silken knots

Coming from a traditional quilt background, when I first started making art quilts, I was firmly stuck in the 100% cotton rut. It had to be all natural or nothing.

Then I saw some pieces by Annie Helmericks-Louder, large wall hangings made of silk. Knocked my socks off--the sheen, the colors, the texture. So I started playing with silk. Made some pieces that were all silk, some that were various types of silk combined (raw, crepe).

I've been playing with some hand dyed pieces of cotton, ones that were put in more than one dye bath so there's a lot going on in them. I took this one piece and put some narrow tucks across it to increase the texture. For some reason, I had a scrap of green silk laying on my work table. I picked it up, tied some knots in it, and one thing led to another and led to this piece:


I'm not sure the difference in sheen shows up in the picture, but in person it's very striking. And the strips of knotted silk pop off the surface here and there. I couched down the strips, even the ones that are woven in an out of the others. The piece is currently backed with a piece of felt and the edges are raw, I may finish off the edges somehow...and I haven't decided whether it will be framed or freehanging...