Back to the studio

A search for material for "traveller's blankets" found all sorts of exciting fabric, and has given rise to another idea, based on sails and the seams in sails -
These ideas get captured in my SNB (studio note book - a bit like the "SRJ" we were required to keep on the course) - for future reference. The third "blanket" idea started with looking at the rope ladders in the sailing pix Tony has on his website - and then noticing the seams on the sails. Finding a long length of grey silk organza was important in developing the idea -
Sometimes my studio is usurped by someone else's printing activities - he's finishing off those frankenstein trousers and moving on to t-shirts -An important part of the discipline of "getting into the studio" is simply getting into the habit of leaving the workspace tidy at the end of the session. Another important factor is having a stopping time. I like being flexible - making up time lost to usurpation, for example - but it's so much easier to know that at a certain time you can just move on to something else. (Or is this the onset of the rigidity that comes with advancing age??)

Gallery view

The opening of the latest exhibition at artisan80 found the place very crowded indeed - the exhibition is a joint show of five artists. (Next exhibition is ... us ...)Heading home, I got a snapshot out the window of the car - doesn't it look jolly - originally it was a grocery store -
Tony has large photos for putting in the windows - it'll look great.

Kingdom of Ife

Sculpture from West Africa, at the British Museum until 6 June. Wonderful statues in brass, copper, stone, terracotta.I liked the striations on the faces, and the beads modelled as part of the statues -
Some of the carvings were of symbolic animals, like the chameleon - it can swivel its eyes independently and thus see both forward and backward at the same time -
Two cast metal rings were impressive; they were possibly used as stands for offerings. One showed vultures pecking at bodies (presumably of captives) and the other was less gruesome - intertwined reptiles, each cluster with a snail.

Couldn't resist taking a photo of the lighting and shadows -

Journal quilt or "Journey" candidate?

Both, maybe ... it measure 7"x10" and incorporates some of the "TravelWriting"-printed fabric. Other fabrics include discharged black from the Bob Adams workshop at FoQ years ago; scraps from a kimono I made for Tony out of an african batik print; pinstripes from recycled shirts; a bit of silk dyed at the very first CQ summer school.

Mystery object

Which bit does what isn't immediately obvious. (Seen in the loo at the British Museum.)

Swan upping

My favourite item in the "Horace Walpole and Strawberry Hill" exhibition at the V&A was the book of swan markings. And less than a week later, by coincidence, I found more - on this website, which incidentally has lots of other eclectic items.

"All swans were Crown property," says the V&A's caption, "but licences of private ownership could be granted to individual or institutions of appropriate status. These were regulated by the Swan Act of 1482, with the ownership indicated by marks on the beak. The book refers to swans in Norfolk."

Similar marking systems indicating ownership exist for cattle in the wild American west (brands) and for reindeer in Lapland (ear clipping), that I know of - and others no doubt - all those ear tags for livestock and leg bands for birds.

Swan upping refers to the marking of the swans - but first catch your swan! This is an annual ritual on the Thames. Here's Stanley Spencer's rendition -

"Stitched up" at the V&A

At the "Friday Late" last week, you could pick up a sewing kit, find a quiet spot, and get to work -"First Aid" posts around the museum provided practical help -
Because of the rotten weather, the events that should have taken place in the garden were moved indoors. This is a steeplechase on sewing machines -
It might have been a good time to see the Quilts exhibition, but I went to see Horace Walpole at Strawberry Hill instead. The exit was through the shop, and there were many quilt books on display -
indeed, an entire room of the shop devoted to fabric and other temptations -
including these cards of buttons covered in the special V&A fabrics - at £6 a card. How nicely packaged they are -
Caren Garfen has expanded from embroidery on cloth to a range of tempting merchandise -

Portable photo booth

I got fed up with having messy backgrounds on photos or messing around with holding up paper so that the object was presented nicely, and made a portable photo booth.It's three pieces of mountboard, hinged with masking tape - the side folds in one direction, the bottom in another. Takes about two seconds to set up; stores flat. It's quite big, but I only have to move it between the worktable and the ironing board, depending on lighting conditions.

Oh, the little things that make the work go more smoothly!

The accordion book is one I made about ten years ago - drawings of ancient figurines of warriors from Sardinia, done shortly after I'd bought some vivid inks.

Wisteria

In full bloom on a wall in Kensal Rise -A different, later variety along the fence at a rather more famous location, St Paul's -

Painting stories, week 3

The task this week was to take a scene from our story and look at it in as many ways as possible - from far and near, from above and below, whatever. Alison suggested doing 30 or 40 variations - some people did at least a dozen.

My chosen scene is when Lady Mary, exploring Mr Fox's castle, sees him coming, dragging the body of a young lady who seems to have fainted. Lady Mary hides. Mr Fox suddenly notices the diamond ring on the young lady's finger and tries to take it off, but it is tight - so he gets out his sword and cuts off the young lady's hand - which flies right into Lady Mary's lap! Mr Fox doesn't see where it went and doesn't think to look where Lady Mary is hiding (fortunately).

With my recent immersion in steps and stairs, of course there had to be stairs in some of the scenes -
Bottom left is based on the initiation well at Quinta da Regaleira - a staircase winds inside a tower. Bottom far right includes a shaft of light falling across the chest, showing Mr Fox's shadow, with Lady Mary in the gloom. Not sure how I'd paint that, but we'll worry about that later....

By break time I had other views that incorporated stairs and shafts of light -After the break, instead of painting one of the scenes, most people carried on with yet more drawings. I found it hard to imagine just how Mr Fox would hold the young lady to drag her along, and will have to ask friends or family to help out with a bit of re-enactment (rings and swords prohibited).
Another puzzle was to visualise heads at odd angles - from above the skull and below the chin (lower right, with Lady M behind the curtain).

Homework last week was to find pictures of things we'd be using in our scene - as my scene has changed (and might again, who knows), I'll need to do more of this picture research. For instance, in the story Lady M hides behind "a cask". The story was known in the time of Shakespeare - so would Mr Fox be wearing a ruff? Is his "castle" perhaps a mouldering suburban des res? All sorts of combinations are possible....

Ladders on my mind

One theme - or rather, motif - I keep coming back to in thinking about "Journey" is ladders - which could also be train tracks.The first attempt at a 3D ladder in fabric didn't quite work ... not sure if it's leading anywhere...

Found along the way

Monday found us on the Thames foreshore at low tide, and yielded clay pipe stems, weathered glass, rusty old nails, and bits of pottery -On Tuesday, as I walked across Hampstead Heath something blue among the stones on the path caught my eye; nearby were other shards of pottery and glass -
Some of these are very small. But wouldn't they look great as a huge painting?

Use of time

It's strange to have whole long days at home - and the only urgent deadline still weeks away. It feels like there's something missing!

Having the whole day stretching ahead isn't ideal for me. Yes it's lovely to have all those beckoning possibilities, but all too often it comes to 7pm (time to listen to The Archers) and nothing has been "achieved". Not that achievement is the end-all and be-all, but you do like to feel the day hasn't been wasted.

Because of this known danger, the 9am-1pm studio time is working well. Knowing I've spent 4 hours, more or less, focused on Making Work counts as "achievement". Sometimes things move forward; sometimes I tear them up. At the end of the session I clear things away - holding the mess at bay. It's getting easier to throw things out, and to know what needs throwing out.

Enough thinking - let's have some pictures.

After printing some of the TravelWriting onto fabric, I took it further. Here are some unexpected things happening on the back -unexpected in that they just sort of happened, somehow - thanks to a quick rummage in the scrapbox for inspiration -The front -
and the back, with all the rows of stitching in place. Usually I tie and bury the threads as I go along, so they don't get tangled into the subsequent stitching. The bits of gold organza were fused onto the black fabric. I used various bobbin threads, and need to pay more attention to adjusting the tension -
Finished -
The idea is that the back interacts with the front - both the red markers for starting and stopping (if that's how you want to read it) and the gold "bumps" - perhaps they are the proverbial "leaves on the line" -
Ideas for further development - cut the printed area lengthwise and the back at a slant, to show the inner layer; use two colours of inner layer; little puffs of coloured fabric coming out of the back; hand stitching on the back before machining; some stitch marks on the front before machining; areas on the front like "geographic features" eg a lake.

Two Dogs

Using a combination of stencils and stamps cut from rubbers and styrofoam pizza bases, Thomas has been developing ideas for his "Two Dogs" label -These are practice bits done on trouser hems and recycled shirts -
The chain of dogs is to go inside the waistband -
I suspect some fused applique is called for.

Exhibition details

Friday 4 June is "the party" - do come along! Click to enlarge the map and to get bus numbers; nearest tube is Willesden Green.
Now all that remains is to make and select the work, and set it all up. I'm spending a lot of time in the studio these days, but nothing much to show so far. Whereas the photos that Tony sent away to get huge prints made arrived this morning - they look great!

Frankenstein stitching

Last week my son was walking across the road and got hit by a car. He was lucky - just a few cuts and bruises, but did get taken to A&E by ambulance, and they cut off his trousers to check for damage to his legs.

While recuperating, Thomas thought it would be a good idea to sew up the cut trousers with a "frankenstein stitch". I found some iron-on interfacing to hold the legs together, and did the tricky parts - then showed him the stitch (sort of a two-sided buttonhole stitch) and gave him the needle and thread.It took a while - he has long legs -
Here it is before stitching -
and here it is, finished -
- except for the embelishment of a designer label on the back pocket - Thomas had a heraldic idea involving Corgis -
I gave him various types of fabric, showed him my textile paints and collection of rubbers for cutting a stamp, found the freezer paper in case he wanted to make stencils, and then went away for the weekend.

Coming back, I found the worktable clear except for this neat array of paint, and replacement rubbers -
In another part of the room, evidence of activity -
Haven't looked at the results - I'm waiting for him to come home from work and tell me about it. Where next ....

Blogger problem(s)

For some reason, the "Older Posts" link at the bottom of the page has disappeared. So, to look at the posts from a whole month isn't possible - despite my attempt to change the appropriate Setting to "view 31 days". Frustrating! - I use the blog as a reference diary, for those times when you wonder "when was that exhibition anyway..."
The workaround is to click on the last post shown in the sidebar, then when it comes up to click on the last post shown in the sidebar, etc etc, till you get to the end of the month. Tedious! - and not exactly intuitive. But it kinda works.

Another possibility would be to post less! But the blog is where I keep the tidbits that interest me, in a way that I'll (hopefully!) be able to find them again.

Instructions on the internet were not helpful, as Blogger doesn't give me the alternative of downloading the complete template. Is it because I'm using the old editor? I tried the new one and found it awkward (maybe you just get used to doing things the way you're used to doing things...)

Anyone else had this problem?

Textile events at Dulwich Picture Gallery

In the post yesterday, the leaflet from Dulwich Picture Gallery -Dulwich is a bit of a trek from north London, but it's a nice place to visit. The gallery is the oldest public art gallery in England; it was founded in 1811. The building, designed by Sir John Soane, included almshouses for six old ladies - they are now exhibition galleries. The building has influenced the design of art galleries ever since. You can take a 360 degree tour here.

The collection is basically baroque, but the temporary exhibitions are often more modern. The Paul Nash exhibition ends on 9 May.

The gallery's current events programme includes some textile-related events: three lectures on Wednesday evenings, starting 26 May - John Allen on Tibetan carpets; Susan Collier and Sarah Campbell about creating design; Michael Brennand-Wood's overview of embroidery, pattern, lace, and floral textiles.

On 13 May Sue Prichard, curator of the V&A Quilts exhibition, will be talking about that show.

"Rock Mountain" is one of John Allen's carpets, inspired by his experiences in Nepal -This Collier-Campbell fabric dates to 1972 and was adapted from a tapestry by Gunta Stölzl -This photo gives you an idea of the scale of some of Michael Brennand-Wood's work -