Lost In Lace

hand cut paper lace and shadow.Piper Shepard

“Lost in Lace – transparent boundaries” curated by Lesley Millar is the current exhibition at Birmingham City Museum, on till 4th March; I went to see it recently with colleagues, Hanne Rysgaard and Basil Kardasis, who are part of the Stitch and Think research group. Hanne and I had decided to make a large porcelain hanging based on lace for the group’s exhibition at the Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery which takes place later this year, thankfully a lot later. Basil came along for the pleasure of a day spent looking and talking.

Atelier Manferdini - Inverted Crystal Cathedral.

The first thing that really got me excited was the scale of the work on view. The Gas Hall where the work is housed and much of it is designed to fit, is massive and the lace exhibits certainly inhabited the space and made a monumental but ethereal impression. My own impression after my first walk around, was of a silent shadowy cathedral; but it wasn’t silent and it wasn’t gloomy, but it was majestic.

Juxtaposition . Cardboard Jaquard punch cards woven together:Suzumi Noda

I became fascinated by the light within the space and also how the unusual materials used to construct the pieces still acted as lace, you can see it but you can also see through it. trying to assimilate the whole exhibition on my second  journey around I sought out this now you see me now you don’t aspect, as seen above.But I had come to try to take away some aspect that I could develop in the work that Hanne and I are about to embark on. We actually didn’t look or speak together for about 3/4 hour, then she said “light” and I said “shadow”.

shadow cast by 'Juxtaposition'

Cosmos Series paper and paper thread: Naomi Kobayashi

I became obsessed by the shadows cast (or not) by the ‘lace’ so this is post is now about the  shadow experience. I now wanted to see and capture shadows, but this wasn’t as easy as I had hoped, which gave rise to a long conversation on the train home to Bristol, about how will we achieve large-scale combined with strong shadow….Annie Bascoul talks about shadow in her pages in the excellent catalogue, she mentions the “eroticism of the thrown shadow” I like what she wrote but I couldn’t find a good shadow to photograph ( but this may be due to my ineptitude with the camera)

Installation of Moucharabieh, cotton Ffbre: Annie Bascoul

A not very erotic shadow – sorry

Some of the most fascinating shadows were from the smaller pieces,below is a detail from 2 edges of Diana Harrison’s ‘Time Line’ a broken,small in scale but very long length of polyester thread. cotton cloth and dog hair. I really wanted to stay and draw the with crisp complicated meshed shadows formed by the fabric and it’s fine black pins that anchor it in position.

The best shadows  obviously were mad when the wall or floor was close to the surface casting it …and the refreshingly bright blood-red piece by Micheal Brennand-Wood gave crisp grey snowflake patterns as an extra bonus.

Lace the Final Frontier, painted and stained aluminium :Micheal Brennand-Wood

and in the children’s activity area beyond the main hall there were lovely paper snowflake patterns hung on a washing line.

And it made the most ethereal and unusual shadows

But my favourite shadow was the strange almost mottled fish skin appearance cast by the unbelievable hand – cut paper lace panels, by Piper Shepard, that made a sort of triumphal arch between two tall and elegant pillars in the museum.

and here is the panel that made this shadow…

And if you feel that I have just not done justice to this exhibition, because I haven’t talked about the philosophy of either the artists’ or the curator’s decisions to make and show the work and I have missed the whole point – good. Go and see for yourself or if not, buy and read the catalogue :-Lost in Lace, written by Lesley Millar,  published by Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery, ISBN 978-0-9570494-0-6 and let me know what you think.

Stitching Corsets Galore

Florrie finishes first.

The Corset Making courses at Heart Space Studios are very popular and always fascinating to watch.  They take 2 days of solid making, from marking up the 3 layers of fabrics

copying the patterns onto the chosen fabrics

then cutting out the 10 pattern  pieces that go into a traditional boned corset,

pattern pieces for the top layer spread out ready to stitch together

plus the linings and the interlinings which all have to be prepared before hand,  so that means 30 pieces of pattern to be cut and sewn together…

sorting out the pattern pieces into the right order

Holly gets to grips with the machining

It takes some sorting out before embarking on the mammoth task of sewing the whole lot together; we do say that the makers need to be used to using a sewing machine to participate in the course and that by the end of it they will be able to stitch straight lines perfectly and be ready to tackle any other garment making with confidence.Practice after all makes perfect.

Once the basic shape has been stitched together, in order to get a first fitting everyone has to get the fastening organised and they start with precise marking of calculated measurements/

marking up the eyelet postition

at this stage it starts to look more like engineering than dress making – and in a way I suppose that is what a corset is… a rigid structure for enforcing or reinforcing – the body into another shape.

working with a bradawl to puncture the layers of fabric

then the detailed application of the eyelets begins.. after the bradawl  – the hole punch and eyelet thingimyjig is applied

suddenly by lacing the eyelets with ribbons, we can get the garment on the body to see how it looks…but first the tight lacing….

possibly my favourite picture on the whole of my blog, this is an under-bust corset, perfect for wearing over outer garments for those burlesque episodes in a modern girl's life.

and this is all before they have to sew in the actual stays, or stiff rods that will take over rigid shaping of the body

Lisa sorting out the rigid stays that will be encased into the corset.

Lisa Keating, the Heart Space tutor,  looks so mischievous on these pictures; but this is where all her promises are delivered. This fitting is on the second day of the course and everyone is just about stitched out, but she knows that she can get them all enthused again with this first fitting.

I can’t resist showing these pictures of women being laced into their corsets for the first time. This is the fantasy moment blended with the total satisfaction of making something difficult to achieve but beautiful and completely transformative in every sense of the word.

this is the eventual use of a beautiful silk fabric bought on holiday

moments of self -help and introspection – did I make the right measurements?

how can anyone be so small?

as opposed to moments of true grit.

this picture says it all - magnificent!

But eventually after several more hours of work and another tight lacing try -on, the effort is all worth while

a finished laced gold and black corset, all ready to go to the ball.

 

Voices, The Quilt Art Group

My new year’s resolution was to get out and about a bit more so when I was asked to open an exhibition of quilts at the Devon Guild Craft Centre at Bovey Tracey, England, I said yes, even though I was a little daunted. However several people asked if they could have a copy of what I had said to publish on their various websites, and I thought well why don’t I blog it? So, here it is.

one quilter standing on front of another's quilt:Mirjam Pet-jacobs.

” When I was first approached by the Devon Guild to introduce this exhibition, I could not imagine why I had been asked! But when I checked my diary for the day’s date I felt a little more adequate for the task – I was scheduled teaching a Crazy Patchwork Workshop at my new textile venue, Heart Space Studios in Bristol. Patchwork Quilts, like Japanese Kimono, are for me the epitome of textiles – perfectly useful art objects.

catalogue cover for quilt exhibiiton

When looking at the catalogue for VOICES and the Quilt Art Group’s website, what first impressed me about the group is that this international organization has managed to keep successfully connecting and exhibiting together for nearly 30 years – this is no small achievement. At present the group members live and work separately across several European countries and America. What they all share is the universal language of stitch, and speak it in the dialect of quilt.

Wrapped - Charlotte Yde

It is now common practice for artists to use whatever materials they feel appropriate to express their ideas. Indeed any art establishment abreast of the times and at ease with itself takes the use of mixing media and genre for granted.Without naming any of the usual suspects, the fact is that quilts and large – scale fabric installations are now widely accepted as a vehicle to relay an artist’s inner vision.

one wall of exhibition, form left. Jette Clover,Anne Woringer,Cherilyn Martin

But this was not the case in 1985 when the Quilt Art group formed and stated that its intention was to ‘deliberately make quilts as an expression of art….and to extend the boundaries of quilting as an artistic medium and achieve wider recognition of the quilt as an art form” .  this surely demonstrates that it was a pioneer in bringing about the changes we take for granted today.

Silent Voice (detail) Sandra Meech

By using an extended range of techniques, materials and tools associated with traditional quilt making the group aimed “ to create non-functional quilts to be displayed for their visual aesthetic; coupling integrity of expression and quality of craftsmanship.” The work here is as much a statement about craftsmanship as it is about personal expression.

A heap of Strips - Inge Hueber rearranges her fabrics to demonstrate its different colours and form

It visually and sensually demonstrates many successful examples of that wonderful moment of transition when putting different materials and techniques together, the disparate things become whole.

Purple Story, Yael David-Cohen. paint, print, stitch

These fabrics have attained their integrity by fusing together a variety of several textile “languages”. Here we see evidence of the traditional craft skills juxtaposed with today’s technologies. The fluency with which different techniques are used to make one whole piece enables these works to be studied long enough to be “read”. The rich and varied surface sustains the viewers’ interest so that slowly more subtle meanings are revealed.

Lost (detail) Mirjan Pet-Jacobs

Reading the group members’ personal statements it becomes obvious that  choosing textiles for a means of expression is not happen – chance

Mirjam Pet-Jacobs  writes

“ Maybe because they are so commonplace, textiles have the enormous power to both evoke recognition and to tell stories “ and several of the artists talk about “ storytelling”

Fan field. (detail) Elizabeth Brimelow

Elizabeth Brimilow in her personal statement says

“ Fibre has been grown, spun, woven, dyed and stitched for thousands of years. I stitch and manipulate cloth, which is used for its tactile quality, its intimacy and its substance. Through my hands I have a story to tell and this connects me to other times, places and cultures.”

Spirit of Place( detail) Eszter Bornemisza

The meaning contained within the making is as important as the choice of the right tool for the right job, or put it another way; being in command of a range of technical ability gives the maker infinite choice to find the telling means of expression whatever the message. To develop a level of craft practice so that the actual means of production stops being the first, and sometimes the only thing to notice, takes much time; we now talk of 10,000 hours to attain fluency in any skill.

Lost in Translation (detail) see blow

I stitch by hand and I am aware that time must be spent in a state of concentrated repetitive making to achieve fluency. It isn’t so much the precision of stitching, it is rather the rhythm that has to be established to enable a maker to sustain a large piece of work over a long period of time. Whether making by hand or machine an almost meditative state of mind needs to be attained to complete most large -scale work.

Lost in Translation Dirkje van der Horst-Beetsma

To quote Richard Sennett,in his book ‘The Craftsman’

“ Built into the contractions of the human heart the skilled craftsman has extended rhythm to the hand and the eye.”

And as Inge Heuber  says on her web site

Inge Hueber discusses her strips in progress at the PV

“ you understand best what is created by your own brain and heart. “ and she also writes of “waiting for a special rhythm “ to start before she works.

This exhibition of quilts is varied in its subject matter, and outcomes. Some works are expressions of emotions,

Mourning Walk (detail) Cherylin Martin: paper, thread, mixed media

some are personal memories….

personal memory from a quilt shaped like a (very wobbly) dress - Val jackson

some overtly political, and sometimes they just appear to have been made for the pure joy of colour and tactility.

Hanging Gardens - dyed and pleated silk Ann Fahy

But by and large they have been produced with enough thought, innovation, knowledge and craftsmanship, to achieve a piece of work worthy of contemplation beyond the overall quality of its making – which is surely what differentiates art from craft ?”

When I had looked at the actual exhibition, (I had only researched the catalogue and the individual artist’s websites) I certainly could have written a great deal more and about other connections and ideas that flowed from this work, but close readers of my texts will recognise quite a few of my favourite themes are here so I let it stand.

Heart Space Knit & Stitch Club

Debbie Bird’s embroidered landscape

The new Heart Space Knit & Stitch Club had its second meeting with a “Show and Tell” session, meaning everyone was asked to bring a piece work, preferably textile, either something or their own making, or something inspirational, held memories that they could talk about.

Debbie Bird, who is one of the our regular tutors ( and has agreed to be a leader for some of the club’s stitching sessions) showed 2 completely different textiles. One was a richly embroidered, patch-worked landscape that she had made at a weekend workshop run by Ineke Berleyn the colours sang out and Debbie told us that she was thought it very inspirational as she had lots more ideas to develop from this workshop. The other piece she had brought could not have been more different…

Debbie Bird's patchwork quilt - the Hungry Caterpillar

It is a patchwork quilt made for a child, out of scraps she had left over from patchwork commission; she just pieced it together from what she could find quickly and because she enjoyed making the first quilt so much. What I liked about her ‘show and tell’ was that she showed 2 sides of her work,  she brought them to explain that if you love textiles you tend to love all manner of different textiles, so the club should be varied in its approaches to what we have to make together.

Clare Griffel's knitted scarf with rolling edge

Clare Griffel who is also a leader for the club, showed some very simple knitting, a long scarf knitted lengthways to look like a woven fabric, and talked about the problems of casting off. The method she had used  for this was too rounded and caused the scarf to roll, this started her on a quest for different methods to achieve flat edges – something she will be able to help others with on the knitting nights.

Knitted silk necklace

But she also brought a purposely rolled piece of silk knitting that makes an unusual necklace (we sell these in our shop Space) and everyone including the stitchers wanted learn how to make this. And she showed a book that had inspired her and recommended to us all, an knitters almanac by Elizabeth Zimmermann, I will get more details about this at the next knitting session of the club.

2 inspirational rolls of printed cotton

Not everyone brought along things they had made, Clare showed us 2 lovely rolls of cotton she had bought from my favourite Bristol craft shop, Creativity,  she intended to make summer bunting with it and we all agreed we would have been tempted by them as well, they were so beautifully but simply presented.

Sophie showed some images she had learned to print onto fabric at a recent series of Teresa Searle’s evening class at Heart Space, she intends to embroider into them.

Sophie's choice - sorry - couldn't resist it.

After the ‘show and tell session, both Clare and Sophie went into the large studio and started making…with plenty of pink fizzy fuelled advice from the rest of us. Yes I know that we shouldn’t have a drink on the work table but it was a pre – Christmas get together.

Debbie gives bunting advice to Clare

Meanwhile we had other wonderful things to look at, Jan Connett, a stitch club leader showed embroidered shoes she had bought in rural South West China….

embroidered Chinese slippers, the insoles have flowered fabric to tread on.

we were all intrigued by these and spent a long time inspecting the needlework, including pattern darning, couching, chain stitched fillings with heavily quilted soles, everything hand stitched and then sequined!

detailed view of the brilliant embroidery

Then another embroidery made at a workshop, Carol brought in a proper old-fashioned needle-case, made at a Kelly Aldridge class.

proper hand embroidered needle-case by Carol Clarke

I am very intrigued in who goes to classes and who doesn’t – I don’t, it has never occurred to me go to another embroiderer’s class (except when I check into Heart Space classes) I just go to books or museums to study other embroideries for information; maybe I am too insular in my outlook. I have however gone to many other types of workshop in pursuit of my own development, jewellry, metalwork, enamelling, photography, all things I can’t imagine how to do at home alone.

But a real advocate of workshops, particularly ours, is Libby, she couldn’t make our first workshop so sent her sister instead, and then using the diagrams and notes that I had provided for the mirrored hearts, brought in her versions and also some sock pigs….she was laughing, rather sheepishly, as she was pulling these out of her bag  – it must have been my face – what on earth was she going to show us – here was I thinking how wonderfully eclectic everything has been and now – Sock Pigs?

Libby Butler's sock pigs

Well what a surprise, they were adorable, and what is more very exquisitely made. Libby is a really good needle woman, she had re-made the pinned and beaded heart some months ago so I know how much care she takes, but these funny little pigs were her version of some she had been taught to do elsewhere -  I especially liked the tails….

backsides of Libby's pigs

and what did I show?  Well they are things already contained in the blog the mended white Edwardian blouse from my very first post and the Bleeding Flowering Heart. which is in the Heart pages. I am so looking forward to the stitch club developing, we seem low on knitters and this is reflected in the post. But next time I will redress this and concentrate on the knitting members. We plan to meet every week on a Thursday night  so there should be plenty to report on judging by the variety shown by members at these start-up sessions.

Drawing Embroidery

shisha mirrored heart

This little heart has been made for a project for the new Heart Space Stitch Club. I designed several small felt hearts that could be made in an evening and taken home. I offered everyone a choice of colours between bright pinks and rich reds with sequins and beads and silver thread embroidery, it is Christmas after all.

stithcing the heart

One of the makers was amused at the frivolity of her choice of materials, excusing herself by saying it was a only a gift for a child. But then I explained that she had made a perfect symbol for protecting a child, the heart is now a universal symbol for love and the mirror would divert the ‘evil eye’; traditionally shisha mirrored embroideries were used to decorate children’s garments

So imagine my feeling when looking carefully at the images I had taken throughout the evening I saw the maker’s eye gazing out of her tiny stitched mirror.

an eye gazing out of the mirror eye

This struck me as the perfect way to introduce the collection of embroidered garments I had organised for the Drawing Club the following weekend.

child's jacket embroidered with protective shisha mirrors

The fabrics I had chosen for the drawing class were an wonderful array of embroidery in wools and cottons and silk and silver, mirrors, buttons, shells and coins on dyed and printed grounds, all made by hand and traditionally worn for festive occassions by people of the desert communities in Pakistan and Rajahsthan and Gugarat in India. I had also brought in some books that deal with the symbolism for these fabrics, amongst them one of my favourite resource books, Amulets by Sheila Payne.

worktable with reference books, embroideries and all sorts of materials for drawings

But where to start with such a myriad of pattern, texture and colour, I said to try to be faithful to the colour and the students soon set to work colouring and cutting to form backgrounds for the detailed drawings.

piles of embroidered fabrics to delight a colourist

These are all worn and faded fabrics, so some of the first studies were surprisingly subtle, chalks applied to darker grounds give a broken faded effect. For the first exercise I asked the class to describe the embroidery in as much detail as they could, just to get them focused. This is after all, primarily, an observational drawing class.

collage of pattern details over crayoned ground

Describing the details made lively descriptive drawings and collages. I liked the inventiveness when students started to make 3D collages for describing tufts and fringes.

getting the character of a fabric by using paper collage as base for drawing

However not all the colours were difficult to attain, several people had brought in their own materials and some of the hand-made papers were really good colour matches. As one member of the group had requested a workshop featuring collage I had provided lots of coloured tissue papers with paints and inks in silver, plus silver- well silver coloured, metal leaf.

toanl colur matching for ground paper

Then the drawings, themselves  started to become collages, so they were being made in a similar way to the fabrics – by being separate pieces stitched together and then embroidered.

collage of 2 drawings together.

I had asked the class consider how to recreate the effects of the light bouncing from the mirrors, several different techniques were tested, silver inks, paints, foils and fibre tipped pens, that all gave different results.

silver paint markers drawing onto tissue paper collage

the application of silver foil was particularly successful at rendering the reflecting light.

collaged paper for gathered stripes and foil for mirrors

There were several fabrics that were not mirrored, but with strong embroidery patterns that were developed into bold drawings.

exuberant chalk drawing

and also some very large but subtle collages captured the beauty of worn fabrics

faded fabrics recorded by subtle crayon and paint onto collaged tissue papers

Eventually new and fresher studies started to emerge, the students were starting to express more than the look but also the spirit of the materials.

fresh collaged version of the embroidered peacocks

 But at the end of the afternoon, we looked at all the studies alongside the actual fabrics and were amazed at the way that they belnded together, it was difficult to tell which were fabrics and which papers, not the intention of the exercise but interesting, considering the free way in which the drawings had been assembled.

assessing and recording the results at the end of the collage and drawing session.

Commemorative Crazy Cushions Completed

2 Commemorative Crazy cushions

The most hits my blog has ever received in its entire life span of 18 months, was shortly after the Commemorative Crazy post, and many people contacted me saying how much they liked the content and story. So I was delighted when Jane called in to Heart Space Studios to show me the finished cushions that she had made in time for Christmas for her 2 children.

cushions showing tartan fabric backing

They were so beautifully made, using fabrics from her late husband’s sports jackets and ties, and Jane had been able to use the small piece of  tartan fabric, that was her husband’s clan tartan as the backings to the cushions. (did I say that I have a tartan as well – the Hay tartan – all brilliant  red and greens overlaid with a very noisy white check -  nowhere near as tasteful as this one)

close up of the lively wool plain and tied herringbone stitches

She had embroidered “DAD” on one, at her daughter’s request, it is in whipped running stitch, very subtle and almost merges with the tweed background.

whip stitched commemoration

And amongst some other memorabilia, Jane found her husband’s  ‘pips’, these are badges usually in the shape of  a star or a crown and worn by army officers on the epaulettes of their uniforms.  These particular ‘pips’ are actually stitched onto fabric in  gilded thread so two of them they were put to good use at the seam joins of the crazy stitches. Usually a star is stitched  at such points by the embroiderers of the  traditional crazy patchworks.

gilded 'pip' used as a foil for the collision of several rows of embroidery

Jane has enough fabric to make another cushion for herself and even some smaller gifts for other members of the family…. and then she may decide to design and make the large throw from the remaining tweeds. I will keep a record of this progress.

Putting up Christmas

bunting wall at Heart Space

I am not a big fan of Christmas, I prefer New Year with its promise of a fresh start and better times ahead…but here at Heart Space Studios everyone expects us to do a Christmas window at least. But with a refurbished shop to launch, the powers behind my shaky throne decided to put out all the flags – well bunting to be precise – and go for it….hot mulled wine, mince pies and a late night opening party. Added to this was an idea for an exhibition of bunting.

animal mask by Jenni Joule

But, first things first – find the inspirational object – I always do this when starting something new, search for an image or a piece of fabric – anything that gives me lots of ideas or gives a very strong atmosphere…Sophie found it on Facebook in the guise of a head – an animal’s head, 3 animals in fact, by artist Jenni Joule, who brought wonderful things in to a meeting about a month ago – we were away, a spooky-wooky frozen forest

Debbie Bird being very precise and technical

rejected heart bunting

Meanwhile all the tutors set about producing bunting…Debbie Bird held a class on making it and so Heart Space admin, ( Sophie Bristol and I) turned up to find out how to do it.I made several attempts at heart shaped bunting in very tasteful fabrics…they were soon abandoned.  What I needed was a contrast to the white spooky windows..I realised I was trying to reconcile 2 different atmospheres in one space – so the only way to go is complete contrast, the more extreme the better. We would have one red window and one white. So I found an old and very crude Russian shawl in my stash, I hand painted the mustard coloured roses with some pink and purple dyes and then cut it up; next I went for glitz – why stop now? then I added tartan, I do love tartan and paisley – I couldn’t bring myself to cut up any of my old woven paisley samples – far too precious, but I had at last found a use for this old neglected shawl.

tartan and Russian Shawl bunting

I didn’t bag-out the pieces  but just cut them and left them, as they are cut diagonally to the straight grain they shouldn’t fray too much, and hey it’s only bunting…..I set about making 5 lines to sell.

But then we had to start stocking the shop. The first thing was to get one area working properly to set the tone for the whole place. An old and true saying is ” you can’t sell from an empty shop”;  so we piled it all in, colour co-ordinated of course.

Teresa Searle’s felted and embroidered bags, mittens and cases look wonderfully colourful, setting the standard for the rest of the shop, my hand embroidered felt letters look strong and clash nicely with the work beneath.

the first stand of textiles sets the tone

And the pile of scarves hand knitted by Sarah Thorpe go happily with Janet Clarke’s beautiful soft coloured felts. For real winter warmth, the  knitted and felted Hot Water Bottle Covers and neck warmers made by Steph Wooster all mingle together.

felted hot water bottle covers and knitted scarves

The shop starts to look like it is in business.

the shop takes shape

But what about those windows? The winter white one came together very quickly, it is now stocked with cream and white  woollen goods for sale, with the 3 headed animal standing sentinel.

spooky white window

But the other window was more of a problem, the costumes that had been brought didn’t fit our stands and there weren’t enough animal masks to make an impression, beautiful though the horned mask is, by Jenni Joule.

jacket and mask by Jenni Houle hung with my silver heart

I needed more red stuff to link with the bunting on the wall behind…so I asked Lisa Keating who was running a corset making workshop for us, if she had anything suitable to contrast with the white and silver and she lent us this wonderful glitzy black and gold number – now that’s what I call a contrast.

Lisa Keating's black and gold lacedcorset

Then I took every red or silvered glass heart from home and hung them in the window – my house now looks bare – but the Christmas windows are paramount.

red and silver window with my glass hearts from home - note the corset bunting by Lisa

Eventually everything was finished and looked totally intentional; always the way when a design works out well, you can’t imagine that you ever had any other ideas than the finished piece.

Drawing Faces

starting a portrait with the eyeball

The Sunday Drawing Club that I conduct at Heart Space Studios, continues to surprise and fascinate me..this week 2 old and trusted classes in totally different ways of drawing portraits  – with  difference. In the morning we began by using make -up to draw with, so no long sampling sessions to get the skin colours, but a real battle to manipulate the media.

a face complete with blusher and eyebrow pencil

We started with self portraits….the difficulty for most women who are attuned to wearing make up is that they draw what they want to see, as if they are applying make up to the page for the same reasons they apply it to their own faces – to enhance themselves instead of using it as another drawing media.

difficult greasy foundation used as shading

Mike did not have this problem but found the blending particularly difficult as modulating make-up on paper is surprisingly hard, some of the foundation lotions are really greasy and do not blend happily with one another .

tonal drawing as background for self portrait

The slow build up of the subtle colours, above, was interesting to watch because eventually the tacit knowledge of applying make- up for years results in carefully modulated tonal drawings. But eventually  gestural drawings developed as people started to realise the potential of media. the drawing below has been made without using the techniques to apply  of make- up.

using make-up as any other drawing media

Everyone started drawing only using their fingers….

The next stage is to sketch in the eye brows and mouth using appropriate coloured make up…eyes brow pencils and lipsticks

careful application of coloured lipstick and brow pencils

So now to draw other people….

this picture sums up the drawing class, intense concentration and rapid hand movement

the group split into couples or threesomes…and took turns at drawing one another – this is so much harder and much patience and ingenuity is needed to be a good sitter and drawer both at the same time.

The gradual build up and refinement of the drawings was developed slowly when the students were “allowed” the use of more conventional media…I am a strict mistress when I teach drawing.

starting to refine and define using conventional media

the eye - always the giver of life to the portrait

The necessary degree of concentration for this way of working  shows in both drawing and model above, but  also look at the mouth. I had talked about how Hans Holbein completely captured the character of his sitters by drawing very precisely the line of the shut mouth…this example is well observed.

But for some unfathomable reason all the people who drew bespectacled partners omitted the glasses from their drawings!

not exactly observational drawing

The in the afternoon session, something completely different,  I started everyone stitching the eyeball but no drawing allowed only stitch – I am even stricter when I teach stitching.

stitching a portrait starting at the eyeball.

The complete change of media and type of drawing really achieved some remarkable results, slow but immensely concentrated studies resulted from the short session. Often stitching is a release for people who imagine they cannot draw, no-one ever has high expectations for the outcome of this exercise.

thoughtful eye to start a subtle portrait

Not all the people who come to the group are stitchers, so it was fascinating to see how they tackled another unusual drawing media.

varying the stitch to describe the features

At the end of the day we had made a good start on the stitched work and several people vowed to finish them, I will post them later if they do. But I am interested in the variety of stitches applied to this exercise and I feel that some of the group could develop their own work using stitch – but I would think that wouldn’t I? In fact I would like to have another class that involved both of the day’s exercises on one portrait…maybe later in the year.

hoops of stitched portraits at the end of the afternoon.

Commemorative Crazy

Jane's finished cushion from the original workshop

It is the 11th of the 11th 2011 and I am in commemorative spirit; yesterday at Heart Space Studios we made the beginnings of a series of commemorative crazy patchwork pieces. After the last Crazy Patchwork workshop one of the participants Jane, asked me if I could help her make some more patchworks using the beautiful tweed jackets that had belonged to her husband, she could not bring herself to throw them away after his death, but now saw a way that she might be able to use them to make gifts for their children.

silk ties and heathery tweed unpicked jackets

I was very pleased to be asked to conduct a one-to one session with her to help cut into the jackets and organise the patchworks. I knew it would be really difficult so I volunteered to cut into them for her , suggesting that she make a start by unpicking and when she arrived she had carefully unpicked and pressed them all; 3 beautiful tweeds in soft shades of beige, grey and brown and she also brought some club and military ties that she had been unable to part with, and a piece of her husband’s Scottish clan tartan.

silk ties woven with memories

This is what I find so compelling about many old and used fabrics, the story behind each piece; “Make, Do and Mend” is not such a simple statement when applied to projects like this. The first thing to do was to cut the cloths to make a sample piece of patchwork. I wasn’t taking any chances with such valuable fabrics.

starting to cut up the tweeds

 The little sample would tell us what size patches would work best, which fabrics worked well together and what the ratio of ties to tweeds was best. The clan tartan turned out to be the right size to make backings for 3 cushions….so only the ties and tweeds to be organised

sample patches bonded on a backing cloth

But the most important thing of all for the success of the project was selecting the colours of the embroidery yarns, they had to be chosen and tested. I had brought several types of woolen yarns for Jane to sample, the usual tapestry 4 ply and some crewel wools that can be used singly or in multiples, very useful for developing colour combinations. Looking at the colours embedded in the tweeds it was a real pleasure to try to match them ..and at first the pale turquoise crewel yarn seemed the best choice

selecting colours to complement the tweeds - check out that pink

But the colour that really delighted and just kept calling to her, was a zingy hot pink – not what you would imagine for this soft and hazy set of fabrics, but it demanded to be used, Jane kept laughing every time she picked it up.

the pink thread that just had to be used.

We also discussed putting a message or an initial onto the piece, and I explained how in the Crazy tradition there are lots of written messages..so she is writing her husband’s initials on a corner piece of each cushion, but has just emailed me to say that her daughter wants her to just write ‘Dad’ on hers.

platyng with the colour combinations

The use of the crewel yarns in the different tied herringbone stitches makes it easy to combine colours to soften and blend the brightest yarns.

Now Jane had to get brave and cut up enough to make a whole cushion square to take home with her – we distributed the tie fabrics between the tweeds…quite a bit of work ahead …

laying out the first cushion square

the last task before she left the studios was to machine stitch everything into place ready for the decorative stitches that are the true embroiderer’s delight in making Crazies.

matching the patches ready for decorative stitching.

During the workshop Jane explained that she had taken tailoring lessons to make her husband a coat from some tweed he had bought from Scotland, she now wondered what she should do with it – my suggestion is to combine the left over tweeds from the jackets and use them to make a huge throw or blanket using a strippy quilt design….so she is now happy that she does not have to throw it out but most importantly, when I wrote to ask her permission to use her ‘story’ she replied that she now felt that the jackets had “still got a life”. That is why I really appreciate using old and loved textiles to remake and recycle.

Kirsty’s Crafted Card

sample of 1st embroidered card

Recently I was advised  to watch Kirsty Allsop’s TV programme, Hand Made Britain, in order to immediately offer a special class in whatever she had made that week in textiles; a new idea for attracting new students toHeart Space Studios. So this week I did just that – watched the programme that is all about making things for competition at County Shows, which I was delighted by having spent many happy days in marquees up and down the country gazing in amazement at the things that people produce for competition.

Portishead produce show

The local Portishead flower and produce show, even inspired an entire body of hand embroidered work, The Flora Embroideries.

my embroidery of Flora, the goddess of flowers

I watched with growing fascination as Kirsty, aided by textile designer Claire Coles, made a pretty paper collage that was then machine stitched to produce a greetings card with a bird and flower design. She was obviously enjoying every minute of it .

OK, I thought – I can do that – and then I will make another version of the idea adding textiles to the papers to run as a short workshop, easy – peasy……

presentation board for an earlier work

That’s what I thought until I started to make my sample. Looking in my plan chest I found some old presentation boards from my book, Crazy Patchwork, lots of lovely images and scraps of fabrics all ready to be re-cycled into new and glamorous greetings cards.

selecting and arranging the papers

It was when I was trying to make a loose and airy design from my tiny scraps of fabrics and old flower pictures that it all seemed to go a bit wonky - but not wonky in the right way or enough to be quirky - which was the look I was aiming at.  I eventually found that working on a coloured background was easier than all that white space glaring out between the collage ( I had been so busy writing my ideas down when watching the TV that I really hadn’t paid that much attention to the actual nitty-gritty of the proceedings) now I was paying the price of over confidence.

stitching the collage with copper coloured thread

I am not a great machine stitcher so even with the embroidery foot in place, the card was quite difficult to stitch in a fluid line; using metallic thread didn’t help either but I often use metallic thread as a neutral tone for busy designs, plus the scale was very small for my level of skill.

stitching on the back of the card

For once I actually think that I preferred the back of the card as even though the stitching is really bad – it is a quirky drawing – I may work with this idea a bit more in future. I was beginning to admire Kirsty’s effort more by the minute. It took me about 2 hours to get to this stage, but it did look a bit sad - beads will cover a multitude of sins – like the holes in the middle of the flowers….

finished sample card

Eventually I got something I thought I could develop - I really liked the addition of lace to the paper and had to resist use all fabric instead and I like the odd combination of different materials so the next day quickly made another card to photograph for the Heart Space website to advertise the class. From these 2 samples I now need to develop a system to enable people  to make their own versions simply and easily. So now I am off to source and organise papers, pictures, fabrics, glues, beads, threads and cards so that the students who come here can have a relaxed and enjoyable time creating something new from something old.

second sample

Back to Kirsty and the programme; she entered the card into an embroidery/hand craft competition at a show in Wales but won no prize with it – fair enough, it was her first attempt. What did win was a traditional embroidery made into a card, it was very precisely stitched – in fact the prizewinner carried off the ‘best in show’ award for what looked like a large – scale cross stitched alphabet; I suspect it was made from a commercial kit or someone else’s design.

For this reason, I generally find the craft displayed at most county shows dispiriting (unlike the produce which I love) all that seems to be rewarded is careful craftsmanship, but I suppose that is what the shows were originatedto promote. But I prefer to see things that people have had tried to fashion for themselves - some personal quirky things made up out of what is available which is why I always prefer seeing the  children’s competitions that are often much freer in spirit, and originality is always rewarded, now what does that tell us?