Domestic Sketches

Today, in The Time Of COVID-19, I am unashamed in pursuing normalcy through examining commonplace, often overlooked objects.  This slowly-stitched, meditative process is a reminder that there is life after this, that there will be a time when we can all exhale and take tentative steps toward establishing our own "new normal."

These four sketches are stitched on rough linen scraps that have been cobbled together to make a whole.  The challenge was to stitch over the raw-edged seam lines without having any little hiccups in the lines of floss.  The green, natural and blue blocks were a learning process, but when I got to the cup and saucer, my capacity for challenge was exhausted, and I used an intact scrap of linen twill as my background block.

Little Quilt

Strip Weaving is an interesting way to create a surface for stitch.  This one came into being as a project to keep my hands busy in the evenings while we watched the British Mysteries.  Perhaps it should be called "The British Mystery Quilt"?

It is 7 1/2 by 8 1/2 inches, roughly.  Linen, mostly, with some cotton for a contrast in texture.  The stitches were limited to straight and cross stitch, with some couching and a section of tiny, tiny french knots.  The piece became such a part of my life that I was actually a little down when it was finished.  THere were evenings when some sections refused my stitches, while others yelled for attention.  The end result appears to be a map of a small, colorful town.  My granddaughter was the first to recognize the story here.  Kudos, Bethy!

Re-thinking: Map, 2016

This piece was posted in May of 2016, but since then I have had a change of heart about it.  To the original leather and linen construction, I have added the rows of straight stitch.  But, most importantly, the orientation is now turned upside-down.  As a navigational guide, it seemed best to have the home base in lower right, a sort of docking point for starting and stopping a journey.

Yes, I do like to think about things a long time . . .

Winter and Spring

Two pieces finished, the "Spring" only this afternoon, "Winter" last spring.  For some reason, stitching seasonal pieces in their proper season is not easy for me.

The spring trees are treated playfully, each almost circular foliate set on even more improbable trunks.  Layered, both appliqué and the stitches.

Winter, the older piece, is a more thoughtful treatment of the bare trunks, in somber shades of grey, white and grey-brown.

Once lost, but found

I had computer woes this morning, and while frantically going through files I came across this-- once lost, but now found.  A card for Jordan.  Our computers are amazing little creatures, seemingly possessing para-normal abilities to sense when they should let us find something nice in the early hours of the morning.  Despite all the scrambling and angst about the lost Keynote presentation, thank you, dear Mac, for this gift.  And for opening the window to the "new" storage for Keynote files.

Starry Night

This is a little piece that wouldn't stay within the 4" square I meant for it.  It is an example of my starting something that simply had a mind of its own, and then hanging on as it galloped  off in another direction.

The fabric is linen I dyed, and the threads are a mix of hand and commercially dyed cottons and silks.  A little white-painted bowl sat on the worktable with the brightly-colored skeins tumbled together as I stitched and planned and listened to the story the threads were chatting about as the lines and shapes unfolded under my fingers.  Working with intense colors is always quite stimulating, but to add to the mood of creativity I listened to the soundtrack of BFG as the stitching progressed.  How could anything stay sedate and perfectly mannerly with John Williams' delightful music filling the studio?

And that is how all of these little images came to dwell here: stars, even a little block of fallen stars, a blackberry "briar" patch, river road, tracks, foliage . . .  Ethan shares my passion for blue and green, so this will be my subject for our writing club meeting this afternoon.  The children write their stories, Grandmother stitches hers.  The children read their lovely written works, Grandmother tells hers and accepts the children's excited interruptions the way historians add footnotes to the body of their data.  What better way to spend the after-homework-is-done moments of an afternoon in the studio?

And yes, Beth Ralph, you are entirely right about the way the story should be matted and framed rather than stretched over a small wooden stretcher the way I usually do these pint-sized pieces.  Isn't Show 'N Tell the best part of FreeStyle?

Feathers by the water

The story of this piece is one of wondering, "What if . . . ?"

It started off innocently enough, a weaving in a variety of yarns and thread, then the idea of weaving feathers into the story changed everything . . .

Once the feathers were in place, weaving the last part of the piece was impossible.  The feathers changed the story, and I left off working on this for weeks, waiting for the rest of the idea to form.  That was when Sherry Mayfield suggested that I not continue weaving at the bottom of the little hand loom, but to ease the piece down the empty warp and work from the new middle toward the top.

After I had moved the weaving and feathers down, it seemed a shame to do something common to it, like weaving with ordinary (or, in my case, semi-ordinary) materials.  Instead, I made a fabric sandwich of silk paper, a scrap from a vintage handkerchief, a cutting of old linen, and covered it with silk chiffon and a small strip of more silk paper.  This was the point of initial stitching, straight stitches using a high-sheen cotton floss in horizontal lines.

When it all held together fairly well, I began weaving the embroidered block into the open warp.  That called for more stitching to secure the embroidered sandwich to the piece (or the sandwich to the warp).  For this I used silk, a pale blue Spun Silk with Flame thread from Stef Francis.   These new silk straight stitches were all done in vertical lines in contrast with the cotton.  The vintage cotton yo-yo looks on the scene with kindly interest.

Three days of intensive stitching and assessing the progress of the piece followed.  With a deep breath (carefully, carefully) I cut the piece from the loom, then began weaving the warp ends into the stitching behind the fabric sandwich.  Next came a strip of "eyelash" from Tentakulum (Painter's Threads) near the bottom and above the feathers, and stitching the little reeds in shades of indigo silk.

I believe it is done.  When I look at it I find no adjectives or adverbs in need of changing, so the story is complete.  I have never inserted a stitched cloth, large or small, into a weaving before this, but as I consider the possibilities this is a mixing of techniques quite worth exploring.  The warp threads that are left on the front of the work are the most challenging feature for future experimentation.  Thank you Sherry, for encouraging me to look at this piece differently!

A closer look at the stitched/fabric sandwich weaving:

Now, if I can keep from touching it long enough to consider mounting and presentation . . .

UPDATE on the Feathers:  Poor feathers!  One was lost in moving it about . . . I think it is time to think of a resuscitation (yet again),  as one has been lost.  Or, I should simply move on, put this hexed piece in a studio journal and note it is not something to be tried again.

*Sigh*

Summer Map-making

Maps are not always flat little things with lines and letters and numbers.  Sometimes they can show us the way in and out with stitches and silk thread on scraps of hand-dyed silk noil.

Dreamscape

The ladder that seems to reach into a befuddled sky . . .

Two summer strolls

In a little park, strolling, and thinking about . . .

Turquoise beads and a scrap of fringed green fabric.

The threads and I considered how many different ways we could color kid glove leather, the threads were of the opinion that the leather could NEVER be as nuanced and subtle as they.   Because it was growing late, I did not answer.  But the next day I spent a lot of time working on putting color on smooth, thin, kid leather.

Blue Wood

This from the winter-- the threads and I were chatting about how silly it was to always think of trees as grey or black and having green leaves . . .  It all depends on your operating location-- in or out of the box.

Spring Musings

An examination of spring colors, spring fragility-- these two pieces have surfaces of silk over layers of hand-dyed silks and linens.  

The first is on a firm ground of so many layers I lost count as it was being assembled.  The silk chiffon over the top of all was dyed, spottily so.  But it was the spottiness that gave the center pink area more interest.  The green danglies are there because it reminded me of the texture of the spring as it just comes into being.

Here is a different look at the spring.  The small piece is worked in hand on a very thin ground of (mostly) transparent silks and little snips of linen and a dyed lace.  The tree was made separately was slipped under the chiffon before being stitched in place.  A bit of hand-dyed linen defines the ground and left of the landscape, but the tree itself still dominates the scene because of the full bushiness of its branches and foliage, even covered.  The beads are trying to tame everything, but you know how difficult it can be to tame a spring day.  Held up to the light, it changes character, in that mysterious way light has of transforming colors. 

Birthday Garden

For my sister, who has a marvelous green thumb, an on-the-wall garden to see her through the winter until her spring bulbs begin pushing up.  Layers of fabric and stitch in a wide assortment of weights . . .  modeled on a garden not far from us that is laid out in orderly rows and beds of color.

Happy Birthday, Baby Sister!

Blog Inspiration: Mandy Pattullo

Have you ever had a favorite artist whose work inspires you to improve your own creative process?  Or, maybe to investigate things you hadn't considered before?  Mandy Pattullo is one of those inspiring people to me.  I do not have her sketching skills, nor do I work with some of the materials she uses, but her love of old fabric and stitch and the dignity she gives in her transformations of these pieces is such a person.

For the month of January she began working with postage stamps, filling a sketchbook with paint, paper and cloth, and it made me think about my own box of postage stamps, collected over the years-- and how dwindling the availability of these stamps becomes as we e-mail more or send things through carriers rather than the postal service.  I pulled out the packed-to-the-gills box and marveled at these little works of art, just as I had when I was ten years old.  And if I was a cartoon, I would have had a little conversation bubble over my head with a lightbulb clicking on:  Bingo!

The Bingo Moment came when I realized that the diminutive size was perfect for the palm-sized fabric collages I was working on.  I needed a focal point that had great detail to it, and it must be quite small.  A piece of printed fabric was not to scale, and the pieces were too small to create easily-recognized images.  And there were so many colors stored in those tiny bits of paper . . .

The pieces are built in my little fabric sandwich style, layered and stitched work that might be layers of hand-dyed pieces from old napkins and tablecloths, pieces of clothing, things left over from other projects-- even the threads were often re-cycled by over-dyeing when I had an abundance of one color or another.  The edges might be finished or not, depending on the fabric itself.  The unfinished edge is a way of giving immediacy to a piece, like a quick sketch from a vacation or a walk in the woods.

If you would like to see Mandy's work, her blog is here.  Below are two of the pieces her postage stamp collages inspired me to create.  Now that the gate has been unlatched, this may go on for a while . . .  lots of stamps . . .  tons of fabric scraps . . .  long winter days ahead . . .  ? ? ?

Thank you, Mandy!

Rainy Day in the Neighborhood

Obsessive stitch.  Neurotic stitch.  The sorts of stitched pieces that have their roots in a succession of rainy days.  About 4" x 4".  Layers of different fabrics, stitched experimentally-- part of this was stitched and dyed prior to the appliqué and addition of more stitching, which gives it great textural interest.

Two Trees, Moon

Roughly 5" square.  From sketches of the early autumn trees in the moonlight.

Some stitching

Garden, with weeds.  A true garden.  Those tidy gardens without weeds belong to helicopter gardeners, the ones who hover and gasp and rip up the offending "weed" as if the garden police were knocking at the gate, ready to write citations and name names.

And, because I grew peas in a pot (a very large one) a couple of summers ago, I love remembering the fresh-cut smell of the pods between my fingers.   I've given them a little whimsy here with Mother of Perle buttons:

Happy Thanksgiving!

Blue Vase

Many years ago, I committed what was to become a life-long mea culpa: I broke a blue glass Art Deco vase that belonged to my mother.  She handed the albatross to me and asked me if I could pull the plastic flowers out that were quite firmly wedged in place.  Of course, coming from Mother, this would not be an easy thing to do, but I had not yet lived long enough to understand this.

I still remember standing in the little laundry room at the back of the house, trying to understand why the (stupid) plastic flower on the (even more stupid) wire stem wouldn't come out of the (beautiful cobalt blue) vase's narrow opening, and I tugged at it, turned the flower, tugged again-- and the vase broke into pieces in my hands.  The break disclosed the truth:  the stem was a very long one, so Mother had simply folded it back on itself and stuffed it in the vase.  The end of the stem caught on one of the bulb-shapes of the vase and could not have been extracted without x-raying the vase, then having the Bomb Squad come in with intricate tools to work the wire out.

The drama that followed this little scene made an indelible impression on my younger self, and one day decades later, I began to embroider blue vases.  None of these stitched vases looked like The Blue Vase I so vividly remembered, but photo realism was not the point of applying needle and thread to linen.  I never put all the ensuing pieces in one place, never "collected" them on a wall.  They are scattered through my house, and occasionally I come across one in the studio stored in a box of old work.  I numbered them, at first, and there were more than thirty pieces before I stopped numbering.  Some I cannibalized for other projects, some were made into greeting cards (but not for my mother), so they are lost to me.  I will post pictures of these little pieces as I come across them, and maybe they will finally be together, if only in the world of the internet!

These pieces, however, I do have, and I begin my exhibit:  The piece at the top of the page, "Sansevieria" was first posted in 2010, but as it is part of the series, I include it here.

Below is the first.  I remember carrying it in the pocket of my jacket, along with a needle and a little clutch of DMC matte cotton that had been cut into 12 or 14 inch lengths.  I would work on it as I walked downtown at lunchtime, in traffic when I was stopped at a light for 45 minutes at a time . . .  in all the odd moments in a busy life of wife and mother with more than one job.

These two were done using more scraps from the same piece of very loose, rough linen as the first.  Once it came to filling the vases with flowers, the rayon bullions couldn't be stitched while walking in downtown Atlanta, and I needed good light and a quiet place to work.

Here the blue vase got a rug-like setting, with the felted triangular shaped appliqué in the border.  The tassels are made from DMC cotton floss.

This rather mis-shapen piece is a combination of Machine and hand embroidery with vintage cotton appliqué.  The rusted ground cloth was from a flurry of rusting fabrics I did in 2012.

The Blue Vase needed a break, so this one was called "Blue Vase on Holiday."  It is on hand-made felt with tassels, beads, stitch, and the vase itself was cut from another Blue Vase piece that hadn't worked very well, then applied to this one.  I always thought the vase had chosen a far and cold country for this trip-- there seems to be ice and pale sunlight in the felt, icicles dangling from a lower corner.

Next is one of my first machine embroidery experiments.  I did not know how to set up my old Viking for free-motion embroidery, and I don't know if there was even such a name as that for this work.  The metallic and rayon threads are stitched on a piece of commercial felt, and with the beads and the funky stitched framing, it is a glitzy little piece-- yet, it is not the size of the palm of my hand!

As the Knoxville Freestylers are beginning a study on drawing with a sewing machine, I did a quick machined piece for a demonstration.  This latest Blue Vase is on a piece of hand-made felt.

This, however, may be my favorite in the Blue Vase series, which I back-stitched and titled, "Blue Vase in Black and White."

I will come across more pieces, or at least I hope so, and when I do, I'll update this post with pictures of those pieces.  Meanwhile, enjoy!

Waiting for the Spring to Come

We will make a trip to the beach with my sister, son and daughter-in-law and The Adorables.  This is always a magical time for us.  Until then, I have this picture, a snapshot in cloth, to remind me of how much I will enjoy the change of scenery and softer air.

Surrounded by the tidewater river, there is a lighthouse between the mainland and the islands that can only be glimpsed briefly from the road, but that glimpse is very worth the waiting.  I have set the old lighthouse in moonlight and taken all sorts of artistic liberties with color and shape.

Hurry, Spring!

January Musings: Stitches and Poems

The New Year is always a time of looking-- looking back over the shoulder, looking forward into the unknown.  I do not make resolutions anymore, but I try to take up projects or ideas in small doses, giving attention to one thing at a time.  Well, maybe two things.  Never those long, impractical lists that are more wistful thinking than reasonable expectation.

One thing I have decided to explore this year is mark-making in all its aspects.  We did a bit of this in FreeStyle last year, and I discovered how peaceful it is to take up some improvised tool and dip it into ink or paint and see what mark it will make on a piece of paper or fabric.  The marks stretch into a rhythm that slows down my day, as if I am marking out a pool of quiet around me, a place to work and uncover ideas.  And in the quiet, the ideas simply pour out.

After the mark-making, the needle and thread come out.  If I were mute, I could explain myself to the world with that ancient medium, but the world would have to slow down to "hear" my answer.  Slowing down, of course, is the key.

In the Ways To Slow Myself Down, I add this story:  I fell onto the patio, via a metal chair, in early January.  Since that time, everything in my little world has slowed, sometimes to a grinding halt.  Stitches were put in and taken out (of me, for goodness' sake!), more doctors, the re-defining what is important . . .  I am so grateful for stitches that held me together while my head healed.  Grateful, also, for the stitches that kept my hands busy between the first accident in November until now.  From that time of slowing down, I have this piece, which is a sort of poem to the winter.

Poems are ways of slowing down-- reading meaning in the spaces between words is not so different from finding meaning in the little spaces between stitches.  Both words and stitches can be layered, thick with meaning.  They can be frivolous or deeply serious.  Terse or chatty.  Fluid or choppy.  What perfect complements they make!