Envigilating an exhibition

As I have already posted, I have a piece in the Textile Awards exhibition at Buda.  It was my turn to sit at the exhibition on today.
It was an interesting experience - I met quite a few people who are interested in textiles and who had come to Buda specifically to see the exhibition.  There were also people there who had come to see the house and didn't have a special interest in textiles. They all seemed to enjoy the show.  Most of them put in votes for the People's Choice prize too. The show finishes this weekend, so I expect that it will be announced soon.
I managed to get the names of the winners of the two categories: you can read about the winners here.
Teresa Poletti Glover won the Gold section as well as the overall prize. Chris Beehag won second prize in the Gold section.
Beverley Downie won the Inspired by Buda section and Raewyn Penrose won second prize in that section.  
I recognised Raewyn's style from the workshop I did a couple of years ago.  The coat was lovely.

Part of Raewyn's jacket.

I also met Cheryl Kennedy, a fellow workshop member from a few years ago at the Ballarat Fibre Forum - she has her own exhibition on at the moment, in Castlemaine, at the Falkner Gallery.
Then I met the person who ran a quilting class at a Northcote Community House, it was when I was on long service leave and trying to put together my folio to apply for the Studio Textiles and Design course and she was a big help, so it was great to catch up with her too.

I also caught up with a fellow student from the course who also graduated last year.  So it was well worth the trip and was a very interesting experience.  She took a photo of my work there - you can see the shine on the synthetic fabrics, something I did not get with my photos.

Aprons

There is an apron exhibition on at Buda.  You can go and see it and the Contemporary Textiles exhibition at the same time - maybe you should check the opening days, one is in the house and one is not and they may have different opening hours, I'm not sure.
Anyway, we had a wander around the house and reminisced about the aprons, table mats and tablecloths we remembered from our mothers' homes that were in the same styles as the ones on display. They were in several rooms, so we kept coming across new ones, prompting more memories.
We also discussed not wanting to wear such lovely items while cooking or cleaning!

The dark one in the middle is made of ties.

It made me want to get out some of the old embroidery I did so long ago.  I still have an apron that I learnt to do smocking on - in grade 4.  It is the only smocking I have ever done, I think.  And I remember getting a table cloth with a pattern stamped on it, from the Women's Weekly, if I remember correctly.  I just may have to rummage around and see if I can find them.  The embroiderers' guild is having a display in July of similar items, maybe I could put them in, if they are in good condition.

Opening of Buda Textile Award exhibition

A friend and I drove to Castlemaine today to attend the opening of the Buda Contemporary Textile Award.  It was a very pleasant drive there and back, sunny and warm in the car, despite it being the official beginning of winter.

We arrived just in time for the speeches and award presentations.  Congratulations to the winners.  I didn't note their names down and they are not on the website yet, so will have to let you know who they were later.  There was a very pleasant buzz from the crowd, all excited to be there to see the works and enjoy the enthusiasm.

The works were presented beautifully and the room had lovely lighting.
I can't believe it, I forgot to take a picture of my own work.  Oh well, that was because I met a lady who did the distance education course that I did last year through SWTAFE, the machine embroidery course.  We got chatting and comparing notes about the course and what we are doing now and I simply forgot.  But I did get a photo of her work.
I have included a photo from inside the house to show what I assume was the inspiration for the base of her lamp - it seemed like a good connection to me, anyway.

You can see the winning entry for the Inspired by Buda section in the background.

I also met a lady from the AusNZ tapestry online group. She had done a tapestry, of course!  It is good to meet people you know vaguely through the internet, in person.

It was actually a much brighter day than the last time I visited Buda and I got a couple of pictures of pieces I hadn't had a chance to photograph last time.  I especially liked this lamp.

Buda Historic Home and Garden Textile exhibition

The Textiles Awards exhibition will be held at the Buda Historic Home from June 2nd to 17th.  It is in Castlemaine, not far from Melbourne.
There are two categories, Inspired by Buda and Gold.  I decided to make a piece that is Inspired by Buda. I have written about it already, in terms of the problem of using inspiration to come up with a new work. There is a lot in the house and gardens that was inspiring.  I eventually decided to work with a bullrush design, incorporating some borders from the stained glass windows in the house.

It is about 50cm x 58cm, made of synthetic organzas and one layer of hand painted silk.  I ended up using about 7 layers as I needed to double some of them to get the intensity I wanted.  Actually, having the silk, which is translucent but not transparent, helped.

I tried to sew very closely along the lines of the design but discovered that, when I cut back the layers, the fabric was starting to pull out from under the sewing lines.  There were two things I had to alter in my technique - one was to sew messy lines so that there was more fabric under the sewing and the other was to cut away from the sewing lines, not very close.  This helped and there was much less pulling away.

I was a bit nervous about washing off the soluble fabric that I had traced my design onto and used to stabilise the work but it all behaved very well when washed - whew!

The organza behaved quite differently from cotton when I cut back too.  It was MUCH easier to go through too many layers, so I had to be very careful to only go back to the colours I wanted to expose.  Crystal organza cuts (and shreds) more easily than ordinary synthetic organza too.

I had two pairs of scissors for this, one very sharp for getting started and one with turned up ends so that I could hold it flat to the fabric with less risk of cutting through too much.

As I was basing it on a stained glass window, I had hoped to have layers the same front and back, cutting though to the middle (i.e., the same back and front) but that was too hard.  So it is to be viewed from one side only.  It also looks different depending on whether you hang it in front of a window or not.  It is transparent and some of the colour is lost when the light shines through.  But I am happy with either look.

Inspired by Buda

I have been playing around with using synthetic fabrics to produce a stained glass window look.  My current work is based on the Buda Historic Homestead. They have a Contemporary Textiles Award that will be on in June.  I think it is biennial.  There are even workshops in the intervening year in which you can visit the house and gardens and be inspired.  I was unable to go last year, partly because I wasn't sure I would want to participate - that it way too much planning ahead.  But my friend and I did visit recently and took lots of photos.

After going through a lot of my images and trying various ideas, I have come down to using three images of glass in or around doors in the house.

What is rather tricky is developing your own image when you are inspired by something in the house, as is part of the brief.  I have taken part of the etched glass image and part from the designs above and put them together in my own design.  But it is hard to say it is totally my own design.  This idea of being inspired by someone else's work is very tricky.

Tea Cosy making

Wednesday is the day my friend and I get together to make things and inspire each other in our textile works (and generally have a good time).  Sometimes we go out and get inspiration.  Last week we visited the Buda Historic Home and Garden.
This week we attended a workshop at Bundoora Homestead. We worked in a beautiful old room with a chandelier and a beautiful ceiling.

The aim was to make either a base for a tea cosy or embellishments to add to a base.  We could choose crochet or knitting.
It is years since I have done any crocheting, and I tended to do granny squares and other very flat work.  So, of course, we chose one of the more difficult, textured patterns!

But our teacher was up to the challenge and got us far enough to think that we may understand how the pattern goes together.  It will need more making to get the idea firmly in my mind though. Actually, the two teachers did a good job as most people chose different designs and patterns and there was quite a bit of assistance needed.

As you can see, I didn't get much done and need to practise. 

We made sure that we were using Australian or UK terminology.  I once mistakenly bought a pattern for a scarf that was from the US and, even though I had printed out the comparative stitch descriptions, I kept getting mixed up about what I was supposed to be doing.  I would read DC and do the Australian movement even when I had the US description in front of me.  It was just instinctive to do what I had learnt so long ago.  I gave up in disgust.  Now I may get it out and try again.  I am feeling the need to have some knitting or crochet on the go - it must be autumn.  It will probably mean that I have to write the pattern out - not sure I can be bothered.  I might just find a new pattern.  There are so many around these days and many are free on the internet - but you have to be careful to know what country they originate from, what terminology they use.  Problems, problems.

One lady made a gorgeous pansy that can be added to a base.

Sorry about the focus, I don't seem to have much control with my phone.

The workshop was to support the Tea Cosy Festival that is coming up.  Last year there were all sorts of tea cosies made using a wide range of techniques and materials.  Some were quite practical and some were just amazingly outrageous.  All proceeds go to Cancer Council Victoria. They are hoping to have 500 tea cosies this year.