More inspiration

This is another photo (of Grevillea Robusta) I have in my collection that can be used as inspiration for work. I am still waiting to discover what I can do with it. Next week I start concentrating on new work for the year so I am going see what I can do with it. Somehow mywork turns out different from what originally inspired me and I don't know what this says about me.

Squash in France

I took this pictures of pumpkins (squash) in France at the markets in Sarlat at the end of 2006. Aren't they colourful and interesting shapes. I want to use them as inspiration for future work but I am not sure what this will be yet. I am going to spend the next week or day letting them float in my mind till the inspiration arrives. Perhaps they will provide inspiration for you as well.

More paper Art

This is another one of my paper art pictures. It was done by using the method described on 21 January ie. gesso, watercolour, paper serviettes sprayed walnut ink and goldfinger. Hope you like it.

Paper Art

One of my interests is creating papers that I use to create cards. Over the last few days I have made a few different ones - just for the fun of it. This is an example of one of these papers. It has been made by with a paper serviette glued on a painted gesso back ground. Then I stamped an image on top and embossed that with embossing powder. As you can see because of the uneven surface the stamp image was not precise and this was the effect I was looking for. I just wanted to highlight the flower without covering it over.

My general technique is to use watercolour paper which I cover with gesso - back and front and leave to dry. Then I use either acrylic paint or watercolour and paint over the gesso - any colour or combination of colours and leave to dry again. Then I use drop paint onto the base colour (or you can put dip your stamps into acrylic paints and leave a series of marks (or any kind or description) and leave this to dry. From this point on you can stamp with pigment inks, or glue serviettes onto the surface. You can emboss where you have stamped or spray walnut ink over the surface or any combination of these.

Finally you can use gold finger or treasure gold to highlight surface uneveness to give it life .

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Pad Folio

This is one of my embellisher made felts that I made into a pad folio. The fabric was made on a back ground of normal machine made felt with layers of wool tops, silk fibre, knitting fibres and other various fibres. It was based on the concept of a forest of trees but as an abstract idea rather than a real life representation. I also made a beaded tassel to attach to the tie. I hope you like it.

At long last

It has been almost 12 months since I was able to make an entry in this blog. This happened because (a) I lost my password (b) computer problems (c) camera problems (d) frustration.

Despite all this I have managed to do quite a bit of work during the year. I bought an embellisher and experimented with this, I did some dying with procion dyes, I attended a traditional felting workshop and made a number of interesting samples.

As well I did quite a bit of beading - making one of my ornate necklaces and other bits and pieces.

I have also done a bit of paper arts- making papers to use for card making and making book covers.

So over the next little while I am going to photo these works and put them on this blog in the hope I can amke a contribution to the world of textile and paper arts.

Memory Book

I have just finished this fabric book this week. Each page is actually a pocket for keeping special things in so I call it my memory book.

It is made from several different interfacings - one very heavy for the in between pages and lightweight shapewell for the actual pocket pages. I hand dyed these first by spraying with different coloured dyes that I then allowed to mix on the interfacing. I then did some machine embroidery finally embellished this with a few sequins and many, many french or colonial knots in a variety of different coloured, types and thickness of threads.

The cover is made with silk paper that I made (although I bought it already dyed) and embellished mostly with beads and a tissue paper motif that I also made.

Hope you like it