Resurrecting a disaster

A couple of weeks ago I made a screen print of iris flowers. My sister had drawn the design on the screen with soy wax. She finished printing for the day and because I'm so mean I felt obliged to finish up the last of the paint rather than throw it away! A piece of fabric was grabbed with no thought of colour or suitability. You know how it is when you just grab the first thing you find. The result was less than lovely but today I've been working into it and I hope it has possibilities. I'm thinking it might hang together with the two appliqued iris quilts I've almost finished.

I wanted to lose most of the unconsidered colour and introduce a flat gold background like you often find in Japanese paintings. I was also thinking of the lovely red ground you often see under gold leaf so I painted most of the pinky red out using artists' acrylic gold paint, working with a fairly dry brush so that glimpses of the original colour remained. Then I added detail and shadows with Derwent Inktense pencils in Chilli Red and Sepia. You can't tell from these images but the flowers now have very long stems - I shall have to decide if they need to be tucked into a pot or simply finish at the lower edge of the quilt. At some point I must find an iron - sorry it looks so creased right now!

What's everybody else up to? You've been a bit quiet for a few days! Linda

Jamie Oliver's teapot.

I went to Jamie Oliver's for lunch today and ordered a cup of tea with my lunch.  Look at the teapot it arrived in!

Is it sad to take photos of what you're eating and drinking??  I'm not sure, but it was such a lovely oriental cast iron teapot that I couldn't resist; it made fabulous tea as well and had one of those built in strainer things so you didn't get a mouthful of tea leaves.




I asked if they were available to buy and the waitress went and asked for me.  She said that they weren't but were available from IKEA! Who'd have thought?

This is a preliminary sketch done in pen and ink of my still life from the other day.  I haven't got around to doing much apart from this and the sketchbook page (below) but  will do the Chinese Lanterns next I think.

More books

I said I would never be tempted to more books yet here I am with two more!

Book cases are groaning, I've no idea where they'll go when I have finished gloating over them....

But, look at the subject, Japanese prints and patterns.

Here are a couple of pages........

Chinese themed still life.

Having watched DMTV's episode on drawing a still life (excellent btw!!) I thought I'd set up something using the little teapot my daughter gave me for Christmas.

I don't have a lot in the house that has an oriental theme so was a bit stuck but decided a few Chinese Lanterns were appropriate. Thought I'd go for Stephs minimalism, and lose one or the other, but couldn't decide which and will see what they look like when I've drawn them.

I'll let you know how I get on!

Sushi inspiration

I love food! So what could be more fun than using a style of food relating to the orient. Sushi is so beautifully presented that I thought this would make a good starting point for at least one piece of work for our exhibition.

From my photographs I worked into my sketchbook emphasising the spiral construction of the sushi.

My next step was to load a chisel nibbed pen and needle nosed bottle with black dye and set to work drawing on some lengths of white cotton fabric.

 The lengths of fabric are still rolled up in the utility waiting to be rinsed. Once they are rinsed and pressed I will pin them up and stare at them for a while before deciding my next step.
The pojagi that I posted about before Christmas is progressing very slowly as I'm finding it difficult to hand stitch the dark blue fabric with dark blue thread in the evening - roll on the lighter evenings!
Edwina

Rag Market bargains

Hi Marie,

I'm glad to hear you enjoyed your day in the big city - it makes such a change when you spend most of the time out in the sticks like us doesn't it? Your Rag Market finds look gorgeous. I thought you might like to see the bargains I found there last week - nothing as sumptuous as your brocade but lovely cotton jersey irresistible a £1 a piece!

The black discharged one is finished (actually I'm wearing it as I write this!) and the grey one with black feathers just needs its neck finished. Took about 20 mins to make each top up on my trusty overlocker.

Annabel, you have to go with an open mind rather than a set shopping list. There's an awful lot of rubbish there too but if you keep your eyes peeled you can find some treasures. And remember there's always the Fancy Silk Store opposite and Jamie Oliver's for lunch!

Love Linda

Lace and brocade

After taking in the lace exhibition at Birmingham Art Gallery, so not what I expected, and truly wonderful, I went for a browse around the rag market and look what I found! Small scale brocade, it had to come home with me......how Japanese is this! Fans and cherry blossom. Of course, any fabric I use in exhibition pieces will be my own, this gives a taste of the richness of the east.

Jiggery Pokery

Hi everyone,

I love it when the blog is so busy with everyone posting! It's brilliant to see what's going on in everyone else's workrooms isn't it?

This afternoon I have started on what I think will be my first quilt for Orientation. I did have a head start though:

Can you tell what it was in a previous life? It's the skirt from our 'Art to Wear' outfit from last year's Festival of Quilts fashion show. Needless to say I won't be parading down a catwalk again anytime soon, so when is the occasion to wear a such a skirt? I decided there probably wasn't one and have ripped out the back seam. Of course doing that doesn't make a flat or rectangular (quilt shaped) piece of work so some modifications are required. I have made quilts that could have done with a dart or two to get them flat, but I do try my best not to start out that way!

I had thought that I could 'make up' the sides to get it rectangular and then add a bit more fabric to the top edge. As you can see pinned to the right I have got some more of this parchment coloured cotton, but sadly not enough. It's been in this state, staring at me for about a week now, but today I thought, what would I do if this was paper? Well, I'd just cut out the good bits and jettison the rest before collaging to a new background - simple!

 Here it is chopped up. Obviously I was limited in the cutting up as some motifs were touching and couldn't be sensibly separated, but I've broken it up into four segments which has given me enough scope to rearrange the composition.

I've laid the pieces onto the rectangle of spare cotton, altering the angles of the strings that suspend the birds and cages so that they converge more steeply to, at this stage, an imagined point. There's more fabric folded behind the top to accommodate this but my pin board isn't big enough to lay it all out!

As I've cut up the pieces I've kept some of the edges that now form negative spaces where new cages will be drawn into. You can see one in the photo above. I think this'll be a useful way to bring the composition together. It's all just pinned together at the moment and of course I don't have any Bondaweb. I think that might make it all a bit thick and stiff anyway so I might just hold it all together with some temporary spray then quilt it to death to secure it all.

Bye for now,
Laura

Progressing pots

Sorry to have been quiet for so long (although those who know me, might well feel that is no bad thing). What is so good about this blog though, is that because there are several of us contributing, there is always someone busy and blogging. I have been enjoying following what the rest of the group is up to, and am having to gag myself to prevent me talking to Laura about that gorgeous printing beastie she has got.... I know that as soon as I understand it's (and her) capabilities, I shall be assaulted with ideas and inspiration, which will take many years, I suspect, to realise. And I haven't got a few years spare right now - definitely not! I haven't been idle - just had to do some work for other things. But I thought it was time I gave you all an update on poor old Oriental Pot 2 - who has been very gracious about being left hanging on the design wall, with no attention for a few weeks. I think when I last blogged, I had a first layout of the background, and a smallish blue pot - which will be receiving a bonsai tree, and definitely needed some help to compete with a typically busy background. Here he is ...

Definitley overwhelmed poor soul. So first of all I have added some lighter strips and am trying a couple of different fabrics to sit behind the pot ... pink ....

and blue ... which I like best. I know the bonsai will also suffer a little from the same problem, so I am planning to put a sort of moonish type of series of circles, behind where the tree will sit. I do not want this to be too dominant in itself, as I want the tree and pot to be my focal points, but I definitlely want it lighter and shimmering. I've decided to paint some bondaweb with pearlescent white paint - a bit watered down. I've then lightly foiled the resultant web with silver and oil on water foils. I've then traced and cut out the circles and placed them on the background ...

The outer ring - still with backing paper attached - it won't be as light as this ....

and the inner rings .... I think this might work ... fingers crossed ....

OK - not bad ... but not quite as shimmery as I wanted - the paint on the bondaweb has caused the foiling to be really subtle - this needs more bling .... so I decide to machine quilt the rings with silver thread and a very close stitch

closer up - just still too much white ....

You can see the stitching better from the reverse. The rings are in metallic silver and all the rest in two shades of shiny rayon - both greenish

And here it is from the front - hard to show the subtlety of the shimmering rings - but I think it is there ... you will have to come to the exhibition and judge for yourselves! All ready for the Bonsai now - which I have made a start on. I have a couple of other bits to do frst - but hope to be posting again soon - Hilary x

cherry blossoms and lions

Hi all,
Not sure I can shout anyone down with this but on the continuing topic of "not really relevant" here's what I've been up to!
It's been feeling an awful lot like spring here this past week, which is glorious! We have had a very civilized ( so far) winter here at this end if Canada and my thoughts are on cherry blossoms. Prodded there by the arrival of the Call for Entry for Cherry Blossom: a Textile Translation show which happens every spring.


The quilt is about 37 inches wide by 45 inches long ( and for some reason is sideways in the image- sorry ) so those blossoms are big! I know they look a bit weird right now but they only have their “base coat” of paint on. It's not looking like much yet, but I have great plans!

I did make a wonderful find this weekend! with a very oriental theme. I have been looking for some "interesting" chairs and these are what I found.


There are two of them and they aren't a pair but apparently they are the mans (which is a bit larger and the one in the image above) and the woman's chairs. They need some serious clean-up and maybe a bit of glue but I fell in love with them. There is some carving on the backs which I am slowly unearthing....


Not quite sure what this little creature is meant to be ( a lion maybe?) but he/she might make an appearance in Orientation?

Bye for now, Catherine