Unexpected Choices...

...are always interesting, and usually the best.  I'm mid relapse, and whilst  lying in bed, was leafing through an art book... and had an idea.  Perhaps unsurprisingly, it was a book about Sean Scully, and the idea was to do with this particular structure.  Yes, it needs to be ironed... sigh. 

The colours in this aren't all that accurate, but you get the drift...  Left to right, there's a section of rust dyed lutradur, one of tea and onion skin dyed cotton, and rust dyed muslin.  Two of the three are semi transparent, and that proved to be quite important. 

I'm not that keen on this, mostly, I suspect, because I hate white, and rarely use it in anything at all, textile or painting, other than to mix in with other paints.  I love colour...and apparently have a problem with the absence of colour.  The original idea I had, was to add some colour, a square, thereof, in the lower right section, which is quite different to the original idea, to stitch with the thread you see there, browns and blues, following the curves in the rust dyed sections, and across the white.  When I went into the studio to select the fabric, though, I spotted the box with the lace. 

I don't use lace, much, but I have some for hats.  Somehow, though, it seemed like a good idea to use something lacy on top of these semi transparent fabrics, following through on that idea.  When I opened the box, I spotted a doily.  Now, I don't like doilies.  I had a brief moment when I thought I'd use them in work, as is the fashion...but it has never really seemed like my kind of thing.  I really don't like this whole, take something, or better still, lots of things vintage and slap it/them onto a background and call it art, trend that has been hanging around for at least a decade, if not more.  Circles, though.... I liked the idea of circles.  So I fished around in the box some more.  And then I had a rest (as you do...well, as I do, these days). 

And this is what I'm going with.

   
Three doilies, all featuring lace and/or cutwork.  The one on the right is positioned on a circle of lutradur, to echo the lutradur element of  the base fabric.  And I've fished out some very pale threads to stitch them down with.  That, though, is for another day : I've overdone it.  But it has been worth it, I think... much better than sitting gazing at a computer screen. 

Changing Direction...

...is always a possibility, given the way I work, but sometimes it's inevitable.

I spoke here about being inspired by the work of Sean Scully.  This is the second of those pieces, which would have been three pieces of fabric set together, had I had three suitable pieces... however, these two seem to sit fairly well together, so here we are.  Nothing like the work of Mr Scully, but entirely like mine...nobody can ever accuse me of not being flexible in my approach.  The fabric itself was two pieces which were donated by a couple of kind friends, when I bemoaned my lack of scrap fabric (I'm still bemoaning my lack of hand dyes, but that's another story).  The pinky brown fabric on the right has been reversed, to tone down the patterning, while scraps of the fabric on the left have been used to create a vertical and a couple of horizontal lines, to develop the relationship between the two cloths.  Finally, there's a lutradur circle, with a shell inside it, at the top.  And it's ready to stitch. 

Which is my problem.   I spent a fruitless ten minutes looking for thread with which to hand stitch this piece.  I don't have the money to buy any, and I don't have any dye, either, so I can't make my own.  And I can't see myself hand stitching with machine thread, because it doesn't have the impact that perle and other thicker threads have.   I do have choices, though.

First off, I could just not stitch it at all.  And that's really tempting.  This piece feels like a painting, and were it a painting, it would be finished.  Fact is, though, that it isn't a painting, and it feels like it does need some stitch, albeit perhaps not as much as I might usually do.  So it looks like machine stitch is the only option.  Given the amount of machine threads I have, there's bound to be something suitable.  And if there isn't a variegated thread, I'll combine two plain threads.  I think I'll be stitching, not for pattern, but for texture, which will hopefully make those elements stand out a bit more, as well as connecting them.  For the meantime, though, I'm going to put it aside, and see how I feel after a couple of months.  Building time into design decisions is A Good Thing.  I don't think this will lead to a shift back to machine stitching in general, though, partly because it's too tiring, and partly because I've come to enjoy both the process and the result.

Finding A Rhythm.

I  recently watched a documentary on the work of Sean Scully.  I didn't particularly like his work...or so I thought... but I found his process fascinating, and not unlike my own.  He works with stripes or blocks of colour, and I found myself thinking, I need to do that.  Let the fabric speak for itself. Needed to be hand dyes, I thought, needed to be in some way related to each other.  Minimal stitch, I thought, and went through my really very limited selection of hand dyes (ironic, given that most of my stash was my own hand dyes...), and put together three tops.  I thought I would machine quilt them, but when I ran out of hand work, I thought...maybe...   So I fished one out.  This one, to be precise.

Reader, I didn't like it.  (For those of us who like to know these things, a piece of rust dyed muslin on the top, hand dyed muslin (of a different, slightly heavier weight), in the middle and a piece of commercial fabric on the bottom, the only piece of fabric I could find to go with the other two).  The problem?  Firstly, I didn't like the shape, and felt the strips were too wide.  Secondly, I couldn't work out how to stitch them.  Third, I couldn't see a way to make them hang together in a cohesive whole. 

I turned them round.

That felt a bit better, but still, the problem of the width of the bands of colour, and the shape.  The thought of dismantling the whole thing, changing the width of the bands and sewing it all back together, just didn't appeal.  There was, however,  distinct problem with getting all three fabrics to relate together.  Each way I looked at it, I felt as if tow of the three bands sat together well but all three, didn't.  I needed to find a solution, to pull the whole thing together.  Oh, and did I say?  It didn't feel like mine....which is perhaps not surprising, given that usually, my ideas come from my own personal landscape, where this one had come from considering someone else's.  So, reader, this is what I did.

The fabric is all a bit darker than in this image...but... The wool is couched onto the top, reflecting the swirls in all three fabrics, but taking their own path, not following anything already existing in the cloth.  I would have preferred to have hand felted the wool down, but that's not really an option now, so I used an apricot coloured thread that matches some of the apricot colours in the fabric to the right.  I then found some brown variegated thread to quilt the rust dyed section, with colours from all three pieces of cloth, and then thought...now what?  My original intention was to stitch with a darker thread, but that didn't seem right.  And there needed to be something else in that upper right hand area, to make it more interesting.  So I cut a circle from a piece of Lutradur that had been dyed orange, and stitched it on.  I then found a very pale variegated thread to stitch round the resulting curves, on a much larger scale than the earlier stitch.

I have to say, this was not at all what I intended, but I think it resolves all the problems I identified with the piece.  What's more, it relates nicely to many of the drawings in my sketchbook over the years, and some of the work I've done in the past.  There's a tiny example here .  I'm pleased, even if it wasn't what I intended.  And it's a bit cluttered, perhaps.  It is, however, definitely mine: I don't think Sean Scully, were he ever to see it, would recognise his influence.  And that's how it should be.  Now for the other two.

Oh, and as a ps...it's called Rhythms. 

The Last...

...of the recent batch of monoprints.  Well, not the absolute last: rather, the last of the monoprints I can hand stitch.  Those that remain, have too much paint on them to make hand stitch comfortable, so will be machine stitched.   

I think this is my favourite of this current batch.  More colour variances, and varied texture and marks.  The stitch is pared back to allow those things to show through.  The blanket stitch is perhaps a bit heavy handed...though it looks better in real life. 

Coming to the end of a cycle of work is always problematic...what to do next?  I've started a small creativity group on Facebook, based around a monthly prompt.  I have a few ideas around that, so at least that's something.  However, they're mostly around paint, and I need to have some bits and pieces to do by hand on days when I'm sofa bound...so that needs to be thought about.  I've got a few bits and pieces tacked up and ready to go, so perhaps one of them.  They need a bit more thought, though.

Meanwhile, given I'm set up for paint... I wanted to experiment with Lutradur XL and paint, so, while I was monoprinting, I used some of the excess paint to put a wash on a piece that had been part of a larger book, but cut away when I changed my mind about it.  I then added some machine stitch.

 It's effectively the same colour, both  sides, but with different thread, plain on one side, variegated on the other.  Yup, more landscape... one of my defaults.  I think what this one wants, is to explore the idea of weather, and the changes in light, and therefore colour, that there are when there is a change in the weather.   Which doesn't exactly fit the bill for hand work...but hey... you do the work you have in front of you.

Every Now And Again...

I make a Useful Quilt, no art involved, really, for the back of a sofa or the wrapping of a baby... this is one such, made for a friend's newly-arrived grandson.  I can show it to you now, as it was collected yesterday.  It's by no means the best thing I ever made, but, as my granny would have said, it'll do a turn.

It's about 36" square.  The centre blocks are African fabrics, bought a year ago for no particular purpose... I had thought about making a book with them, but this seemed an altogether better thing to do. The green was the only fabric I could find that sat reasonably well with  those strong colours, while the surrounding fabric is almost jungle-like, and seemed appropriate.   I like making for babies...I think that commercially made things are either too big or too small to be truly useful. This, though, is roughly the right size for spreading on the floor, or the grass, for tucking a snoozing small child into, on the sofa, or the floor for that matter, for a trip out to the car on a cold, damp day. 

What I did discover, however, while making it, is that this size is too big for me to handle now.  I suppose it's a measure of the deterioration in my health over the last year.  I had no problem a year or so ago with Jessie's Japanese Garden, which was quite a bit bigger (see it here).  It is what it is.  I've just torn up a pile of A4 sized white fabric, to monoprint; I think that's about what I can cope with now.  Not entirely sure what I'll do with the two other quilt tops I talked about in the Japanese Garden post...perhaps hand stitching is a possibility.  We do what we can.

Stitch, Stitch, Stitch

I had a hospital appointment a couple of days ago, so took some sewing with me, Borderlines again, which has been hanging about looking sulky on my sofa, as it hadn't really progressed from the last post.  So...here it is.

This last area is a really strange shape; a narrow piece, right at the top (which is to the bottom of this image, underneath the abstract sun shape), plus a fairly large approximate rectangle, with a curving area along one side.  When I change threads, this time to a darker brown/blue perle, I tend to change the direction of the stitch in order to delineate the different areas.  So, running them horizontally,  parallel to the stitch closest to them, just above the paper blocks, was not going to happen, but running them vertically wasn't really ideal either.  Finally, I decided that the best way to stitch this area, given the circular sun shape that somehow had to be worked round (no pun intended) was to stitch diagonally.  This isn't an ideal image, but hopefully it will give you an idea of how that's working...I'm fairly pleased.  And there will be some larger stitch in that small area above the 'sun', which will echo the larger stitches lower down.

So...nearly finished.  Too tired to stitch today; we were out yesterday (of which more tomorrow), so I need to rest to make up for the energy I expended.  It was worth it, though...a joyful time was had by all concerned.

Cara's Leaf

We're grandparenting this weekend, normal service will eventually be resumed after I've recovered... Today, we took Cara to gymnastics, then had lunch out, wandered round a garden centre, followed by Serious Cake for Cara and Grumpa (who knew a child that small could eat that much meringue...?).  And then we topped that off with a play park, in the Kinneal Estate.  On the way back to the car, Cara really wanted a leaf from one of the many trees surrounding us.  Grumpa obliged (Granny did try to put her off til autumn, but with no success). 

So, I thought, what can I do with this?  Pressing it, of course, would have been a possibility, but I've never really got my mind round what you do with leaves that size once they're dry.  So... I drew round it.  My initial intention was to let Cara colour it in, and I will still do that (she's pleased with the idea), but I'm thinking, applique.  I'm thinking cushion.  Or memory quilt (though there would need to be a lot more memories than just one leaf to make a quilt...maybe it needn't be all that large,though...).  Or just a singled blocked applique quilt.  Yes, okay, I'm wondering what got into me, too, it's so not my kind of thing....clearly the granny genes are kicking in...

And here it is.

And that's as far as it's likely to go, this weekend anyway.  I'm exhausted already, and there's a day and a half left... so won't be playing with the idea any time soon.  I'll keep you posted.

Finally, thank you to everyone who was so supportive after my last post.  I really appreciate it.  Blogging is a bit like talking to yourself, sometimes, hearing other people talk is lovely.

Revealing All....

So.... did you have any thoughts as to what the theme of the quilt I made for the 100 Fundraiser?  Here's the whole thing...

It is entitled 'Natural Graffiti', and measures 23" by 32".  It's a bit of a steal, for the price; it would sell for a bit more than the $100 that is being asked for it.  It was inspired by a number of things.  I've always been interested in marks in nature, where natural phenomena like erosion cause unexpected effects in the landscape.  And I love looking at graffiti, of the manmade variety; there's a lot in the area of Norwich that I park in when I go shopping.  And several years ago, I took photographs of two different buildings, one a church, one a cathedral, where copper had changed the colour of the stonework, as if something had been poured down the walls.  That's what inspired the discharge dyed centre of the quilt.  It was pieced using a variety of dye printed, dye painted and discharge dyed fabrics, in a single piece.  It was then folded to find the optimal positioning and stitched together, which is why it has no edges (I hate binding, and it wouldn't have been appropriate for this work). Finally, it was discharge dyed and a little drawing added, before finally stitching by machine.  The stitching is minimal, because I think that in this piece, the fabric does the talking.... so I stitched to support the patterning and give a bit of texture.

I do hope someone likes it enough to give it a good home; I love this piece, personally.    I've come as close as I can to the colours of the original in the photograph.  The 100 deadline is Wed 4th Feb, and full details are available here.  There is a lot of amazing work available... go check it out!

More on the 100 Quilt...

Another detail image for you.  I wanted to show all the different surface design techniques that are present in this piece.  Batik is something I rarely do, but thoroughly enjoy whenever I do it.  This piece has one of those elusive batik fabrics in there...

The cloth on the right hand side is the batik piece.  It started out as a piece of white cloth; you can see the bright white marks of the original cloth really clearly.  It was overdyed in orange, and finally in blue, to produce the brown background.  The piece next to it was a double dyed piece, which was then discharge dyed; once the quilt itself was assembled and stitched, it was discharge dyed again, across both pieces of fabric.  You can quite clearly see on the left hand side piece that it is lighter in some places, where it has been discharge dyed twice.  There are a few places at the top where I've allowed it to return to the original white, but by and large, I've used the discharge technique to alter the colour, not to remove it.

So... any closer to establishing the theme of this quilt?

ps more about the 100 here...

It Seemed Like...

a good idea at the time.  I make stuff, that people like, admire, enthuse about.  So I would sell it, and offer workshops, and go to quilt shows and teach classes, and write books.  That way, I could make some money to cover the cost of making the stuff that people like, admire etc...  Seemed reasonable.

Sadly, however reasonable it was, it didn't work.  Other than the books, I've not managed to do much in the way of selling, either stuff or workshops.  It's hard to come to any conclusion other than, people don't actually want to buy what I offer.  So, I'm going to stop.  I've just withdrawn from the last few quilt shows I had planned to do; I can't afford the inevitable financial loss that I would make by doing them.  It's great to meet people and show people stuff, but at the end of the day, I have to eat, too.  I'll keep on my Etsy shop, for the books and such, but probably gradually fade that out too, though I do have more books in my head.

As for the work, well... I have no choice but to continue.  I'll still pop up here from time to time to show you what I'm up to.  But I'm tired of beating myself up by constantly offering things that nobody seems to want.  Some people would say I just didn't work hard enough; that's possible. Others might say the work is Just Too Weird; that's also possible.  But it's what I do, and who I am.  I tried; I failed. Now I get to Move Swiftly On.

A very great thank you to everyone who has bought stuff, been encouraging, told me I'm inspirational, all that nice stuff.  I really appreciated it, and appreciate it still.

Progress...

...on the small brown piece I've been working on (more on it here and, indirectly, here).  This is where we were at... printed upon but otherwise untouched...

so... it seemed to me that I needed some machine stitch, and something to go inside those circles.  The machine stitch was easy; orange circles to reinforce the print.  I thought that there needed to be something substantial added to the circles in the centre, and made some multicolour felt beads.  I had used some of them in the jewellery I've been making recently, cut in half to give me a flat surface to use to stick them down.  But when I cut into them, I discovered that they were MUCH more interesting on the cut side, than on the outside...

so... the whole thing looks like this;

It's still not finished, but it has improved.  I think there's something about adding thin wrapped twigs along the length, or perhaps some flat discs... or both.  And perhaps some more paint.

Tomorrow... perhaps... though I really should be preparing for the show I'm doing at Spalding next weekend...

Another Rescue.

This piece really needed something... It started off as a piece of vintage tablecloth, which I'd hand dyed.  Two lots of hand stitch had added texture, but not a lot else.  I didn't want to paint into it; I felt that would make things worse, but my linocuts are far too small to be meaningful on this size of piece.  No, it's not that big...but big enough...

So, I found a piece of mountboard that was roughly the same size, and decided to make a monoprint.  The original colour I chose was a metallic turquoise blue, but there wasn't enough contrast for me, so I mixed it with some white, into two different shades, and added two more lots of pattern.  And here is the result:

Looking at it in an image, clears the mind... I'm going to trim the unprinted section at the bottom, and possibly turn it on its side...PSP says it might look a bit like this...

And then Yet More Stitch?  Possibly.  And I might paint into it, and/or add embellishments.

You can see quite clearly from the mountboard how the printing actually went...

On the principle of waste not, want not, I'm contemplating adding an watercolour wash to this, and then possibly using it as a base for a collage.  Textile, of course...

Rescuing Quilts...

is fairly straightforward, really.  But it can take a bit of time.  This one lay about for ages, until I gave it some hand stitch...I blogged about it here 

...and then it lay about some more.  I knew it needed more blue, I even knew that I needed to print it, but I just couldn't bring myself to take the risk.  Well, finally, I did it today...and here it is.

It looks better in the flesh, but hey... it's also a bit greener in the flesh.  I'm please, though, I feel it's an improvement.  Not perfect, but then, nothing is.

There's even a couple of cats... you can see this one in the close up, but can you find the other...?

Being Away From Home...

can be wonderful, but also a pain... the latter, when you forget your sketch book.  I had gone to the bus station to meet my friends Alison and Michael off the Inverness bus, had some time on my hands and...aaargh... no sketchbook.  Usually I have two or three in my bag.  Fortunately, I did find a card blank in there (no, I have no idea what it was doing there either).  That, a pen, courtesy of WH Smith, and fifteen spare minutes on a bench, produced this;

I've been mulling about shapes like these ever since I got back to painting.  Working in this format, though, made me wonder about making a book.  And some quilts.  So, an idea was born.  Notice that I write all over my sketches, just to remind myself of what the thinking was at the time...it has moved on a bit from there, now.

I love the simplicity of sketches, and would like to make some stitched sketches in a similar vein... watch this space.  The series seems to have a title; 'Linescapes'.  These ones clearly tie up to landscape, but I think that overt marks like these will not last long; they come from one of my quilts, Norfolk Fields.

Although there is definitely a connection between the two, I think Linescapes is really about space, not about landscape per se.  It might be argued that there is no difference...but it feels like there is.Now to clear the decks so I can Get On With It.

Learning At The Hub

I volunteer twice a week at the Hub, a centre for adults with learning difficulties.  I thought it would be fun, and I was right.  What I didn't allow for, was how much I was going to learn from the people I was working with.  I'd like to show you something.

This is a wheelchair quilt, made by a very determined lady who loves sewing, but who doesn't get to do it very often.  She used the sewing machine, with a bit of help, to put it together.  She made all the fabric choices, and put it all together, and decided that the hearts would look great on there, too, so she added them.  Technically, this is not the greatest quilt in the world.  But it was made with joy, unfailing enthusiasm and passion, and it is fit for purpose...in this case, keeping her legs warm when she goes out.  And she is incredibly pleased and proud of her achievement, as she should be.  She's already planning her next quilt, this time for a baby who is due to arrive later this year.

I love teaching at the Hub.  Everyone I work with really has a go at things to the full extent of their abilities.  They hold nothing back.  They work fast, and with enthusiasm.  They don't self censor; the inner critic is a myth at the Hub, and so we get through at least twice as much work as I would expect a class to get through in an hour...which means I have to think on my feet, and improvise.  It's good for me.  This week we made badges.  I expected us to make maybe half a dozen... we must have made at least twice that in the time available.

What I love most of all, though, is watching what people do with the materials when left to their own devices.  They combine the most unexpected things in wonderful ways.  I think it's an extreme version of beginner's mind, that Zen concept that is so important to creative people.  The key, though, I think, is what I said earlier.  Everyone I work with has a go at things to the full extent of their abilities, no matter how limited those abilities might be.  All I have to do, is meet them where they are, and help them to express that inherent creativity.  Just imagine what it might be like if you did the same... have a go at things to the full extent of your abilities.  What might change?

Why not give it a go?  Think less, make more.  Do unexpected things, and don't worry about it.  Be proud of  what you achieve and accept it for what it is.  Above all...have fun.  I know we do.

Reculer Pour Mieux Sauter

It's just so elegant in French... it means, going backwards, to go forwards. I suspect I've used it in a title before, but it's worth restating.   I'm in the process of clearing out and reorganising my fabric rooms, upstairs in the attic.  I'd like to say it looks worse than it is, but I suspect it's the other way round.  I've shown you pictures of my chaotic workroom before, so I've put up some eye candy instead.  Much more fun to look at than mess, however creative it might have been at some point.  I've got a bag of scrap to go to a school, a bag of fabric for the Hub and I've surprised myself...more of that in a moment.

I've been giving myself a hard time recently, about my work.  How it's admired, but doesn't sell.  How, much as I'd love to work as a creativity coach, I haven't got out there to persuade people to try it, even though I know I'm good at it, and have a suitable background.  How I didn't write a book last year, despite planning it.  How the kits haven't sold...and how I haven't promoted them enough.  Me, me, me.  When you work on your own, it really is all down to you.  Above all, I worried that I've been so busy trying to make work that other people might like, so I could earn  some money (my husband is currently out of work, so there's no money coming in), that I'd lost sight of my own work.

Not a pretty picture, is it?  Whilst I might sound as if I'm being hard on myself (and heaven knows I'm good at it...), it's really the truth.  All, except the last bit.  What I've discovered is that there has been a lot of work going on around the edges in the last two years or so.  I know it, because I've found it, in piles, waiting to be developed, hidden under Yet More Fabric....I can't believe how much fabric there is, I swear it has been breeding up there during the summer...  And I haven't looked at the hand dyes, yet... argh...

So... I've decided to Get A Grip.  I'm going to finish clearing the studios, and see what else I find, and then make A Plan.  And, because I know that I have had this revelation before, and forgotten it, I'm going to write it down, but not in such detail that I drown in it (which is what happened last year).  Give myself room to make.  Stick with the daily haiku idea (twenty days, something like twenty four haiku), which is quickly turning into a journal of sorts, with some illustration.  Not quite an artist's journal, but interesting, nonetheless.
Scared?  Hell, yes.  Confident?  Not really.  But it does feel right...so I'm just going to think less, and do more.  That's the catch line for the plan... think less, do more.  And yes, I've said it all before, in public, too.  Hopefully, this time, I'll be able to stick with the plan.  Wish me luck, I think I need it.

The image above is 'Where'.  I made it several years ago.  It's made from hand dyes; the word 'where' was discharge dyed on one piece.  Then, I painted over the top, using acrylic dyes, after extensive machine stitching.  I love texture, and this piece has it by the bucketload.

Quilting Continues...

...on my (now overdue) grand daughter's quilt.   I can't show you any images...but I have four different quilting patterns in each of the four main panels on the quilt, have left the sashing untouched, as yet, and am in the process of quilting the borders...three down, one to go.  So, instead of talking about it, I thought I'd show you a Haiku.  I've already written about the idea of Haiku, here, and said in the comments that I was thinking more about it.  This particular piece is an experiment, a sketch.  I had made the little quiltlet several months ago, using my own hand dyes, and it has been lying around, waiting to be quilted.  It reminds me of Highland fields and hills in autumn, and  I thought that I would quilt leaf shapes into it.  Then, I thought it might be interesting to draw them, instead...so I did.  (Remember this is very much work in progress; it will have a lot more done to it than this.).

Looking at it, I started thinking haiku...and wrote one, inspired by the colours and the leaves; here it is.

It is written in gold marker pen, and as such is quite difficult to photograph, but this gives you an idea.  It says;

Green turns brown and gold
Dances with the cold, wild wind
Lies in moulded piles.

There's a lot still to be done.  The drawing is a combination of that gold marker plus a brown Inktense pencil.  I'm trying to decide what to do...whether to work more in pencil, or in stitch.  I do think it needs More Leaves, but that will have to wait for now.  I also think that it needs some foiling at some point.  And hand stitch, not machine.  Fortunately, it's not a large piece at all (if I could reach it without dislodging the sleeping cat on my legs, I would measure it... .    If you have any thoughts, feel free to leave a comment.  I hope to get this finished before Christmas; it will be my pick up and put down when I feel like it piece of work for the moment.  A nice change from machine stitching my soon to arrive grand daughter's quilt.

Lino Cuts...

are such versatile things... especially if you make them on Evolon.  I made a cutting of a fern frond; this is it with stitch;

The fabric was, of course, white; the print was made with fabric printing ink, and the purple in the background is made entirely of stitch.  But I wanted to ring the changes... so I made this one;

Dark Fern has a layer of Lutradur 30 on top of it, immediately changing the colour of the entire background.  Stitch is a variegated metallic stitch, simply outlining the fern frond.

Finally, there is this one;

This is Autumn Fern.  The piece has been transfer dyed in layers, and then hand stitched.

Just for a change, I used stem stitch for the central vein of the leaf.  It's interesting to see what a strong contrast it makes with the long stitches delineating the edges of the leaf, and the small stitches creating the background.  On reflection, I think a back stitch might have been better for the delineation task...but it's fine as it is, I think.

All three pieces have been stitched on cotton wadding.  I think, myself, they're closer to embroideries than to quilts, but technically, I suppose they qualify...what do you think?

And Now...

...for something completely different... I'm going away for a week, up to Scotland to visit my son, daughter in law and assorted relatives... so the sketches are going to pause for a while... I did, though, think that I needed to take some hand work with me to do, and promptly came across a version of Mooncat, which needed some hand stitching.  But rather than wait til I got Up There, I Just Did It...and here he is.  Mooncat is an occasional series, a white, translucent cat in a variety of gardens; the first one can be found, here.

This one is called Mooncat In The Autumn Garden.  You can't see the hand stitching in this image; the thread is silver, and only really shows in the light.  Mooncat is made from Lutradur 30; the blue is my hand dye.   So here's a close up...

Now, of course, I have to find other handstitching projects to keep me going next week...lol.  Other than hand stitching the binding on a kiddy quilt.  Fortunately, there are various UFOs upstairs; doubtless one will be suitable. 

I don't expect to be blogging over the next week, though I may surprise myself!  Try to stay out of mischief while I'm gone...!

Meditation.

I've always thought of my art work as a meditation; the amount of focus and stillness that is needed to make just the right mark at just the right time is very similar, I think, to that of a meditator focussed on a koan.  Yesterday, though, I decided to begin to make a series of small pieces called 'meditations'.  This first one is 'Meditation In Purple And Gold'.  The photograph is disappointing; this piece looks much better in real life, I think.  It is made from four fabrics, two large scale and one small scale prints and two tiny pieces of hand dye.  Interestingly, what looked teal in the piece reads as grey in the quilt, but has returned to teal again in the photograph.

So...I pieced at random, and because I liked the selvedge edge on one of the prints, a blue poppy, I kept it, meaning to make it the focal point, intending to have it turned round the other way, like this...

...and it's interesting this way, too.

Problem was, though, that the piece felt disjointed.  I machine quilted in the ditch to stabilise it, as well as into some of the large, dark blue curves.  That didn't help.  So I hand stitched in purple metallic thread over the entire quilt, with the exception of the cloth with the gold spirals.  That unified the piece, somehow, I think by making the purple theme uniform across the quilt.  And because I haven't stitched the purple and gold fabric, it makes it stand out just that bit more.  So I turned the quilt on its side to emphasise that connection between the three pieces of fabric, and I think it works.

Here's a close up of the stitch.  It's not perfect.  The stitches aren't uniform;; neither are the lines perfectly straight. Know what?  I chose to make it that way.  I think it's more interesting to look at.  I stitch the way I draw, varying the marks to give the eye something to look at.  I don't think it detracts from the piece; rather, it improves it.  And the day I can show something like this at a quilt show without having to explain all of that, will be the day when I know that the quarrels between traditionalists and art quilters have finally been put to bed... pun definitely intended!