Sketchbooks And Journals...

...became big business several years ago.  Articles about how to are all over the internet, not to mention the books.  In this country, I think it's a lot to do with City and Guilds; if it's not developed in a sketchbook or journal, it's not considered 'proper' work.   Snort.  And all these articles and books are full of beautifully finished illustrations, many of them mixed media of some kind, implying that that is what you should be producing.  Yeah, right.   To me, both sketchbooks and journals are working documents, and they're not for public consumption.  They're about process, the development of ideas, and it's unfortunate that this plethora of information and images potentially puts off as many people as it encourages.

I rarely use a sketchbook, and when I do, it tends to be to kill time in a waiting room.  I much prefer to develop ideas through the materials, usually without a specific plan.  As it happens, I was in a waiting room yesterday (more of that later), and I thought I'd share what I did, and what the process was in its production.

So...I started just making marks, a good way to warm up.  They're the marks in the centre of this page, a roughly sketched repeating pattern.  And then I thought, what I should really be doing, is playing around with ideas for a book, more specifically the book that will support the work I showed you here

So... I drew a number of rectangles.  and started to play around with the basic idea, to see if it would work at the smaller size of an individual book page.  The rectangle trick is a really good way of developing ideas; it lets you compare and contrast within a single page.  Seemed to be okay, so I took it a stage further, looking at the way the pages would combine in the unfolded book.  They occur in threes within this particular folded book structure.  You'll notice that at this stage, the blocks I've sketched out aren't particularly carefully done.  This is an idea; as long as I can get a rough idea of how things will work, that's enough.  I prefer to develop on the actual piece, or on a facsimile thereof, rather than in the journal...see what I mean about a *working* document? 

I started on the bottom page, top row.  Three semi abstract landscapes.  As I thought that having them all aligned in the same way was boring, I tried changing the orientation on the bottom row.  That seemed better, so I looked at what that would be like in combination, on the page above.  I'm happy with that, and will try it in real time.  And, as the doctor was running late, that gave me the chance to sketch out an idea I had several days ago, for a shaped book based on a tree.

This one will be all about the cutting, using the same approach as for a doll paper chain.  It won't be possible to stand this one up, but I still think it'll be an interesting thing to do in either paper or textile.  And that took me to leaves, a visual pun on a 'leaf' of paper, using the same technique.  You'll notice I write myself wee notes (and often I never refer to them again...go figure...).  Incidentally, I went back to the original post and made some more notes; the drawings of individual pages made me think that it might be interesting to make some single pages like that, and join them using some wrapped twigs.  I'm not sure if this one will work, particularly not the second leaf shape.  Though the second one might be interesting as a chain that I could drape around a larger book...it's a thought...

So, where does that leave me?  A couple of ideas confirmed as doable; another as a possibility, depending on size, and a further idea for a 'garland' of leaves, possibly made from burned out lutradur and stitch.  Not bad for fifteen minutes of thinking and drawing. 

I hope that demystifies the making of sketchbooks, and proves how useful they can be.  I started with no idea whatsoever of what I was going to do, but the process of doodling reminded me of things I could be doing to develop a couple of existing ideas. 

I said that I'd mention the doctor's appointment.  The ME ( I refuse to call it 'my' ME) has deteriorated quite dramatically over the last couple of months, and I can no longer stand long enough to work. Plus, I will be having minor surgery next week, which has the potential to make things even worse.  As a result the blog will be significantly less frequent.  I'm really sorry about that, but there's a limit to what I can do from my bed, and that's where I've been more often than not this past year.  I'll do my best to stay in touch, though.  Fingers crossed that things improve.

Unexpected Results.

You saw Merlin making himself at home on top of this book, yesterday...it has progressed a bit since then, perhaps not as much as I would like, but nonetheless.

I realised while stitching, that this is another Purple Rain book.  There's enough of that pink paper to make a series.  This is hand made paper, and it felt stiff enough to allow it to stand up as an accordion, but not so stiff as to make it unpleasant to hand stitch.  So far, so good; all true.  What I didn't appreciate, though, was the effect of the stitch itself on the nature of the paper, or, more accurately, I suspect, the amount of handling the paper is getting in order to put that stitch in place.  The paper is going all floppy (to use that well known technical term).  When you put this amount of stitch into a quilt, it stiffens it; into a single layer of fabric, and it distorts it.  This is both distorting the paper and softening it.  It's actually reminiscent of working with Evolon, which also softens if you handle it a lot. 

I got a bit perturbed.  Here's the book, standing on its edge, to let you see how it is progressing.

I've positioned it very carefully, otherwise it looked rather like a drunk propped up against a low wall.  And I fretted about it, just a bit.  But then I remembered that this is a book; books don't routinely get propped up like this for display.   They're usually seen flat, opened and read, one page at a time.  So I stopped fretting and decided I liked the book as a book, rather than as a sculpture.  It'll be fine.

You can't see it in the image, but there's still a bit of a cat shaped indentation in that front page... I suspect it will be meeting an iron, or possibly a lot of heavy hard backed books, once I've finished the stitch.  The thread, incidentally, is hand dyed variegated silk thread with an uneven texture.  The purple strips are Khadi paper, which I'd bought to make a book with...didn't quite have this in mind, but it works.

Feline Assistance?

Only if you use the term loosely.  I only have two cats now, down from four.  Mollie and Merlin love textiles, and 'help' whenever they can.  The level of assistance varies .

Mollie is a quilt girl.  Here she is, trying out 'Borderlines' for size.

Oh, I like this one, Mum...

Mmm...comfy...   She later dozed off on it entirely.  Not quite what you expect for an art quilt, but...

Merlin, on the other hand, is more cosmopolitan in his tastes.  Here he is sitting on a lot of different things, simultaneously; my sofa does get a bit busy, as I spend a lot of time sitting on it.  I think he called it purrrrformance art; I called it all sorts of things, none of which were polite. 

My lino cutting stuff, is on that board, Merlin... be careful... and don't knock that box of notepaper over, or the pen... really, though, what he wanted to lie on was the small book I'd cut from hand made paper, again from Heather's parcel.  It had been folded for some time, so rather than try to iron out the creases, I used them to create another accordion book.  Which He's sitting on.  And here's the result.

That was flat, before he sat on it.  It now has a perfect impression of his bum.  Pass the iron, somebody... 

More about the work in progress tomorrow.  

Pride Cometh...

...before a fall, I know.  Amongst the goodies in Heather's bag were three long strips, two of fabric, one of paper.  Wrapping, I thought.  Definitely.  So I folded a book using Lutradur XL.  First mistake.  Yes, it folds.  No, it doesn't hold well, so it doesn't like standing up, and it's not easy to handle.  It really needs to be pressed into shape for a while before you use it, for a book anyway.  Won't be doing that again in a hurry.  And then I wrapped it.  Looks okay, I thought. 

Reasonable balance, lots of space within the structures, not sure about that first page, but otherwise...
And then I turned it over.

And discovered that the fabric was not lying flat...looked awful.  Puckered, too.  In the end, I realised that the problem was tension (in art as in life, sigh).  The strips were too long for me to keep a consistent tension on them, so what I thought was a good thing, actually wasn't.  So I had to dismantle it, leaving the blue paper strip untouched (it would have torn if I had tried to remove it, and I like it where it is, fortunately.  This is version two, where I've wrapped and cut. 

Am I happy?  Not with that bit on the left hand page, where two pieces of fabric converge, just doesn't work, need to do something about that.  I think that's always going to be a risk with wrapping, need to be careful with how I deal with the ends.  And whilst it doesn't seem to matter how long the paper strips are, fabric strips are problematic if I make them too long.  Otherwise, though, it's better.  I like this simple, graphic approach, but in this case, I think it might be too simple... watch this space...