Summer in the Deep South, Oddments

In early June I wondered if this would be the year of extended spring that went straight to autumn.  No such luck.  We have experienced bursts of rain interspersed with temperatures in the high 80s and low-mid 90s.  Gardening time is just after daylight, then again just before dusk.

Which means the best place to be is in the studio!

One thing Quarantine time has given me is a space to reflect and put things together.  Finishing the Almost-Dones has been a pleasure, too.  I have amassed a collection of little pieces, palm-size or a little larger, and when I came across them, I began to add to the collection.  These are concerned with color and texture, some are about shapes.  None are really finished pieces, but they are ideas.  The best thing to do when you aren't full of inspiration and the muse is off visiting friends and partying, is to simply show up and do something.  Lack of Inspiration and uncooperative Muse can be my excuses for not getting work done.

With that thought, I began to arrange some of the pieces into vignettes.  Once done, I thought of filling in the white spaces between them with little oddments collected since I was a child and curious about all small things that could pop into a pocket and be pulled out later for closer examination.  I found an old frame with a front-closing door and began to assemble these bits and pieces in some order.  I call the collection "Oddments," and, with great originality, they are numbered 1 to 4.  I have not kept any of them in the frame, but I photographed the individual vignettes.  The idea of leaving them flexible and mobile is appealing, particularly in this time of turmoil and change.  Nothing seems to stay the same anymore.

I offer you a guided tour of my day of play.

No. 1:  Here the center green circle is a tag from a dress by Gudrun Sjoden of which I am particularly fond, so I did a little stitching on it.  The other stitcheries are on linen, paper, even one in the lower line (on a yellow wedge ground) is unspun silk on a piece of paper towel with paint splattered onto it.  The slice of house at lower right is what I secretly fantasize about painting my (presently) blue house one day.  Painting the dots was an inspired moment, as the linen was from a very old shift I'd worn threadbare before I would take it out of my closet.

No. 2:  The arched line is an experimental wrapping of thread and fabric scraps, really small shreds of fabric that I dug out of my waste clippings.  The upper left leaf design is stitched on paper and cloth, with the leaf shape sponged onto paper from a wet cloth I'd just dyed.  Next to it is part of a (very) old wax-painted sample.  The wood in center is from a beautiful and large lavender bush that I brought with me when we moved back home from Knoxville in 2008, and after 12 years of bewilderment at its new location, the plant simply folded up shop.  I love the wood, as even the roots of lavender are a feast for the eyes.  The little boat at the bottom center is thumb-sized, to give you an idea of scale (or maybe of the size of my arthritic thumbs).

No. 3:  The center yellow piece was stitched on a scrap from a manilla mailing envelope.  Using Cas Holmes' instructions (The Found Object in Textile Art) for momigami paper, I wadded, folded, scrunched and crinkled until the paper softened to have a fabric-like hand.  I ironed it, and stitched with hand and machine.  It is a memory of travel to New Mexico with our son many years ago.  The thumb tacks next to it are ancient, I remember them in the back of a drawer from my childhood.  And the little ladder in the lower row is from some long-lost toy of my son's saving.  It is next to a stitching on paper (right) and little shape studies (left).  The red buttons were from my mother, and the piece directly above it came from studying Gwen Hedley's Drawn to Stitch.

No. 4:  Here I realized I had gone to setting things up in something like rigid exhibition order, and this page, though it has some of my favorite objects on it, is less animated than the other pages.  I have confessed to you, with the photograph, of my love of buttons that aren't always perfect and round.  Likewise, my feeling about trees and shrubs.  The little trees were wrapped from snips of embroidery and knitting thread so they look as if they can dance and actually enjoy themselves.  The black and white piece at top left ignited an interest in zentangle drawing and stitching that lasted almost a year, along with sketchbooking with white ink on black paper.

What a huge mess I made with this project, but it was a fun and productive mess.  At least that is what I kept telling myself . . .

Stitch Sampling

This article from TextileArtist.org is a nice read if you have ever wondered about the value of sampling stitches or techniques before you start a project.

Sampling can be addictive.  It's all about the "What ifs" that keep popping up as you try one thing, then make some small alteration to the process or color or thread weight and try it again.  Even better is when you let one idea link to another and another . . .

The reward of all this curiosity spread across small pieces of fabric is that the samples are making your own encyclopedia of stitch and technique ideas as they begin to fill a box or a bin.  Notebooks with cloth pages (the holes are made with buttonholes) hold mine.  I've even used Pellon as a page, which keeps the pages from folding over in the thick binders.

If you searched the dark corners of your own studio space, how many samples could you collect?  Enough to fill your own ring-binder notebook?  Maybe two notebooks?  My favorite ones are where I start out a little loose and not so nice, but as the stitching continues, I can see the improvement I make.  Seeing where you came from is often a great teacher.  And mistakes might be the best teacher of all, because we learn more from mistakes than doing things perfectly the first time.

Don't forget other fabric techniques-- Felting experiments can lead to a new direction in wet or dry felting.  Fabric manipulation gives texture, whether perfectly or imperfectly worked.  What about painted Lutradur or Bond-A-Web, heat-manipulated surfaces . . .

Take a moment to read the article about sampling as a creative process.  It might be the impetus you need to start your next project!

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*