Another way to go

Thought it was about time to remember work I started after the end of my first year at uni. These works were formed with the painted silk fabrics that were included in the final assessment and awaiting inclusion in a project.

Together, 2011

The three towers represent my sons and myself. The circles symbolise events that occur but of which there is no control over, I try to hold on tight to my sons.

I next want to think about the work of Anna Glasbrook that I saw at Gloucester Cathedral before christmas and already featured on this blog. But what am I going to focus on? Maybe perfection, perhaps vulnerability and hidden strengths. I would like to try more transparent fabrics, more stitch, maybe drawn images or maybe just symbolic / abstract. Get going on the sketchbook and see what happens next.

Machine embroidery on dissolvable fabric

Thought it was about time to try machine embroidery at home with my Bernina machine. I used cheap cotton thread usually supplied for overlocking and a dissolvable fabric a little like vilene as it seems easier to use than the plastic/ polythene types. I decided to keep with free machine embroidery and draw straight from image onto the fabric with my machine and no prior drawing on the fabric. It would not be perfect and the vulnerability of my hand, eye coordination would be evident, rather than pre planning the image to get it nearer to perfect.

This was a very enjoyable process although time consuming. A lot of thread was used but the fabric held well as I continually worked into it. 

Here the embroideries can be seen during the process of making. They are both still firmly attached to the dissolvable fabric.

For this third image, the fabric has been washed away and the camera gives way as my stitching was not solid enough. Any tiny gaps between colours just separate. Whilst I don't want it to be perfect, I think I would like the process to be well constructed. However, I do like the way the piece relaxes and shows it's vulnerability as the strengthening fabric is washed away. But the weak threads do show strength as they are bound together, and now I just need to explore this further with different images, colours and threads. Maybe larger or perhaps smaller but lots of pieces. Perhaps they could be suspended on thread or placed between glass so that both front and back can be viewed. 

An artist that has inspired this work is Amanda McCavour a Toronto based textile artist who's work explores the drawn line from minimalist and conceptual to figurative and realistic. Here are some images of her work...

Stand in for Home

Living Room, 2010-2011

I really admire her scale and talent. Her exploration of the vulnerability of the single thread and the strength when stitched and worked together. 

Also, the work of Naseem Darbey has helped me with this idea. Darbey also likes to explorer the relationship between textiles and drawing with direct observation. The sewing machine is used to draw directly onto a pliable, yet dissolvable glue film called Romeo Aquatics. 

In the image below called 'If Your Heart is not Nailed to Cliffe Hall', Darbey was influenced by her research into the archives of Castle Cliff Museum, West Yorkshire: working directly from the observation of non-pathological human hearts, draping the fabric over styrofoam, which acts as  a mannequin as she goes. Made from  many layers, the work still looks fragile, but it is powerful: the heart has had it's base layer dissolved but as it is sculpted into shape and the light floods through to reveal its fragile, yet intricate structure, it becomes very strong: maybe an apt metaphor for life.

'If Your Heart is Not Nailed to Cliffe Hall, 2010

In an article in 'Embroidery', volume 62, 2011, Darbey emphasises the importance of looking continuously at what you are drawing whilst making marks, stating this is fundamental to her practice. This is something that I am trying to make myself do so that I can enjoy the journey and have some fun as my eye starts to guide and I leave the drive to be perfect behind. And whilst paper makes me feel vulnerable, with the machine I am beginning to find that the thread is vulnerable and that I am happy with that. Like McCavour and Darbey, this vulnerability is important and allows the object that I have drawn to take on a new meaning: it is now more about why I made it, why I don't mind its new sense of fragility and how these imperfections add to the beauty.

New Year

What an end to the old year: whilst still dealing with difficult personal issues, I really felt that life was improving - the uni work was proving very enjoyable and there seemed to be some sense of control over our home life and even the advancing Christmas season was being embraced for the first time in three years. But then came the day itself and a trail of cataclysmic events that now mean life has to change and I have to re-motovate my self to continue on the degree course. Do I just want a break and time to really rest and reflect on what has happened to me in the last three years, or do I grab the 'bull by the horns' and start to rebuild my enthusiasm to create art but in a way that also allows for some personal healing?

First some images from my work at the end of 2012...

Henri Moore said that great art is not perfect, it contains conflict that is unresolved (Henry Moore: Writings and Conversations by  Henry Moore and Alan G. Wilkinson). I want to explore the conflict in my life. I want to be a perfect mother, midwife, friend and student but often this is just not possible. Perfection in one area often leads to failure in another part of my life and perhaps what is necessary is simply to concentrate on what is important at the present moment in time, to not strive for perfection but embrace the beauty in the flaws, the untended mistakes and conflicts that truly reflect my sense of being.

This image was made on my Bernina sewing machine: I started in one place on the fabric and carefully drew this image of Carl's camera freehand. No stitch was corrected and the mark was continuous, i.e. I was not able to break off and start in another area to facilitate a more accurate drawing. The effect, well it isn't perfect - the perspective is slightly skewed and any mistakes are embraced, but the image works and I like it. It is about me, my inner conflict that wonders if I can actually draw and make good art. It is about the idea and about my life!

These two images show my first goes with the Irish machine. An attempt to control and understand how this wonderful old machine works.

Plan, to try free drawing on the Irish Machine as I have with my Bernina. Make more drawings of anything that I can to inspire a direction for this work.  Research textile artists that have similar ways of working whilst remembering the work of Louise Bourgeois and Tracey Emin who were studied in depth during the previous academic year.