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I think the piece that started with something I was afraid to cut into is finally done. I have contemplated it for several days, added a bit yesterday, and have decided it is time to stop.
The bit I added yesterday was the shadow circle at the bottom, made of dark (navy?) tulle. I think the piece reads like a diptych now, and I think--I admit I'm not sure--that it balances well. It's a case where the negative spaces may be more important to the design than the positive ones.
And I did a lot of hand stitching on this piece--not the quilting, but seed stitches and French knots here and there. Here's an example:
The first picture is a more accurate rendition of the color than this one; but here you can see the seed stitches. While I am striving toward the 'less is more' school of design, I think that adding texture that can only be appreciated when you approach the piece is a good thing.
I originally just overcast the edges on here, but I actually didn't like the frayed look for a change. I had enough of the acid green silk (which came from a hand dyeing accident--one of the few times I've had color transfer in the washer after dyeing) to use as a single layer binding. I thought about using black, but decided that was because my design wall is black, and not because of what looked right on the piece. I like the echoing of the greenish circle.
The piece is called Lake Cooper after the place I recognized in the original dyed tea towel--the lake formed above the dam on the Mississippi at Keokuk, where I have watched many sunsets on the calm still water, the best ones from my kayak.
Yesterday I found out I got a piece in Fiber Focus 2007.
This piece is called Strata.
The show is in St. Louis, Missouri, at Art Saint Louis, 917 Locust Street, Suite 300, from September 10-October 18.
The opening is September 14. There are several fiber related events in St. Louis that weekend, and sometime this fall Quilt National is going to be nearby. So if you're in the area, check it out.
Today is 'Hammock Appreciation Day' for some reason, so I thought I'd post a tribute to my hammock. It's where I do a lot of thinking and problem solving. Five minutes in it, watching the birds and the insects and enjoying the shade and the breeze, and I figure out how I want to solve a design problem.
It isn't all about the design wall for me; sometimes I have to get away from the stumbling block to see a way around it. And while I'm swaying back and forth, I see the birds strutting around that inspire my napkin sketches.
So if you're mulling a problem, find a place to relax and maybe the solution will come.
Here's one of the pieces I mentioned in my other post today:
It started as a napkin, hand dyed at the same time as some of the birds. But it had a sense of light in it (from the way it was folded in the dye bath).
The tree is drawn from the sumac I have in my garden--a tree which, in the wild, forms large clumps and is not remarkable, but which, as a single specimen, is quite cool. It's kind of like an umbrella, with bare branches almost all the way up to a canopy of graceful leaves. Very Oriental in feel, like a Japanese maple but much cheaper and easier to grow.
It was cut out of a piece of discharged black cotton. I'm becoming a big believer in keeping every little bit of leftovers (sorry, Ann), as the circle was in that pile. It wanted to be on the piece, and it wanted to be in front of the tree. I don't know what it represented except a design element. I stitched the leaves with a varigated embroidery thread. Then I quilted horizontal lines with invisible thread. And couched down the red thread.
The piece has no deep meaning. It's actually not quite as bright as you might think from the photo--this particular napkin is quite shiny. But I like it. A good use for a discarded napkin.
Once again I have a piece that I've hand dyed that I can't bring myself to cut. It happened before, and I ended up framing the piece as is. I've never been happy with that solution, but I can't figure out what else to do with it.
This is the new piece:
One of the dye baths was shibori style--wrapped around a pole with string tying it off. The resulting cloth looks like ripples on water at sunset.
The fabric is an old tea towel. If you look closely, though, you'll see that there are small holes in the piece in the lower right hand corner. That's part of the problem, how to deal with that. I've tried applique shapes on it (realism kills the cloth for me), watercolor sketches (not working so far). I keep thinking I need to tear it into strips and put it on something. I had a piece of hand dyed silk that I think would go with it, but in a cleaning fit I misplaced it. Still looking.
But what make this piece special? I try to abide by the Doritos principle (use it, they'll make more), but then this comes along. It might be that it is so close to being perfect in my eyes on its own that I can't stand the possibility of ruining it--I paint watercolors, too, and many's the one that I ruined by not stopping soon enough. Or maybe even though it's 'pretty' as is, it's just not inspiring me. I've brought it out and hung it on my design wall two or three times in the last few months, and always end up putting it away for lack of motivation.
In the meantime, while it's been hanging there, I've done a couple of little sketch pieces (not done yet), thought about dyeing more napkins, cleaned the house, anything to avoid attacking this piece. Perhaps it is time to put it away again...
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