An Unexpected Find.

While unpacking boxes in late January or early February, I found a roll of hand made paper, which I put aside to bring downstairs to my workroom, with some other art stuff, but somehow never got round to it.  Yesterday, before returning to bed, I went to get the paper to have a look...and found that two of the three pages already had sketches on them.

These are pastel drawings, made around 2007, I think, when the ME wasn't quite so acute.  Doesn't time fly, etc...  I got interested in semi-abstract landscapes, and these are examples.  I was using a lot of pastels at the time, and going to a drawing class, mainly drawing faces, but playing around with the pastels in general, seeing what might be done with them.  I really enjoy working with pastels; there's something very direct about them, applying pigment directly onto paper, using fingers when necessary to blend them.  They're a bit messy, as they generate a lot of dust, but the mess is worthwhile (well, ok, I would say that, being the queen of mess). 

And as soon as I looked at them, I thought...book... a different version of a folded book.  First, though, I'll need to make drawings on the reverse of the paper.  I did, though, make a mock up of the folds required for the book, using the third piece of paper, which doesn't have drawings on it.  This, too, will be drawn on eventually, a different approach to the same thing (see below).

The folds indicate the size of the pages...I won't try to explain further for now.   I do think that it'll be interesting to take a pair of large scale drawings, like the ones I've just found, and divide them up, through folding and cutting, so that they present in a different way, each page standalone, the two drawings interrelated...and yet be able to unfold the book to see the whole thing united again in the original way.  The third book, though, will, I think, have individual drawings like these large scale sketches, option upon option, sixteen in all, relating back to the original drawings, but quite different in approach.

And that's it for today: energy finished.  It really doesn't take much...sigh.

Changing My Mind...

 

is, of course, something I do on  a regular basis.  Now that I'm beginning to recover properly from the gall bladder surgery that knocked me sideways earlier on this year, I'm starting to review what I want to be making.  And to my eternal surprise, that includes at least one traditional quilt.  A very simple four patch, in gentle, pastel colours.  With flowers.  Hmm.  Not a style usually associated for me.  And this quilt is for me...to sit on my sofa, so I can wrap myself in it whenever I please.  It'll be called Comfort And Joy; named even although it isn't an art quilt.

Those of you who live nearby know that it was my intention to sell my commercial fabric.  Since most of my work is around manipulated photographs at present, I  figured that this was a good idea...it's only taking up room.  I looked through it this morning, and discovered that...well...I just can't do it.  It's lovely fabric.  It's my fabric.  And I can imagine using it, too.  I can even imagine teaching a scrap quilt class...  'Perfect Squares'... just exploring what can be done with this most flexible of shapes.  Fun, I think...

No, I don't know what's come over me, either.  But hey.  Change is a good thing.  And I'm ready for it.  The image is one I'll be working with soon, probably on Evolon.  It looks as if it wants to be very tactile, perhaps with beads...  hurrah.