Busy, busy again.

Well, I missed the interesting date of 6/10/16 but that was because I have been busy!

This week I have helped to set up an exhibition and gone to three openings.

The first opening was at The Johnson Collection, on Tuesday evening. I have a small piece of work in it.
A group of eight tapestry weavers, from our regular Saturday group, got together and worked towards the brief. It was either to focus on Christmas or Mr Johnson.
We decided on Mr Johnson and his collection of Indian paintings and some images of the man himself.

You can see the edges of some of the Indian images on the right. Then there are two tapestries, the elephant and Mr Johnson behind a privacy screen.

There are many artists involved in the exhibition and each room is completely different from the other.

There was quite a large crowd and I will be going back on another day to see it all in a less crowded and more leisurely way.  But it was very exciting to be there, despite the crowd, or is that because of the crowd?

Then on Wednesday I went along to the opening of an exhibition, Triple Stitch at Bolin Bolin Gallery at Bulleen Art and Garden. As it is part of a nursery, there was a botanical feel but it was not all botanical. As I knew all three participants, I had a lovely time catching up as well as admiring all the lovely works.

Friday evening was the opening of A Secret Garden at the Embroiderers Guild, Victoria. I have been involved in setting this one up.  I was extremely pleased to be part of such a wonderful event. The quality of the work was amazing and inspiring.

Just before the official opening of the doors.

Eco Dyeing when you don't really know what you are doing

I have a couple of friends who went away for what sounds like a fabulous time with India Flint last year. I think it was last year, it may have been this year. Time seems to be losing its meaning. No, I'm pretty sure it was about a year ago.

They came home with some stunning dresses, wraps and pieces of fabric. So we got together and made some dresses - well, I may never wear mine, it just doesn't look dress-shaped. But we cut and sewed and had a lovely time.
They got their act together and dyed theirs and have been wearing them - gorgeous.
I put mine in a plastic bag to protect it from the moths. After quite a few months, I took it to our get-together last week and actually wrapped it up into an eco-dyeing bundle.

I am not altogether sure what was in the bundle. I took some stuff that I had collected years ago for eco-dyeing. I even took some very old (withered) avocado pips, some very desiccated hollyhock flowers from at least a year ago and some dried up eucalyptus leaves.
I bundled it all up and, on the insistence of my friends and with their help, put in some old pieces of iron, then wrapped it around a copper pipe.

Into the water it went and it boiled for an hour or two, while we had a very good lunch, chat and generally pleasant time.

Then I brought it home and put it in the glasshouse, to keep doing whatever is it that is does. One of the ladies had also done a dress and sent us a pic of hers today. So I thought I had better look at mine. Lo and behold, there were mouldy bits! It could be lucky that I actually rinsed it out today.

It is presently drying in the high winds we are having  - gotta love spring.

It is remarkably square! I am still not convinced I will ever wear it but it does look very interesting. There are some purple spots in it, I think they are from the old hollyhock flowers rather than the avocado pits. Those hollyhocks are well worth the effort.

There will no NO pictures of me wearing the dress. But it is lovely fabric. Merino-silk.

Making the Australian Quilt

This week a friend and I visited the NGV exhibition, Making the Australian Quilt, 1800-1950.
I am very happy that we got to this exhibition. I tend to leave ones that are on for a long time till the last minute and then have to rush. But we have been and seen it in plenty of time.

There were some amazing quilts there. Some were sent back to England, some were sent to the person for whom they were made. It is amazing that descendants have kept them and then been able to see the value and donate them to relevant museums.

It was also very liberating to see some that have been treasured over generations and realise that perfection in making the quilt is not essential. Quite a few were obviously made for practical reasons and the makers didn't stress over exact measurements, etc. They were wonderful to see.

This was an appliqué cut from fabric. 

An amazing hexagonal quilt, made of tiny hexagons.

Some of the quilts were worn away, showing the back fabric, with no batting in between. 

Log cabin, using some rather gorgeous silks. 

This was shown as a bag! Gorgeous. 

Wagga, using all sorts of fabrics. Very utilitarian,

I have 'almost' been inspired to get out some unfinished quilts and see about actually getting them done. There were some examples of unfinished quilts, not finished for various reasons. But it was great to see that they had still been treasured by the families.

Still Learning

This will probably be ho hum for many, many people. But I have finally mounted one of my embroideries onto a canvas board thingy.

I did the embroidery a while ago, experimenting with hand sewn fabric collage. It was based on a picture I took while visiting some friends last year, in early autumn in Saugerties, upstate New York. Not quite a year ago, how time flies.

It has been on my pinboard, looking at me, telling me I should do something with it.

Finally I realised that I could buy a frame covered with canvas and maybe sew the piece onto it. It is about the right size.

So now it is painted with acrylic to mute the background, I have sewn it on and put on the D-hooks.
I am chuffed.

I keep making these little embroideries which are odd sizes, partly because they shrink and I never know how to get them exactly the size I want, partly because I don't think about that at all when I start, I am just having fun playing around. So I am going to have to learn to do some creative framing. Or start making traditional-frame-sized embroideries.

But this is a start.

Leaving it till the last minute

The Embroiderers Guild, Victoria (EGV) is having its receiving day tomorrow and Saturday for the upcoming A Secret Garden exhibition.
I  have had this idea lurking in the back of my mind for a few weeks but didn't get around to trying it out properly till yesterday.

I sewed the foreground and knew what I wanted for the background. I thought.

The foreground is some free motion sewing of a garden. It is done freehand on some dissolvable fabric.

Because I didn't want it to shrink too much, I pinned it to a cork board and then painted water onto the fabric. It took a while to dry but turned out ok. I hadn't sewn it all that exactly to size, so it isn't square. (I was aiming for 15cm x 15cm but it did shrink a bit more than that.)

I had found an image on 123RF that has an eye looking through a keyhole and thought to use that in the background. 

I really intended to have it in a box frame with the foreground well away from the background but didn't leave myself enough time to make the frame, or find one. 

So I have decided not to worry about it, I may give it a go another time or I may not. It was an interesting idea and I enjoyed playing with it - right up until I thought I needed to have it ready for tomorrow. Next time, I will try to plan a bit better. 

Secret Garden continured

Ok, the date 6/9/12 deserves a post!  (Oops, got excited about the numbers, forgot that it is now 2016.)

I have been working on my Secret Garden idea. I had done the background.

Then I did a free motion piece on soluble fabric. I thought I had made it the right size but when I dissolved the fabric it shrank. I seem to make this mistake often. But … it was the right size in one direction.

We had a day learning about Tyvek at the Embroiderers Guild play day recently, so I used that inspiration to try making a wall.  I knew I had a pack of it somewhere, I bought it at least 5 years ago but hadn't even opened the packet. After some wondering where it could be now that I have tidied my studio and knew I hadn't seen it while doing that, I remembered where it was.

So, Tyvek painted, some rough free motion sewing, a bit of heat from the iron and voila - a wall.

Contemporary Textile Exhibition Buda

I went to see the exhibition at Buda Historic Homestead during the week. As I had a piece in it, I was asked to sit the gallery for half a day.

It is set up in a lovely, airy room. All sorts of art was around me and I had a very relaxing time there.

This was my favourite piece, Rabbits, by Jo Maxwell.

My work had been mounted in a most creative way - I loved it. It was set in a freestanding frame and hung in the space inside the frame. You could see straight through the frame so my piece looked as if it was suspended in midair. I will have to think about doing something similar when I get it back.

The Slipstitch exhibition was also in Castlemaine, at the Art Gallery.
It was also very enjoyable to visit. Quite different from the Buda exhibition.