20/02/2020

Well. I can tell exactly how long it is since I posted - the dates give it away.

It has been strange weather, hot and dry, hot and humid, now it is cool and wet. More summer forecast to be with us in a few days.

I have been working on a small tapestry, for one of my online groups. Every year they have a call for entries on a theme. This year's was Wind in Motion. I had several ideas going at first, not all of them appropriate!

I started on ideas last year. I was inspired by a satellite image of a hurricane that I found on 123RF. 

There have been lots of weather images around lately, with all the fires, smoke and then storms that have been coming though. The maps have been scarily coloured - maybe that is just a reflection of the media's inclination to scare us. So I feel as if my image is rather calm, compared to what we have been seeing - even though it is of a hurricane.

The tapestry is on its way to the organisers. I am looking forward to when it comes to our state and can be exhibited at the Handweavers and Spinners Guild rooms in Victoria. It is going to New Zealand and around Australia, so it will we well-travelled when I get it back.

02/02/2020

I have had several reminders (from my many fans!) that today's date is special!!!
We probably won't get another like it for 110 years - not in my lifetime!
So here I am, posting.

Not much to post about though.
I do have a piece that was unsuccessful in the upcoming Australian Textile Art Awards. I am not particularly surprised, it was not that wonderful. But having a call for entries was just what I have needed over this very stressful summer, with all the bad news about fires, plagues, floods, etc.

There was no theme, no particular dimensions either. That was a change for me! However, I recently (a few months ago) attended a Kathryn Harmer Fox workshop and, for some reason, thought about doing an emperor gum moth caterpillar. So I ran with that.

I thought that it would be an ok topic as the machine embroidery group at the Embroiderers Guild, Vic, has a theme of trees this year. These insects dwell in trees, so they fit.

The sewing allowed me to retreat from the horrible world - not that my own particular world, here locally, is horrible. But the news is bad, bad, bad. Heat doesn't help either, or bad air. Anyway, moving on ... I was able to concentrate on the design and sewing and find some much needed peace. So I am totally not bothered about not being accepted, the challenge provided me with much needed focus. And I can look forward to some really wonderful pieces when it is exhibited (March 21-April 5).

2020

The date is 20/1/20. Not sure that there are going to be that many interesting dates this year. So I had better post!

I forgot to mention that I got an image of a tree from 123RF, an online site that gives royalty free images for a low cost.

I used that image and tried it in Photoshop. I put colour on the leaves and trunk, then put in some backgrounds. I tried a few. Here is one, not quite how the final piece ended up but it gave me the overall perception that my idea would work.

My idea is about how we perceive things, influenced by what is around them. Did I say that the theme of the call for entries is Vision 2020? Anyway, I love the way that background colours change our perception of other colours. So the leaves are all the same colours/fabric in each tree but the differing backgrounds change how we perceive them. 

I tried some fabrics I had for the trunks but realised that I don't actually have that many browns, especially ones that don't have other colours in them that would have distracted from my idea. 

Off to GJ's again! (I am trying to use what I have and not buy more but that wasn't going to work this time.)

I bought 25cm of 3 browns. The warmest one worked best. I used some little bits to double-check. 

Then I Vleisofixed (new verb!!) the selected fabric and cut out 5 of the tree shapes. They are all the same, or almost the same. It is very hard to cut them all exactly!

I ironed them on to the background.

Then came the tedious job of cutting out the leaf shapes, using the same colours for each tree. 

Then sewing them on!! I tried to cut them the same and place them the same but there are some slight differences. There is even a deliberate change in the number of each colour on one of the trees - Spot the Difference!!

I say tedious but I was very glad to have something that needed some concentration and removal from the real world. The real world is not great at the moment, especially if you live in the east of Australia (with apologies to those Australians not in the east but still suffering from fires. And now floods.).

If you want to read a very interesting account of how Brenda selects the final pieces, go here. She actually had to eliminate her own piece!!

Exciting news.

I have been struggling, along with many people I know, to be creative when it seems as if all of our part of the world is burning, as it has been for many months.

I saw a call for entries for Vision 2020 textiles (I expect there to be quite a few exhibitions with this title in 2020) and took the chance to work on something that would require concentration and take me into the creative side, away from the real world.

It was very timely.

I have been fascinated for years with the way colours seem to change, depending on their surrounds. So I decided to use this idea.
I played around with a mind map (I looked online for a link and see that there are computer possibilities but I have learnt to do the paper and pen version) of possible ideas for Vision but came up with the colour and perception take on it.

I found some gorgeous fabric at a local fabric shop (GJs Discount Fabrics) that had a lovely gradation of colours.
I have been trying not to buy new fabrics lately but these were too lovely to resist. I bought half a metre each of about 4 different fabrics, so not too much. Only two have been used in the piece, the others are waiting for the right inspiration.
Sometimes you do have to buy fabric that doesn't have am immediate application because you know it is the sort that you use and you might not be able to get it later.

We were asked not to put images online till the selection process was completed but now it has been - and I have been selected. Feeling very chuffed!
Brenda Gael Smith is the curator and is encouraging of us to put in our process, so I will start that now.

Trying out the various leaf colours on different pieces of fabric.

I eventually decided that I wanted colours from several pieces of fabric. They are laid over some polyester, fairly thick, adhesive wadding. Then I sewed them on using free motion machine embroidery.

A new day, a new year, a new decade.

I was told that there might not be so many interesting dates this year, so I had better get a post done today: 01012020 is ok: 01/01/2020.

So here I am not that many hours later - and I have just realised that it is well into the new year here, mid afternoon in fact, but that my friend in New York is still in 2019!

We decided to go for a walk seeing it is a lovely summer's day here - we are well away from all the fires, thank goodness. It is sunny and warm in the sun but there is a lovely cool breeze.

As you can see, we were near the Fairfield Boathouse, lots of people out boating.

We even used the new footbridge across the river at the Chandler Highway. It had rather interesting construction beneath it - and a LOT of steps to get to the bridge so we could cross the river. 

 

Below is part of the paper mills that is being built into a huge housing development, a small suburb really. I thought it might be going to be pulled down but there were objections because of its historical significance, it is some sort of special building. I think it may be the first curtain wall in Victoria - but don't quote me on that, I am not even sure what a curtain wall is. 

So, a new adventure for me on the first day of the new year. Not hugely adventurous, it is rather close to home, but it was like being overseas and just wandering, see what we might come across. Very relaxing. 

End of the year - 2019

I just noticed that I almost missed December!
I haven't been busy but I have been doing some things. I just haven't posted. Must not have been any interesting dates in December.

So, what HAVE I been doing?
We had the exhibition at the Alcove, which went well.
I did warp up my loom in the hopes of starting a small tapestry for the AusNZ tapestry group. The new challenge is Wind in Motion. I am finding it a rather difficult topic to get my head around. I did have an idea, got all the yarns ready and warped the loom. Then I realised that I had warped it wrong, had several bits tangled and could not fix it easily. So I took the warp off. It all sat around for a week or so and then I put it all away. That was either late November or early December. (Just looked it up and it was early November!!) Maybe I'll get it out tomorrow and have another go.

In the meantime, I have had a change of mind about the image. Back to the drawing board. (It would be good if I actually did go to a drawing board for my designs, I tend to use photographs and then I have trouble getting abstract, which is what I prefer.)

I have been trying to only use what I have but I just loved these fabrics and bought them anyway. I can justify it by saying I have already used some of it and have ideas for the other bits. 

Wind drying the washing is one idea I have had. 

I was taking some time today to tidy up stuff that is lying around in my studio. While I was doing that, I came across some interesting yarns and embroidery threads and I had some tentative ideas for both tapestry weaving and machine embroidery. Only tentative at this stage though.

I saw a call for entries for Vision 2020 (I wonder if there will be a lot of vision themes in 2020, 20/20 vision being so good!). There are two components to this call for entries, one is due on January 10 and the other is due on February 20th,)
I had this idea of playing around with background colour and its influence on the colours being used, something I have played around with previously.

I found a sample I did in my textile course and thought I might develop an idea from that.

Butterflies appealed. So I made several, putting them onto different backgrounds. But then I didn't like what I was thinking of doing with them. So they are just sitting there at the moment.

Same coloured bits on different backgrounds.  I think the blue bits are missing from the bottom butterfly though. 

Actually, I did use one for a cloth book I have made as a first birthday present.

You can see the top of the wing sticking out on the right. 

So I suppose I have been a bit productive, just haven't posted. It has been that busy time of the year when Christmas is approaching, New Year follows quickly and the summer holidays are starting, meaning that things are winding up for the end of the 2019 year.

So farewell to 2019, welcome to 2020, which I hope is a good year for all.

Yet another bowl.

I have played with silk roving and made more silk paper, this time with some Angelina Fibre between the layers.
That didn't work perfectly as it tended to keep the layers of silk from binding, especially when I put in clumps. I decided not to iron the Angelina Fibre, to just sprinkle it in. After the silk dried, I ironed it and that seemed to help bind it.
But one lot of silk paper was a bit too fluffy and I thought it would not hold. I sewed a little pattern all over the silk paper and that seems to have worked.
Two new bowls! Not sure what I will do with them.

The angel bowl is made too!