Stitch Stories

Last week I was mostly taking embroidered art to be shown in Bank Street Arts 'Embroidered Narratives" exhibition. Opening event (Facebook)

"Reflection"

"Protected"

I submitted two pieces, and was delighted to have them both accepted. The brief was to submit contemporary "illustrative" textiles, representative, or abstract.

In the work ‘Protected‘ I wanted strong graphical representation of women, with the overlaying figure subtly overseeing and encircling in a protective way. On display but in control.  

The work ‘Reflection’ is taken from a sketch of a male model, but I aimed for an androgynous and anonymous representation of the figure. 

Bank Street Arts will be hosting an open afternoon for Embroidered Narratives on Friday 13th July, between 3:00pm and 6:00pm. All welcome. Cafe Juniper will be open for tea and cake

The exhibition runs from 02/07/2012 - 31/09/2012

Two shows, two countries

Lyn's photo - you can see my dog and Leanne's hills

Recently I have shown work in Portugal and Sheffield. Well...to claim I have shown work in Portugal is a little bit of a blag. My friend Lyn did an artists residency in Portugal, and had this cool idea of a post card exchange. We received three handmade postcards, and three blank postcards to send back with images of what was around us in return. We managed to return two cards as there were only two of us around, and dutifully posted to Portugal. These featured as a very small part of Lyn’s excellent looking end of residency show. 

http://arterra-residencias.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/lyn-dallison-em-residencia-6-semanas.html 

The Sheffield show was rather interesting. At the University where I work, the Physics and Astronomy department have an annual show, and invited participants from the wider University community. They emptied out a lab, and displayed a variety of creative offerings from University staff. A very mixed bag of work, the photography being the strongest pieces IMHO, I guess physicists are pretty familiar with using high tech pieces of equipment such as cameras. 

Clare and myself represented the library very capably, and appeared to drag a fair few of our colleagues into the exhibition. Clare is currently promoting her book, check out the progress on Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/5pigeonspress/ 

New Pad

I got one of them new fangled pads, beginning with i, took it to life drawing, and enjoyed not getting compressed charcoal ground into my hands, or not possibly spilling ink onto the carpet.

I like how I can now edit it, change the colours, change the back ground, change the scale. It will only print out in A4 however, any larger and the image gets a bit pixillated. Not sure how David Hockney does it, but for a first attempt, I was fairly happy.

Feeling Blue

On the blue theme - off to life drawing, first time for 18 months, eek, very nervous. New class, new tutor, new other life drawers. Which end of the pen do I put in the ink again?

After a few warm ups, which are traditionally my best work, it's back to the ink. Opps, what I thought was black ink turns out to be blue. Oh well, I pass it off as creative and interesting (hopefully)

After a few nervous scribbles, all appears to be well. I relax and have a very enjoyable drawing session. Fantastic to be so creative mid week.

Little patches found lurking in sewing box

Having opened up my sewing box, I found no blue cotton - needed to repair daughter's school jumper. To the cotton reserved for art - yay blue! But also rediscovered some patch badge things I made a while ago. Had great intensions of sewing  them onto clothing, but then couldn't see myself wearing them.

May need to make some less challenging images - maybe a dog!

Pencil Drawing

Time to get the pencils out. We have moved into our new house, I have space to create, I'll start with a few simple drawings, this being the first. Pretty pleased with it but I couldn't quite get the mouth right, I wanted a hint of a smile. I enjoyed all the cross hatching for the hair and clothing.

White lines

I sketched my father in law when he was visiting in October '10. I felt there was a good likeness so transformed the sketch into a lino cut. Printing with white ink on black you get a sense of the original sketch. I thinks it looks like him, but his wife doesn't like it because of all the sketchy lines - makes him look old.