One almost done!
Shooting photos in my studio at dawn makes for moody presentations, but here it is really:
Despite the flurry around the dyepots again this week, i have been stitching as much as i can. That distraction resulted in not a week of stitch, but two, though the second one will take less time due to less surface area! I’m at the point too where i can start thinking about what will be behind the wing. It can’t fight, but it can’t “disappear” either.
I just can’t stop making these moons. I love thinking about them, about the next one, about the shape, the colours, the meanings.
The wing is progressing for Samara:
but the spare minutes are for the moons!
Had a bad moment last night when i suddenly thought the stitching on the wings was too tight, too controlled. Must remember to get out of the small work approach!
But it’s getting bigger, looser and is not too “precious” after all. The “myopia” that develops as i work small areas of a large piece means i have to literally step back to see the whole. And since i can see in my head what will be happening in the wings and in other areas, it will work.
One disappointing (in a sense) thing is that the result is not the same as the work done this way on “A Birth of Silence”. (See previous post.) The rust on that particular piece stiffened the fabric for more dimension, something that is not featured much on any of this piece. I may have to manipulate it more when the time comes to attach to the background, or maybe it will be fine. I think the backing fabric i used this time too is thinner or flatter than the one used in ABOS as well, but c’est la vie!
There’s nothing wrong with it, it’s just different.
I’ve just completed a small “commission” for someone, and happily noted that a couple of stitches i used on it can feature largely for “Samara”.
Samara’s wings are (with the figure of course!) the most prominent focus on this piece. I’ve been stumped about how to treat them, and had started three different ways of “illustrating” them, all to no avail. Frustrating. It meant a deadlock, because without knowing how i would work them, i had no idea how to proceed with the background. Hell, it was a gridlock!
The first two were with commercially dyed threads on the rust and natural dye cotton background, the third with all naturally dyed fabrics and threads.
I *do* like all of the ideas–just not for this piece! The first two were a bit predictable: feathers that “look” like feathers, while the third was maybe too much of a good thing with all that colour. (Stack ’em and stash ’em for future work…)
My favourite Thing too, a signature, if you will, is the use of dimension and texture in my embroidery technique. Whether it’s raised areas, or FrankenStitch ( my personal woogly boogly break-the-embroidery-rules-about-neatness-and-even-ness approach), i feel i MUST go back to that. That’s Me, that’s what my work is. The feathers above would have satisfied a bit of that, but nah, too feathery 🙂
I’m looking at this:
in conjunction with ideas from “A Birth of Silence”
and now have these to work on:
I’m hoping that i can do one a week……. the body is almost done, as it needs only minimal stitch, but the background is going to be a bear because it’s so big, and that is why it probably won’t be finished until the new year. (Day Job will be F’n FRANTIC in December, so very very little time there…) When the first wing is done, i can also start making choices for the fabric that will show underneath at the edges.
I know this work won’t be done until into 2019, my slow pace necessary with hand work. No rush, no deadline, nothing really to add to a “Gallery 2018” page on this blog, because i’m going where i don’t know where i’m going.
I’ve spent the morning mining deeper and deeper into the archives of old work, old photos, old ideas.
You can’t duplicate things, at least i’ve never been able to. I have no desire to do copies, even of my own work. Series are one thing, adaptations are another, but/and churning out the same thing over and over is an entirely different mindset…… I tried it a couple of times, but other ideas creep in, so obviously that’s my way to go. I’ve bored myelf when i’ve done production work, no real artistic satisfaction in it. Even my “bread and butter” work is all different!
All i’ve done this year, really, is just that: helping putting food in the animal dishes, gas in the car and new underwear for the human residents at the Stately Barr Manor. Six months without a Day Job took a toll, especially psychically, emotionally, and so i am very happy to go back to alternating art for sale, and Art. (Yes, there is a Day Job again, but you’re not going to hear about it, as i’ve decided it’s not my focus anymore, just a way to build things.)
I’m eager to start actual work again on “Samara”. I know it will take time, and much thought, but once i get into the “zone” again, i also know it will be worth it. To that end, the digging has pulled up two three ideas i want to extrapolate from:
Detail of “Self Portrait: SAD”, 2011. The concentrated areas of stitch, and the looseness of the heart are the appeal here.
“Beautiful Bones”, 2009, i still love that heavy encrustation of sequins and beads on the ribcage, something i never did again anywhere, but am finding very “catchy”:
and a detail of “Birth of a Silence”, 2015, the dimension, the combination of flat and raised, of line and texture:
One of the wings will be coming off the board and we’ll see what happens, how things get combined, re-worked, adapted.
So, what do you do with something you’ve stared at for 2+ years, and then cut up?
Throw it in a dyepot. Because if it’s no longer “precious”, you might as well go the full “wtf, why not?” route.
With natural dyes, it’s predictable that if there’s already iron present on the fabric, it’s going to darken and sadden colours. However, with the unmeasurable concentrations of iron used in rusting cloth, there’s no predictability about the shade or depth. Add to the stew, the fact that these pieces were already lined with cotton flannellette, my favourite stabilizer and crunchtexture “additive”, the dyes uptake was even more capricious. And note too: i did not premordant other than using the iron already on the cloth–if i had thought a bit longer, i could have might have done an alum acetate soak to see if the colours grabbed more, but it’s not a big whoopee bad because i didn’t.
I had thrown the figure itself in an osage bath, and was not happy with the resultant boring tan she became. Admittedly, the osage bath was on its last legs, having been used multiple times, but wow, there was a lot more iron on her than i had suspected. After the fabric had been made during the residency, i immediately washed it in hot water and some synthrapol and baking soda, as i do all of my rusted fabrics, removing stray particles, but this really shows how much the rust/iron had penetrated. Invisible to the eye, but not to chemistry! There are many arguments about how to actually “neutralize” the rust, by many different camps of dyers, but this has been the one that works best for me. AND NO, SALT DOES NOT WORK: does your car STOP rusting in the winter when you get road salt on it????? I dunno where that logic came from….idjits.
So i threw her in a pot of madder and sandalwood (using up two old dyebaths). I’ll have to work around the stocking appearance of her from the thigh down though! The other chunks were also cooked in the madder/sandalwood: the largest piece had been randomly and quickly dipped into indigo first, with the hope i’d get some purples. The wings apparently had the most iron on them, but i really like the effect it had on the madder, strong. NOW she’s singing!
Here’s the comparison, before and after:
Fortuitously, the indigo features centred and right above her head, a serendipitous effect.
While these are not the best examples of these dyes, and certainly not the best way to do things (no premordants other than the residual iron), i’m actually quite pleased with the results. She looks muddier, dirty, earthy, but given that Fall is all those things, and that her name is “Samara”, implying dried seeds, leaves changing and falling, the end of Summer and the return to the earth, that is more important, and actually there are some “pretty” areas.
Sometimes “wtf, why not?” is worth the effort.
When i see my thread choices (also naturally dyed) with her, i think the results will be perfect.
Now………..i have to figure out how to use those threads appropriately for this. As beautiful as the dimunitive leaves and flowers have been on the recent moons, those tiny motifs are not going to cut it for this. I need stronger, scaled up structures/objects/designs. Perhaps it’s time to resurrect the FrankenStitch approach.
Samara has been stalled for a long while. The fabric was created in a residency in 2016, has had a wee bit of stitching on the body, and a hell of a lot of staring at on the design wall.
Every once in awhile i’ve trotted her out on the blog, wondering what i’m going to do with her and how. *I’m* tired of her as she is, so i imagine you’re pretty bored by now too 🙂
I know i probably had some grand vision when i first laid her out at ACAD, and at that time it was enough to be able to deliberately create a design like this with natural processes. I do love her, but for reasons unknown, she just hasn’t fired up my imagination enough to do any more to. I’ve started feathers of various sorts for her wings, pulled naturally dyed threads, fussy cut naturally dyed fabrics for some areas, but nope, no feeling of commitment.
Time for extreme measures then.
Well, at least if i *still* don’t do anything with her, she’ll be easier to store………………………………..
Samara has been patiently waiting “in the wings” for 2+ years, created during my 2016 residency at ACAD. I’ve gone through so many revisioned ideas, that my head whirled, and i’d get lost, and hang her back up on the studio wall to stare at , then to ignore…….
Above, as she is to date, a bit of stitching with walnut and madder dyed threads.
Below, several of the ideas i had for her wings.
Nope. Sort of like both feather treatments and the scrappy look, but not enough to get on with them.
Now what if i
a. cut her wings out also, separate from body slightly, with colour underlay in gaps–but how do i treat the wings themselves?
b. covered the background with scraps, not quite boro, but the idea of rough edges and colour layering—not solid or what is the point *of* that background colouring/patterning?
c. vines, seeds, grasses, grains and leaves everywhere, solid? autumnal
d. wing treatment? the layered feathers?
e. introduce more colours–approach? “blocking”? blending?
f. treated the hexes dimensionally, motif wise and presentation/placement ?
Because rather than do all neutrals like i used to/usually do on these deliberately “designed” wholecloth rust and dye pieces, i want more colour now. It’s part of why too, i’ve been dyeing so many threads with natural dyes. This was part of my original inspiration for the feel of autumn:
I’ve been working on small moons again, behind the scenes, but i need to get back to the Big Serious Work as well. I have to stop second guessing myself: the summer has been one of low self esteem, exhaustion, depression and doubt, and it’s hard to get out of that rut. Dyeing suited the mood swings, creating colour where there was none, but a full bin of un-used beautiful threads would be a waste as well.
How does one boot oneself in the arse without hurting one’s back?
She’s been hanging around since the first stitches added Aug 25th of 2016, the cloth deliberately designed in June of the same year during “res”, and me staring at her all along, wondering where she was going.
Autumn definitely, her browns of seed and stalk, the deep violets of twilight, the greys of shade and old nests, her faded features only glimpsed by outline and shadow. Autumn is both a joy and an overwhelming sense of sadness, lost or set aside dreams. There’s a sense of fecundity in the harvest, but also an end to the fruitfulness of long days. Sept 6/16
I’d had plans for her wings—- and neither plan really satisfied her or me.
I spent two hours this morning, fussy cutting, fusing and swearing, using a regular iron and little dinky heat tool iron, and have this to start embrilting (after i add the layer of cotton flannel that is my Go To “batting”—and though i use that, i am NOT a Quilter, i am an Embroiderer: i just use a few quilty techniques 🙂 ):
Such luscious colours, and i’m so proud i did them all with natural dyes 🙂 (As are the fabrics.)
I don’t know how many textile artists work, when out of the public eye on blog, Instagram and FB, but me, i keep files and a private blog for ideas, sketches, colour and fabric combos, inspiration and possibles. Though little was “accomplished” this year, i’m happy with the results, and the dye play i’ve been doing, BUT i found myself this morning opening a new file and category for “WORK 2018”.
A LOT of the 2017 notes are archived already. Some are switched to the 2018, and a LOT MORE deleted.
I love the little moon series i’ve created over the last two years, and intend to make many more, however i also need to get back to the larger works as well. “Samara” will be one of them, and after seeing her in the sun yesterday, i pulled a bunch of these naturally dyed fabrics.
They may not all get used here, but given the initially planned harder look, i think this is more on track with what she’s saying, softer, still strongly feminine, but with a more “fertile” approach. I want her wings to be more inviting, enveloping, brilliant even. Autumn after all is not just a time of endings, but of rich harvests and warm gatherings. I do need however more autumnal colours so into the dyepots again with some of these scraps.
For other work i’ve wanted to do, i guess i will be making larger pieces of the potassium permanganate dyed cottons after all. I must have cut up the piece i did during residency, thinking it was a “fail”, a lesson learned: leave it alone and the time will come as it needs to!
While digging around in the actual fabrics i still have, i found this, and am thinking to use it as a “marker” for a new series with the PP.
It’s snow dyed, with Procion, but that doesn’t matter. In the grand scheme of things, colour is colour. And the texture of this old rayon velvet is freekin’ awesome. It’s vintage, at least 20 years old and at a yard and a half, is plenty to incorporate into this dreamed of work.
Another week of dyeing, and i figure i will have enough of threads and cloth to “share” and to use.
albedo too 
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