Beautiful, gentle stitching

This weekend, I had the pleasure of attending a workshop with Emily Jo Gibbs, on using transparent organza to make stitched interpretations of photographs. Emily’s work is exquisite in its simplicity, that also manages to capture the essence of an individual or of an object.

The workshop was held in the beautiful, historic rooms of The ArtWorkers’ Guild in Holborn.  The rooms and corridors contain works by previous and current members, inspiration before we even met Emily.

We were asked to bring a basic sewing kit, a variety of threads, scissors for cutting papered cloth and a favourite photograph. Emily provided a pack of different coloured silk organzas and two pieces of white linen for each of us. 

The workshop started with an explanation of Emily’s technique, and an opportunity to examine her original stitched portraits of her children. We then created a small abstract collage, A5 size,  to practice the techniques that she had demonstrated.

What joy to sit with a group of strangers, who quickly lost their anonymity as we stitched together.

We then started a new piece, based on our photographs.This was much more difficult  and a black and white photograph would have made it much more straightforward to discern tone rather than colour. However, by the end of the day, i had this, based on a favourite picture of my elder son when he was 10.

To have got this far, while enjoying the company of others, in a beautiful setting was a gift. Thank you Emily.

If you would like to see Emily’s work in person, she is exhibiting at Mint London from 9th - 12th May.

Scarf, silk, stitch

Several months ago, I dyed some silk that had been a gift from Lorraine Pugh. Supposedly offcuts - these were superb lengths.  I never posted the results of the dyeing, so here they are, as I have finally got round to using them

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I have a much loved wool / cashmere shawl, but it is grey. Trying to introduce a bit more colour, at the same time as simplifying my wardrobe, is proving a challenge, so the grey had to be brightened up.

Quilting some of the silk on the wool

Next stage is to stitch some rouleaux loops and fabric buttons to make it a more individual version of one of these. Inspired a bit by the beautiful scarves made by Ekta Kaul, that I saw in Edinburgh, earlier in the year.

 

Exhibitions to lift the spirits

October Gallery, until 30th July, Eddy Kamauanga Ilunga.  Very thought-provoking use of circuit diagrams on the human body, and fantastic depiction of African fabrics.

Morley College, textiles foundation until 7th July, wonderful work by all students, beautifully staged, and with a chance to pore over sketchbooks.

 Debora Jedwab

Nikki Sims

Bridged Hall

Margaret Scott

Liz Clamp

Textile Alchemy, Waterloo Art Centre, until 02 July, where the influence of new Morley tutor with an interest in dyes form natural materials is very evident.

 

 

Outcome of dyeing

Well that was all rather successful, gorgeous stripes and textures

almost like simple ikat ( soon to be seen at SOAS Gallery) without the skill and effort needed.

Conundrum of the cobbler's children

How can I have the patience to take over 4h to stitch the above, incorporating a carefully selected piece of beach glass, bullion stitches of up to 25 needle wraps, pistil stitch, buttonhole bars, french knots, colonial knots, spider's web, woven wheel and yet not find 20 minutes to repair the hems on two pairs of trousers?  Classic case of cobbler's children.

I love this spring evening light that allows the texture to really show.  My own little Durdle Door on these detail photos.

Precious beach glass at right

Drawing dried up buddleia - and Grayson Perry at the NPG

Today's task at Morley was drawing dried out buddleia flowers, using three different methods of drawing - outline with pencil, shape with small circular movements of the pencil, using ink and a brush.  I was Ok with the results of the pencil drawings, less happy with the ink and brush.

Pencil

Ink and brush

I restored my artistic sanity with a visit to the Grayson Perry exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery.  I thoroughly enjoyed this and the pieces seemed very familiar having watched the first two episodes of his current series on Channel 4.  I particularly liked the way the pieces are placed on a path through the existing collection in the National Portrait Gallery, rather than all placed together in one exhibition room. This made me look at some of the permanent collection in a different way, particularly the collection of black busts in room 21, the display of suffragette photographs and articles in room 31, and the portrait of the Bronte sisters.  As ever, I did ponder who does the embroidery on Grayson Perry's hand-embroidered pieces.  In this exhibition, the number of French knots on the piece about the Ulster loyalists, " Britain is Best" is mind-boggling, and I don't think these can be done by machine.    The Scottish pedant in me couldn't help but notice the mis-spelling of Hogmanay on the tapestry " Comfort Blanket", but perhaps this is deliberate.  On until 15th March 2015 and,  perhaps because the pieces are distributed throughout several galleries, not too crowded, and it is completely free.

Hearts tombola

Sudden, but not unexpected changes at work have led to more time than planned for stitching.  However, those changes are also unsettling, so I am finding it difficult to relax in to a large project.  The hearts tombola has been the solution.  These A6 book covers, made from this tutorial, have filled the bill.  The edging foot really helped giving these a professional- looking edge finish.

Pieces of tie silk, lined with scraps of old duvets.

V and A - vanity and artifice or vavavoom and adoration?

A day out on my own at the V and A to see the Ballgowns exhibition within the revamped fashion galleries at the V and A.   I love seeing couture clothes up close, as the manipulation of cloth involved in these garments is  a skill I would love to have at this level.  The gowns are sumptuous, and the contemporary gallery upstairs is breathtaking and bonkers in equal measure - full length, lace-printed latex anyone, with a latex fishtail hem?

( Atsuko Kudo gown worn by Georgia Frost with dresses by Hardy Amies and Worth of London. Lent by the designer. Carlos Jimenez, © V&A, 2011)

Many of the people at the exhibition commented on how the dull lighting does not show the older garments to advantage  I agree, the muted and pastel colour ways can look very dingy, but there are several photos of the clothes being worn, which helps with envisaging beyond the dull lighting.  On until 6th January, and well worth a visit.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Then a spin over to the New Acquisitions gallery to see new items up close there.  I love this gallery as you never know what you are going to see there.  In the spirit of the ball gowns , the dress below is incredible, in the construction, the quality of the embroidery and the sheer exuberant use of  colour.  One little lad was puzzled by the fact that the dummy only has one arm. ( Images from the V and A website) 

The embroidery of the wave forms is beautiful, but the dress must be very heavy.

 

On a completely different line of interest, the New Acquisitions Gallery also has an intriguing expandable sofa, designed by Yuya Ushida.  Needs some cushions if you ask me.

I don't know what is going on with the formatting here, apologies.

Is plankton pink?

I have used some of the discharged silk from here, to make my A4 piece for the Contemporary Quilt group for this month, still on the theme of yellow. I'm pleased with this, although in some lights it veers very close to orange rather than yellow due to the sheen on the fabric, I think.



Yellow shot silk, brought back from India about 8years ago by my husband. Plankton shapes cut out of paper and used to make a silkscreen. Discharge paste applied through the silkscreen leaving behind the pale pink shapes. Hand-quilted round the shapes with weft threads drawn out of the sides of the fabric, and then experiments with machine quilted eyelets at various stitch widths. Some strands of threads stitched at the bottom of the eyelets to give a suggestion of small tentacles. Faced binding, which is a new technique for me.

I realised as I was making this piece, that there was a large empty space at top right, so I stitched another plankton shape there, without having the discharged colour within it. Some details below,


Discharged motif


Eyelet detail


Stitched motif


Attempt at showing tufted threads


Back showing faced binding.


This has definitely got my stitching mojo back, and some ideas abut machine trapunto on these motifs are being triggered after reading this book by Hari Walner.

So, on the hottest day of the year so far, we use the smelliest process in the studio………

Discharge printing, on fabrics that I have dyed previously and on silks from india that have been stashed away for years. This was also a chance to try out the new screen made with the paper cuts and to repeat a bit of "Charles Rennie Mackintosh meets Frank Lloyd Wright at the Willow Tearooms".


The lighter patterns appear solely as a result of the discharge paste being applied through the silk screen. As I didn't dye these silks myself, I had no idea what the result would be. Excitingly, they are all lovely, details below.

Charles Rennie Mackintosh etc, the first on shot silk dupion and then on tightly woven paper silk




Papercuts





Papercuts on dyed, waxed, dyed again cotton


The paste has to be activated by steaming, so the studio was baking. All worth it though.

Nuno technology not nanotechnology

Nuno felting at Morley last night.  This is an astonishing technique, where fibres of wool become trapped in a fabric base layer, causing that layer to pucker and move as the wool shrinks.

We first of all carded our own blends of dyed merino tops which was a strangely hypnotic activity.  This produces fine rolls of blended wool, rolags.  These are then placed on to the base fabric and felted in.  Hard work but great results.  We were first asked to make a sample piece, including a colour we don’t normally work with, so I chose a yellow backing.

 

This started off as about 12 inches by 10 inches, and has felted in to about 7inches by 5 inches.  Circles of rolag of graduated, blended blues, on yellow muslin backing.

 

For the second sample we had to cover the whole surface with rolag and then trap non-felting fibres in the felt.  The orange threads are silk cut tops dyed at a workshop with Myfanwy Hart several years ago, and the fine red threads ( barely seen)  are silk weft from a scrap left from my wedding dress.

One hundredth post, and ...... it's about hexagons

Still blogging at 100 posts, so better than 85% of starter bloggers apparently.
Hexagons from the Jen Jones Quilt Collection. a velvet and silk quilt made for a friend by another who was emigrating. These hexagons are about 1 inch in diameter ( can a hexagon have a diameter?), so this was a true labour of love.

Stitched over papers, and then hand appliqued to the velvet with feather stitch . The long contrasting stitches around the inner edges of the hexagons are a lovely touch.