Archive for November, 2014

making progress…

Thursday, November 20th, 2014

Ever since I got home from the fantastic art retreat at Lake Tahoe I have been challenged to resume the hand-stitching. I don’t quite know why but sense technology may have something to do with it! Why should I sit with needle and thread in hand, stitching away when I could be playing MahJong on the computer?! Finally I decided in order to move forward with the series I need to get these hand-sewn pieces near completion. Now it seems there will be at least two handcraft heritage pieces.

christening gown sewn to handwoven yardage

This is the first panel of the first piece. The remaining panels are finished but need to be trimmed and then sewn to this one. This is my father’s christening dress which is sewn to two pieces of handwoven yardage.

The neutral yardage on the left was a shawl woven by my great Aunt Lucy who was a weaver extraordinaire. The piece on the right is my own handwoven silk which was a scarf given to my mother as a gift. When she died I re-aquired this piece and it has been sitting in a drawer for 20 years waiting for a purpose. In the center are a couple quilt blocks in neutral colors.

I did cut both pieces of handwovens but there will be other places for the ‘scraps’ in this series. The dress was pretty hard to sew in that it is very fragile. It was ripped in several places and had blood on the back which can’t be seen here. It was hard to decide where to stop stitching, how much was enough, etc. The heart is a piece of my own nuno felting. There is more of this same felting in the section soon to be attached.

nuno felt heart

I also decided to finish the bottom asymmetrically with the dress flowing free just above the fringe of the handwoven on the left.

Finally I hand stitched the backing fabric edge to the woven selvages so that I could preserve those.

I still have not developed a mojo with my hand stitching. I have looked up stitches in books, online and printed out my own photos of incredible hand-stitching. I have a feeling though that if I just quit thinking about it so much it might just happen.

Posted in new work, textures, vintage linens | 4 Comments »

unexpected nirvana…

Wednesday, November 12th, 2014

the view from our room

I just returned from a fabulous five-day art retreat on the shores of Lake Tahoe. What could have been a disastrous turn of events actually turned into nirvana for me. The classroom I was assigned to was midway up on billy goat mountain. I traversed it slowly with cane and friend in tow four times on the first day and that night my knee cried “uncle!”

In the night I decided that the best plan was to have my sewing supply bag and workshop machine brought down from on high to our large room. There I set up shop & laid out designs on the spare bed. Sewing primarily by hand, I worked propped up on the bed with pillows and ice, with lovely Lake Tahoe out the window and Pandora cranking out the tunes on my iPad. It literally was divine! What I actually needed on this retreat, without realizing it until then, was long periods of solitude, to rest my brain and body.

The teacher Lorie McGown, texted me during the days and asked permission to come to studio solitude to check out my work progress. That too was great as I got to know her, had private instruction and got her good feedback on my work. A kindred spirit indeed!

My intention for the retreat was to get going on another piece in the 25 pc collaborative series I have been working on this year. This piece is about my handcraft heritage and I planned to incorporate hand-crocheted doilies, hand-knitting, my great grandmother’s hand-crocheted head scarf, my father’s christening gown, etc.

What I hadn’t been able to figure out was how to make it pop as the french vanilla beige was boring to me. Lorie encouraged me to layer and incorporate pieces of my own work into it and from there it just took off.

father’s christening gown on handwoven cloth

For example, this piece still in progress of my father’s christening gown is sewn to my handwoven silk scarf and my great aunt’s handwoven shawl. Another piece incorporated a lovely quilted belt my mother had made for herself in the ’90’s. She was a world-class hand piecer and quilter.

layers of doilies and Mom’s hand-pieced quilting

Now I am back and rediscovering the challenges of not being able to hand-stitch 8 hours a day!

Posted in aging, documentation, health, patterns, shapes, textures, travel | 2 Comments »