Sunday Share - 31. 5.15

Well that's another week whizzing by....

From the sketchbook, we have this.

This just screams deliciousness at me, for all sorts of reasons.  Really love the green colour palette combo.  But this is all about having played with stitching paper together, why not cut holes in it!

I have made pieces which exploit this.

Strata

made in 2010

close up detail

More recently another technique from this sketchbook page, was put into use for the mini canvas/easel items for the last Material Girls exhibition.

Oh look its hearts, same as sketchbook, wonder why....

Its spooky muzak time again, (or is it really just in the subconscious and that's why I picked first image) - about to stitch some more holes!!!

I will try to be back with a posting during the week - but so much as to remain a secret, I'm going to have to find a way to tease.....

Beverley

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Sunday Share 24. 5.15

Well flicking through another Sketchbook, and thought, how utterly boring, lacking in colour on almost every page.  Put that one back, and fished out another.

Instead I found this, dated August 2002.

True, may be to you this is also boring, but to me its a pivotal sample.

I know exactly where I was when this was shown to me, and who shared it..  Post City & Guilds a group of us met once a month to continue our stitching together.  We became known as EsTA - Estuary Textile Artists,  in the main the companionship and sharing was our essence of existence.
The group lasted over 10 years, until numbers came down to just three, with our founder moving away.

So on one of the monthly meetings this technique was demonstrated, and I had a go and thought, wow this has so much potential.

Indeed it has, I've done so many variations of this, and continue to find others all the time.

This is just one of those.

I never expected to find something that interests me long term, and actually quite thought that those who stuck with the same old same old, were lacking in imagination!  However, from this original sample play, I still find new things in it and am still wanting to explore.  So I find its a technique I return to and always enjoy.
I've no idea of its proper name, but I have seen it in the quilting world, so I guess it comes from there, especially as the person who demonstrated it to me, is primarily a quilter.

There may be more of this, coming soon.....

Beverley

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Matter over Mind - It Doesn't Matter!!

Well, so there I am, having designed another magnificent piece in my head.  It was full of vibrant colour, hot oranges, a touch of bright pink, flash of yellow, and set off with a sprinkling of black.  Brilliant, eye catching.  So how come what actually happened was this....

It goes from a dusky pink, through soft lilac to blue, and also has a lovely shade of peppermint green.  Its all turned out a bit, well, girly, when what was in my head was more rock chick!

It became even more off original thought process, which included dangling tassle like squares - hmmm they morphed into circles.
Obviously somewhere the wiring between the brain and the fingers got muddled up.  But may be original ideas will emerge another day.

In case you are wondering.... the papers are Gelli prints - the kind where you smoosh one Gelli into another to mix the colour, hence teeny flecks of other colour, but really good effect for blending shades.  The piece is also stitched with about 8 different threads to add to the colour graduation.

In the meantime another tick on my list - submission forms gone off for another event.

Sunday Share 17. 5.15

Phew, almost running out of Sunday to share this with you.

Not very pretty is it?  I would love to have sketchbooks with oodles of deliciousness tumbling out of them.   Long admired the likes of Jan Beaney and Jean Littlejohn and more recently Linda and Laura Kemshall.  Notebooks which somehow manage to be artworks in their own right and in entirety.

Actually whilst studying City & Guilds Embroidery, the struggle to try and produce such wonders was quite a hindrance.
I've never really been bugged by the blank page, or the white space but not having the oooh and aaah factor of a sketchbook has irritated.
However, I've long since realised this is a working book for me, and although others may make pretty things to aid their designs, I tend to do a lot of measuring, and calculating and diagrams.  So in the main I have nothing to drool over, no sketchbook envy levied my way.

I hope it helps to see something not so pretty and to realise the information is for me, and only me, so it has to work how I need it to.

Beverley

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Catch Up

Time for an update.  Though nothing to show you.  Truth is I've been knocked sideways by a head cold, sounds so simple and I've been absolutely taken aback that it really floored me.  But then I hear current bug is like that.  Unable to do anything, couldn't see half the time, and room spinning the rest!

I managed to send in a form re a future Exhibition with the ERTF.  Had my doubts I'd got that right, but a few days later response came in so, phew, did manage right email after all.  Few months to sort that one though.

As usual, I've got deadlines which all hit at the same time, ie mid June, after that, nothing til Sept.  So now I literally have to take the dust off the sewing machine, power it up with some super speedy juice and get cracking. Teach the cats how to make tea....  excuse for cute cat pics

Bandit, who is not allowed to sit up here on K's camera....

Spike, supervising work table, yes there is space for me here...

So off to The Material Girls this week, nice to see everyone and thrash out ideas and thoughts. or not.... 

Home and need to make a phone call re my Burnham Art Trail venue - can you come and see me tomorrow. OK, so nice drive out in the sunshine yesterday to have a meeting about allocated space. Gulp.  Here are my details:

Burnham Art Trail

click on for link to Trail map

Venue 13

Chapel Studio

Albert Road

Burnham on Crouch

CM0 8DZ

11am-5pm

You can find me there, stewarding on

All Day on Thursday 25th June

Afternoon of Sunday 28th June

Right, time to get on me thinks, puss puss  tea?

Sunday Share 10. 5.15

I was about to put the last sketchbook back on the shelf, when I stopped to flick through it.  This sharing situation is obviously something I ought to have done before because its reminding me of techniques and things from the past.  I'm guessing this is around 2008, as that is the date on following pages.

So this time I stopped at this double spread.

The papers are various from my stash which may not be totally cream or white, from memory it included a very soft dusky pink and a beige, just part of a collection from when you buy a box of paper for £5.
They've been coloured with Brusho.  Slosh on the colours, red, blue, yellow, stack them up as you go and it all intermingles and mixes.  Leave in the pile to dry.  This is the result, marks and random pattern.

Having decided on paper as my USP a long time back, one of my self torments is should I stitch on paper as is, or is it OK to make it stronger with a support of some kind, ie would that be solving an issue or cheating?  Answer not yet decided upon.

It is possible to stitch on paper without any reinforcement of any kind, and that is a whole challenge of its own.

These samples were going back to my roots of learning dressmaking and challenging myself to stitch seams in paper.
Another reason why I stopped at this page flicking through, as I totally forgotten about these pages, and seams in paper have been on my mind a lot lately.

I did make something more creative

This is using one of these gorgeous packs of small pieces of handmade paper.  Never quite sure what to do with it, and so it remains in my sample box.

Wonder what memories and ideas will be found next week from exploring the past.

I share images on my Facebook page, so if you don't want the 'behind the scenes' observations, Like my page and see what pops up.

Beverley

Sunday Share 3. 5.15

Few pages from various sketchbooks this week, just showing the same idea.

When I buy new paints or threads, I make a little sample chart in my sketchbook.  To be honest it would be better if I'd taken note of what I'm doing and kept them all in the same book, but hey - brains, intelligence and all that.

I started doing this kind of thing right at the beginning of the C&G studies.  I can remember clearly my first Preparing Working Design topic (hated it, had changed my mind, as I often did when someone else in the class picked the same idea as me)  So here I was faced with a green plant.  I must have been asked to consider how many shades of green it had, because the result was me emptying out drawers and boxes etc to find every single green pen, pencil, paint I could lay my hands on and making a colour list of them.
For C&G I kept a little paint book, given that many paints were new to me, like interference colours, and texture mediums..
In this book I applied what has come to be known via him indoors as, Beverley Logic.  ie no proof, evidence, understanding, just me saying well, this is water based, and this is water based, so, two must mixed together....
So this is what we have in the image above, strong water colour horizontanlly, and fancy named acrylics vertically, see how the colours change.

So I also apply this kind of template to other things I buy...

A little square of the paint colour and a mini stitch test of the threads.

I attending a talk years and years back, by Leslie Morgan and I've never forgotten one thing she said.  Don't forget a single strand of thread will look very different from the mass on the reel.  I know, obvious hey?  Well it wasn't until she said it....
These threads in the photos were new to me, as in variegated thread which a short colour change, think its only an inch.  Being me of course couldn't possibly believe that was true, so have to have a little stitch out to see.

I try to make my little record sheets as soon as.  Even if I don't use a product right away, I can alway remember I have it noted and know what it looks like.

Mhmm, I will have to investigate taking them out of the various sketchbooks and collating - but I suspect something on the reverse will have to be sacrificed.