Catch-up

It is almost a year since I last posted here and high time to get back to blogging!  I have done quite a lot of work over the past few months but have felt unfocused and found it difficult to know how to progress my stitching.
Last year I went on a course run by Tilleke Schwarz; I like her work and was eager to go on the course but unfortunately it did not work for me and I did not find the course as inspiring as I had hoped.  However I am now working on a large map of a walk I often take across my local common and it is definitely informed by Tillike's style, (not least in its size, 32'' X 20'').  I keep picking it up and working on it for a week or so and then doing something else, it could take a very long time to finish and already many of the things featured on it have changed or no longer exist.  This is the piece that I am working on at the moment , that is why I am showing it first.

 

I have been continuing with my patchwork/applique pictures and have sold a few more. 

These last two are a bit more abstract, influenced by a sketchbook workshop I did on line with Dionne Swift where circles were the focus.   

 
I also got into quilts last summer, maybe because they are easy and quick to do when inspiration is not around. I made six in all, incuding a 6 x 7 foot one made up of two inch squares of shirt fabric - nightmare - here are a couple of the ones I made, including the large one!

This is the wrong way round, my husband is behind it holding it up.

  

My embroideries on Display at Merry Harriers

Julie, the landlady at The Merry Harriers in Hambledon has decided to give local artists space to display their work and my embroideries are the first to go on show.  As you may guess from the picture above, not only does the pub serve good food and real ales but also it has a herd of lamas which visitors take for walks in the Surrey Hills.

Sale of a picture

Last month three of my patchwork pictures were in a local exhibition and one of them, Cats on the Wall, sold.  Mostly I stitch for my own enjoyment but is such a good feeling when someone else appreiates what I have done enough to buy something!

 The other pictures that were in the exhibition were the one of houses that was in my last post and this one which started off as just a sea scape but then turned into "I'd like to be, under the sea....".   A bit Janet Bolton, but I had just got her book out of the library when I made it.  

A year of stitching

Last January I decided that I would take time out from the C & G Diploma course; it had taken me over a year to complete module 2; it was taking me longer and longer to do the exercises and my motivation was dwindling.   Rather than following the requirements of a course I decided to stitch what and how I wanted  and to see where that led. I have put some work in two local exhibitions and have sold a couple of pieces.
I have decided not to continue with the C & G course,  but just dip into a short course or a workshop every now and then.
Below is a some of the work I have done during the past year.

These are portraits of my chickens, "The Chicken Supremes!" - Diana, Mary and Florence, which were created as a result of me doing patchwork beasts class with Jude Hill.

                                                                  

More Faces, and Resolved Samples Chapter 13.

1. The first photo is the first of my two resolved samples for chapter 13 ( I did 2 because I am not sure that that either quite fits the bill). It is taken from the torn paper portraits as detailed below. I wish that I had used a stronger colour for the couching of the face and also not used white cotton for the machine stitching of the wax marks, but it is only a sample.

2. The strips of fabric machined onto background before the couching. The fabric has become very crinkled because I did not put iti onto pelmet vylene or use a frame, but I think that it looks OK in the final version as it reflects the energy of the source design.
3.

Messing around with the torn paper portrait on the computer
4. Original torn paper design used for the resolved sample.

5,6,7,8,9,10,11. As you can see I quite got into the torn paper portraits!

12. This is my other rsolved sample, going back to the cubist portraits; it uses various types of couching and there is alos a bit of laid work.

13, 14. Design stage for resolved sample number two.

More Masks

I have been messing about with masks - here are some of the results, paper collage, potasium permanganate and lemon juice and applique. I then tried printing some shapes and adding the detail.

And came up with this - I got very absorbed in it while stitching, and am pleased with the result although I am not sure that it is very C&G Diploma!

Hand stitched Shi sha - chapter 7

Above is a collection of shiny things that I found on the pavements of Seville last week. They are stitched down using herringbone, button hole and button hole bars, fly, detached chain, shi sha and straight stitch.
Below, foil from cream eggs eaten over the weekend!

Chapter 6 - Decorative Detail from Shi-sha Textiles

1. Printing with acrylic paint , ink wash over top 2. Rubbing with oil stick,oil pastel and inks.

3. Printed with acrylic and then painted, gold paint on blue and green one. The colour has been altered by computer on the right hand image. 4. Wax crayon and ink

5. The next three are rubbings made with oil sticks, oil pastels and wax crayons on Lotka paper from Nepal

6.

7.

8. As above but on copy paper with ink added.

9.

10. Oil pastels on silver tissue paper, this looks much more effective in real life that in the photo.

11. As above

12. Textured look created by using the same block with different colours - shame about the flash!

13. Printing using acrylic paint, there is a tiny bit of glitter in there somewhere. It is a bit dull but I enjoyed making the background look like an old plaster wall

14

15. The blocks that I used for the prints and the rubbings - made from string, cocktail sticks, wire,cardboard, a rubber and thick gesso.