Developing the graphite travel lines

Wetting the paper before writing with soluble graphite (on gessoed bristol board)

Paper prepared with a wash of grey-green acrylic paint

Taking apart a book published in 1738 - sacrilege?

The bookpages gessoed and written on

Single pages treated with pva (left); the other three are gesso, with writing in various materials

Leftover paint on brown bags - too colourful, at the moment anyway

Lots of water versus no water

Gessoed till receipts, with felt tip, gold pencil, biro, water and graphite, pencil

Fine sand added to gesso; when written on and put into the sketchbook to dry, it made a sandy offset print

"Please do not touch the quilts"

The "do not touch, please" sign is all too often ignored at quilt shows, and it can be an unpleasant duty to remind people (though there are ways, and ways, to do this...).

Human nature being what it is, seeing the do-not-touch sign is likely to make people want to touch!

Here are some attempts at a solution to this dilemma.

"You may be stitched in the ditch"
"Unauthorized touching causes chocolate to taste like brussel sprouts"
"Unauthorized touching cuases adult children to return to your home forever"
"You may be cut into half square triangles"
also
"You may be stacked and whacked"
Displayed in Utah (via)

Nice little (or larger) quilted signs -

California (via)

From North Carolina (via)

At a show in Canberra (via)

Made by members of a quilt guild in Richmond (VA?) (via)

 I'm less than impressed by this sign, in a shop rather than a show -

 Ah, the irony of this quilt by Elizabeth Hartmann -

Note the reminder!

Other aspects of quilt-minding are considered in "White Gloves at the Ready!" on Ragged Cloth Cafe.

Spotted in Queens Park, W10

It's just the cutest thing

A sewing machine is always a wonderful present - and this one is special. It's a Lego Sewing Machine - but you won't find it in a toy store near you. It was specially made, as a present, including the design of the box and the leaflet. All parts are truly Lego - including the presser foot, which is a pickaxe used by a mini-figure.

 

Packaging and instructions design (including photos) by Jeff Fox; inspiration and permission provided by Carrie Bloomston such-designs.com.

Want to make your own? - Carrie has a tutorial here.

Back to City Lit for some ceramics

The course is called Surface Decoration, but I'm hoping to continue with the porcelain slip-dipping project, using pleated, steam-set fabrics. First, though, a bit of playing with shards of relief-patterned glass and coloured slips -

Those were made in the first class and left covered with plastic. What next...

During the week I made some paper structures, thinking of dipping. Some are paper from my book of sermons, others are punched, most are sewn in some way, including with  twisted, hence bobbly, wool -

Week 2 - the hexagon tiles have been scraped back so the patterning show. They've been sent to be biscuit fired.

These hexagon tiles were scraped while the slip was still a bit wet. They are "in progress" -

Some shapes were dipped, with equivocal results, and await firing. "It's a learning curve..." - some were dipped twice; will that flake into layers, or does the flaking happen because the paper isn't covered properly?

A closeup of the one with the twisty, knobbly wool - I don't hold out much hope of it coming out of the kiln intact, but we'll see -

Robert suggests a wire armature to help keep the shapes. I'm thinking about it. And about how the porcelain puddles...

Where's the stopcock?

A drip-drip-drip sound is not a good start to the day. A drip-drip that soon produces a puddle -

A puddle right in the middle of the floor? The pipe to the radiator upstairs must have blown, that's the only thing that's near that area...

My son wasn't happy to be wakened so early, nor was he at all pleased to see the puddle. The first thing he did was check the pressure on the boiler (we had a similar problem before, which dripped into the flat downstairs, eek) - it was fine. Find the stopcock and turn off the water till we figure out what's going on. Drill a hole in the ceiling so all the water can drip from the same place and be caught in a bowl. Hurry back upstairs, contemplating having to move furniture and tear up the carpet. And floorboards.

Then he remembered the water tank under the eaves, and checked that - and indeed that was the source of the problem, with the water travelling to the middle of the ceiling because that's the lowest point.

Turn off the water supply to the tank, hurry downstairs to speak to the neighbour whose tank it is. But what's this - he's had a condenser boiler fitted and no longer needs that tank, his water comes from the mains. Well, if he runs out of water, further action will be needed. Wait and see...

I don't know what I'd have done if I was on my own. Got the bucket to catch the drips, and turned off the water - that's as far as my thinking gets. "You'd have phoned me," said the son. Yes, I would have.

In a previous flooding incident we learned the hard way where our stopcock is. Or rather, we had it moved to somewhere easily accessible.

Do you know where, should need arise, to turn off the water?

Drawing at Union Chapel

Union Chapel, near Highbury & Islington station, is open every Wednesday 10.30-1.00. "Art in the Park" sketching group met to draw there, and had the additional experience of an organ recital as accompaniment. It's an amazing place, starting with the chiselled and gilded decoration on the doors, which open onto an enormous interior -

The chapel was built in the 1870s and dedicated in 1877, and has the expected period details -

An organ recital usually involves a hidden organist, but Rob Rowley, who is also experienced in tuning the organ, could be seen with the aid of a bit of technology, and came to the stage to announce each item and say a bit about the organ itself.

From my pew near the front I had a reasonable view of the metalwork screen behind the pulpit and of the heating grilles in the aisle, which were quite a simple pattern. Gessoed pages from the book of sermons seemed an appropriate base to use at this venue, but to get the pattern right I needed some experimentation at a larger scale in the sketchbook -

The curlicues in the screen were the perfect thing to draw during Rob's rendition of the Flower Duet (aka British Airways advert music) -

 Later I got a closer view of the screen and discovered the colours -

 Most people used colour, and included large sections of the interior -

So interesting to see the different choices of view, materials, styles - especially as I'm never sure I've chosen the right medium for the situation. Or is it a matter of choosing a medium and using it all the time?

Spoon-like

Seen at the Tord Boontje shop, Charlotte Road, EC2 - carved wood, but no details on maker etc

Seen at Society of Designer Craftsmen "shop within the show" - mixed media work by Tracie Murchison,
 with cross stitch in the bowl of the "spoon"

What, no scissors?

Years ago I drew these scissors in the ironwork gallery at the V&A. The image turned up recently on the back of a paper used for printing out a recipe.

I seem to remember that there was a case with various scissors and similar implements, and looked at all the cases, hoping to find "my" scissors - but they were nowhere to be found. As their record reveals, they are now in storage.

In the shop, though, you can buy little pairs of scissors -

and a scarf stitched with scissors, right next to which was a bowlful of these "Apparel Tags", perfect for the ueber-organised wardrobe -

Keep a pencil handy to write:
   Item
   Last worn
   Maintenance _Wash _Iron
   Last dry clean
   Best paired with [three lines for this]
   _Stylish but safe  _Perfection

The last line made me smile - I used to organise my clothes into "work" and "weekend", the latter being a further step down from the relaxed dress code (or, lack of dress code) in the office.

Drawing Tuesday - Museum of London

The posts about drawing in museums appear a week after the event (to give me a chance to catch up!) - in reality, today we're at the V&A, looking at ironwork.

But last week it was the medieval galleries of the Museum of London, which was reasonably quiet, apart from a group of 7 year olds, one of whom planted himself beside me and engaged me in conversation: "What's your name?" Kids are so direct!

My first object was this oak post from a building dating to 956-979. "Several more posts from the same building have been found," said the label. (Can't find it in the online collections.)

"They formed arcades supporting the roof of a building that was at least 11 metres (36 feet) tall. It may have been a great aisled hall or a church."

I used water-soluble graphite and wasn't happy with the result - then added "grain lines" to the wood with biro, which really improved the "feel" of it -

Nearby was this tiny (about 7cm tall) bone mirror case. It was hard to see it clearly, and that's where the camera, zooming in through the glass case, came to the rescue, showing its pattern clearly. It's 12th century, made "in three sections that have been riveted together by copper alloy rivets into two bone strips on the reverse. The rivets have stained the bone green."

Enlarging it to A4 size isn't something I would have attempted a year ago, but working in large sketchbooks has enlarged my approach, size-wise. The maker added an amazing amount of detail at this tiny size!

Sue was fascinated by the coffin lids and drew this marvelous intertwined horse -

as well as an eel spear -

"There was a plentiful supply of eels in the Thames. This spear was designed for use in clear shallow water and captured the eel without injuring it, by gripping it or holding it down. Eels caught in this way were sent to market live."