives the piece some character...it seems to age it, a bit, the way that old paper distorts and crinkles slightly as it gets older.

I ran out of steam half way through the second leaf, but it'll get done, slowly, but steadily.  I meant to take images of the back, but forgot; part of the reason for the intensity of the stitch is that the reverse side is significantly paler than the front, unsurprisingly.  I'm using a darker thread on the reverse, and it seems to be working reasonably well.  More to follow as I work through the pages.

What Do You Do...?

...when you don't have the energy for machine stitch, but you want to do something constructive?  Well...I fished out the box with my 'special' hand dyes, the ones that have been printed, or screen printed, or dye painted.  The jury's out on some of them...I kept them because of the work involved in them, I suspect, rather than because I really want to work with them.  Or they would look good in a large scale project, for which I don't have the energy at present (though things are looking up on that front...but I digress...). 

Here's the box itself... not very big at all, as you can see; I have another one that size with plain hand dyes...not that I consider my hand dyes particularly plain, but that's an entirely different post. 

A variety of colours and textures.  The top one was an attempt at breakdown screen printing...here it is with another one, made far later in the process...

I'm going to make a journal from the top one, but I may cut up the lower one and reassemble it, with or without another cloth or two...actually, it would make a good basis for another series of haiku quilts (find out about them here ).  Might do the same with the top one, actually... it would fit into the ME series really well. 

And then there's this...

It's a lot more orange than this image, but I can't persuade it to behave itself, so you'll just have to make do.  A piece of low water immersion hand dye, which has been overprinted using fabric paints, using two different lino blocks.  Sadly, I don't think I have the leaf shaped lino block any more, and doubt I have the energy to cut another one...it was quite effective.  If there was more of this fabric it would make a good skirt, or some other piece of clothing...as it is, it might become a panel in a larger piece, but I'd need to have a good deal more energy to make that happen.  It'll go back into the box, and wait.  It would certainly make good cushions...but I don't have a room they would fit into... sigh.

There's a lot more cloth in there, but it'll have to wait, too.  Enough is enough.

Done And Dusted...

...at least, where the stitch is concerned...have a look...

The top 'side' is actually a lot more yellow than that, but because Lutradur XL is semi transparent,  and the piece is back lit, the pink from the other side is showing through...and vice versa.  I did contemplate noodling a line across the whole piece, with the occasional leaf on it, but decided against it.  I like the feeling of space in this work.  I am, though, contemplating adding some text...'dreaming the crimson daisy', which is the title of the book. 

Have another look at an individual daisy.

The stitch is fairly even, but it's by no means perfect.  It's the stitch equivalent of colouring outwith the lines; I wanted a relaxed, modern feel, and I also wanted to even out the relative sizes of the petals, hence the stitch.  I usually vary stitch length too, for visual interest, but decided that it would be a distraction rather than an enhancement.  What I'm trying to say here, I suppose, is that I wouldn't win any awards for stitch with this piece, but that doesn't make it any less beautiful.  It works, and that's what's important.  So many of us worry about work not being perfect...well, guess what?  Perfect, by and large, is boring.  And it's really not necessary to enjoy either making or appreciating a piece of art.  Mother Nature doesn't make each petal of an individual flower the same; she doesn't like boring, either.  That's my excuse, and I'm sticking to it.

Getting Sidetracked...

...is a fairly common occurrence for me, and it usually leads to something creative.  Unfortunately,  it also brings problems.  The days are gone when I can just poddle about in my workroom, doing a bit of this, and a bit of that...or at least, not if I intend to do something specific.  And I did have that intention.  I wanted to do more machine stitch, and thought I would work on this book, which has been hanging around for ages, waiting for me to feel well enough to do it.

First, I needed suitable threads...and finding those took quite a bit of the available energy.  I realised, as I did it, that unpacking and shelving in order of finding things, was not the most effective way of doing it.  I need to have the threads near the machine, so I don't have to cross the room to get them.  Yes, it's only four or five steps there and back, so ten in all.  But add in the amount of time it took to stand and work out what I wanted, and select them, and you're into a major energy drain.  So I'm going to have to get someone, probably Robin (sorry, Robin) to move stuff around for me.  But I digress (at least digressing in my mind doesn't take quite as much energy, huh?).

While photographing, I noticed the little ME quilt on the cutting board...okay, I thought, two minutes... and that's what it took.

I'm pleased with it, though I have to say, it looks better in real life.  But back to the book.  Bobbin wound, machine threaded, I worked on a single flower.

Reader, that was enough.  No more energy.  But it's a decent enough beginning.  Here's the back...and this is why I like machine stitch on books.  The back is the same as the front, other than being a different thread (cotton on the front, rayon on the back, both variegated); no need to worry about what the stitch is going to look like, as you do with hand stitch...and for this particular book, it's important, because it was designed with that in mind.

I'm pleased with how it's looking so far.  I wanted to give the idea of a sketch, rather than a full blown representation of a flower, and I think this is working really well.  I may only be able to do a couple of flowers a day; tracing the image with stitch requires a lot of concentration, and that's tiring, too.  But it's worth it.  

Testing, Testing...

...because, after all, it has been a while, and I haven't touched the machine since its service, a good couple of months ago.  Today, though, felt like the day.  Lovely stitch...until I dropped the feed dogs. and realised I couldn't remember what the tension ought to be for free motion... so a bit of farting around, and muttering under the breath, and we were sort of good to go.  I grabbed another one of those pieces that have been lying about forever, this one a combination of lutradur and evolon, and doodled....  to discover that I was seriously rusty.  Oh well... you know what they say about practice...even if you can only cope with doing it for a maximum half hour at a stretch.... here's what I ended up with.

I originally had it the other way up, but somehow, with stitch added, this seemed to be the right way up.  Not that it matters, really, because it was just a test piece, and will either end up in the bin, or be cut up to make jewellery.  Here's the other option, just so's you know...

When I started to feel a bit more comfortable with things, I did some details... mock Charles Rennie Mackintosh roses...

And for those of you who like this sort of thing, here's the back...just wadding...

I'm not the worlds greatest stitcher, but I did have fun.  Hopefully, with a couple more of these under my belt, I can start on the little queue of books that's building up...

Meanwhile...

...another of the pieces I kept out of the cull.  This is a piece of evolon, and it has been transfer dyed; that, I know for sure...the rest is speculation.  I think this is a monoprint.  I'm persisting because I love the textures in some of the areas, mostly the left hand section.

I was finding it difficult to decide which way is up, hence the two images.  The jury is still out, but I'm going to work with the top image, and see where we go. 
 
I've argued with myself, long and hard, about whether to work with this.  The main problem I have is the dark section, which seems to dominate the piece.  In the bottom image, it looks a bit like a semi abstract figure running away (bizarre, huh?). 

So, I need some way to redress the balance, and decided that a continuous line of stitch along the textured section would help to define it.  I happened to have some appropriate thread, but the question was, which stitch?  I feel quite lazy when it comes to stitch, so I decided to use one I haven't used before, split stitch.  Basically, it's a back stitch, but instead of meeting the edge of the preceding stitch, you come out within it, splitting the thread.  Here's a close up...

Reader, it's fiddly.  It's not helped by the evolon, which is not easy to hand stitch.  The best advice I can give, if you want to try it, is to keep the thread taut by catching it underneath, before bringing the needle upwards.  That makes it easier to trap the thread.  It drove me nuts....though I suspect it would have been easier, had it not been evolon....sigh... 

It may have been fiddly, but it worked.  The balance has shifted from that purple morass in the centre, out to the edge, as I hoped it would.

Now to decide what to do next. 

Autumn...

...is definitely here, seemed like the appropriate moment to add some stitch to this wet felted piece, in the shape of a leaf, yet another something or nothing saved from the cull.  In truth, I suspect that I meant it to be a petal...but who knows..it was made several years ago, can't do wet felting now. 

It was, however, always intended as a three dimensional piece.  It reminds me of autumn leaves that have turned colour, and are just beginning to dry out.  They buckle in intriguing ways.  This one has a natural curve on the edge, and slopes as if it were a very shallow bowl.  I really regret that white; I don't know what I was thinking.  So, to break up the white, and encourage the natural curves, I added stitch, as always, hand dyed cotton thread.

Happy now? Not really.. the stitch achieved what it was supposed to, perhaps too well in some places.  Might consider painting that white, using watercolour paint, to see if I can decrease the contrast.  I suspect it may be flogging a dead horse.  Not everything succeeds as planned...hell, not everything succeeds.  It's okay.  It's called learning.

Today...

...is National Poetry Day...here's the website.  There are events all over the place, if you're quick, you might get to one!  So...I thought I'd share a poem.  The artists among us might appreciate it.  It's new, so probably subject to change, and it hasn't got a title yet.  Maybe it doesn't want one.

Please, do not ask
How many hours it took:
Think days and weeks and
Long, long years, think lifetimes
Thought and practice, reflect
On observations,
All those sketches, notes and plans,
That led us to this moment, this
Construction, this depiction.
Ask, instead, its story,
I will tell you what I know of it
It may not match your viewpoint
But it's mine.

 Quilters in particular seem to be very keen on knowing how long something took.  To me, that's irrelevant, as are the technical considerations they usually ask about.  To me, it's all about the meaning, and even that may not be shared by all.  And that, to me, is the beauty of it.  Happy National Poetry Day!

The image is 'Losing My Religion'.  It has it's own story, but I won't bore you with it now.  See what story you find in it, instead.

Trusting The Process....

...is all there is, really.  I spent most of the morning avoiding stitching the new piece, and couldn't work out why.  It didn't feel like being lazy...goodness knows, I know how that feels, and this wasn't it.  I had intended to stitch lines down the whole of the piece, representing tears...except... I made three, and then thought...what am I doing? 

For me, it's all about meaning.  Stitch for the sake of it, because I've always done it that way, isn't my thing.  So I took a closer look at what this piece represents...and discovered that actually, it's about holding it together.  The stitch needed to show that...and here's the finished piece.

There are three lines of stitch on the left hand side, and a single line on the right.  The silk carrier rod has been stitched on, and there are a four stitches holding the tiny piece of rust dyed silk at the top.  And that's it. Just enough to hold it together. 

Because that's what's going on in my life, at present.  I know how to live with this illness, but I don't know how to live with it well, with conviction.  My life is roughly the size of a postage stamp, where before it was a huge, bright canvas.  It's difficult to adapt to, because the parameters change from day to day.  So all I can do is hold it all together, and persist.  And try to make something meaningful out of it, for myself and, hopefully, for others.

For The Want Of A Pin...

...the fabric was lost.  It's a long story.  Oh, okay then.

I thought I'd work on the new ME piece, this one:

So I trimmed it down (yes, I said I wouldn't, yes it's wonky and will need redone with the rotary cutter... sigh.  Take careful note of the long strip of rust dyed organza on the right of the image.  So far, so good.  I looked at it, and decided that, rather than using the metallic thread I had chosen, on its own, I would combine it with a plain grey thread.  And so I did.  Before I started stitching, though, I thought, I'll just pin this down.  There were three pins in my bowl, and given that I had cleaned the kitchen window sill, earlier that morning (don't ask), I didn't want to waste energy on going to get more.  So I Made Do.  Stupid woman.  Daring the first line of stitch, that strip of rust dyed organza fell off, and lay beside me on the sofa, pitifully.  Sod it, I thought, it can lie there til I'm ready.  

So, I looked at the first line of stitch, and thought...nope... In my head, it's ideal.  Sometimes, though, what you feel doesn't match up with what you know, and so it was in this case.  

For a start, it looks like a line of tacking...not the idea at all.  But also, it dominates those pale colours, which are, after all, the point of the piece.  Reader, I took it out, and replaced it with some white, that I think I must have acquired from Clare Hedges (there's a definite advantage to being friends with a weaver).  And at that point, I thought, where's that bit of organza?  Yes, you guessed it, vanished without trace.  So... I looked for it.  The list of places where it wasn't, was extensive, including the book I'd replaced in the coffee table drawer.  Not stuck to my sweater, which I'd had to remove (too warm...sodding ME...I have no control over my body temperature; usually I'm freezing, today, though, I'm too hot).  Not stuck to the throws on the sofa, or the cushions.  So I retraced my steps, back into the kitchen, via the downstairs loo.  No, and no.  I did, though, reassemble the stuff on the kitchen window sill.  So...nothing for it but to dismantle the sofa.  Back to the kitchen, to collect the hand held vacuum, to get rid of the crumbs and cat hair that had accumulated below the cushions... and a quick clean out of the litter tray..sigh.  

Reader, the damn thing has vanished.  So... I thought about replacing it with another bit of organza, but couldn't find any in the scrap box in the living room.  And given the amount of energy I'd used, I wasn't going to look in my workroom.  However, I did find a silk carrier rod... 

Which, actually, I prefer... only now it looks unbalanced against the other bit of organza...so a quick adjustment...

And that's what I'm going with.  If you look very carefully (I've enlarged the image to help a bit), you'll see stitch to the right of the silk carrier rod.  Unobtrusive, as it should be.  I think there will be less of it than I originally intended, and not just because I've now used every last bit of energy I had, and possibly some of tomorrow's, too.  A box of pins will feature on my side table in future...sigh.