Textiles or paper?

We all need to spend time without conscious thoughts and labels circulating in our heads, to allow creativity to spring up.  We can think too much.

My whole life I have been a textile fan.  Recently I've discovered how wonderful paper is to work with too.  But I've been trying too hard to combine textiles with paper.  Just because I have a weakness for both (or is it a strength for both?) it's ok to use them separately.  I kept thinking (thinking!) that I had to use everything I like at once.  Too much thinking, not enough being.  Losing creativity.

Paper is wonderful in codex form, and folded books.  Textiles are great in scrolls because of their properties - they still lie flat after being rolled up for ages, unlike paper (except soft paper napkins).  Other types of paper hold the rolled-up effect depending on the thickness and stiffness of the paper.  Paint adds to the stiffness even if diluted, while dyes don't.  So I prefer textiles and papers to have the vehicle to show their own special qualities.  They can be combined, but don't have to be to still be a mixed-media artist.

I made a scroll from wet felting which unrolled beautifully every time.  The cover for this scroll I made from a silk scarf that I bought plain, then dyed with silk dyes, then patched with torn, dyed silk organza pieces.  It is luscious.  I love it.  And being silk it unrolls flat.

Dyed silk scarf with patches of organza, used as a Scroll Cover

To help you let thoughts go, and let creativity surface, please look at this beautiful photo on Sweetpeapath blog - what peace it brings to a mind.  Master the art of doing nothing, to quote someone but I don't know who - does anyone else know where this comes from?

http://sweetpeapath.blogspot.com.au/2012/11/texture-tuesday-dream.html

Connotations

I can’t bring myself to buy any more new fabrics while I have so much already.  My intention is to use up all my stash (4 big drawers full) and now I have a channel for it.

I have been fascinated with Jude Hill and Spirit Cloth lately; her blog has fired my imagination to start my recycle cloth.  My underlying concept is that every piece of cloth I use has a value to me – the significance of its background – why I bought it, the purpose, was it for experimental, for college, for a quilt  – where did I buy it  - charity shop, big fabric store on a day out  – did someone give it to me – is it a recycled piece from family – do I like it, what are my feelings surrounding it and its previous use – affection for it, association with circumstances.

All this leads to the name I have for it “Connotations”, the definition of this word is a meaning in addition to the primary meaning – in other words, for example, my daughter’s old blouse is highly textured fabric that delights me, and that also reminds me of her.

I have thrown out so many scraps of fabric over the years, and in a way this is reclaiming that waste – not literally but symbolically.  Here are photo details of the first two pieces:

Detail of Piece 1, in which I layered my only sheer with text, over the other layers - not really enough stitching on it.

As you see I am using layers of scraps from dye projects in any lightweight fabric, bits of sheers, bits of silk -  I was going to call it Layers of Meaning.  Every piece reminds me of that part of my life, which overlays another part of life ...

In this detail of Piece 2 you can see I have more stitching - and there is a piece of dyed silk with my name on from a college project.

I am finding this stitching is bringing me peaceful feelings that put troubling considerations into perspective.  Is this why so many work with hand-stitching?

I wonder how big is the recycling fabric movement?  Can’t just be me and a few others that I know ...

Nature Day

When I logged on this morning, I was planning on posting a photo of my Recycle Cloth, which I started after being inspired by Jude Hill, grace Forrest and others.  First I enjoyed my usual browsing of blogs, and then I found one new to me, Sweetpea Path (link http://sweetpeapath.blogspot.com.au/).   Sweetpea Path has such fond emotions showing in these photos.
       I felt so close to the emotion Christi was expressing I wanted to share a photo of my beloved cat Tibs - which one?  Finally decided on this, because she is so appealing curled up on the chair in my sewing room on a day when it was too hot to be outside.

Then I had to post this beautiful hollyhock growing in a garden nearby, which I passed on my morning walk. It is a deep reddish purple, stunning.  

Deepest purple hollyhocks in a nearby garden

When you are feeling strong emotions about something, nature has a way of calming - shows me the way.   Sometimes you have to go with the flow and change your plans because it feels right - agreed?

Making Changes

This week has been about making changes in the way I look at things.  I started off by understanding vaguely that I was in overdrive on the artwork front, feeling scattered because I was trying to work on too many projects at once.  I re-read an article on Change from ArtBizBlog which I now can't find online but luckily printed off.  Then when I was in Adelaide and stopped for my cappuccino time, I took out my journal and started writing how I was feeling.  As I wrote, I got into the scattered feeling and started to write about my priorities, realising I was not working on those things as much as on unimportant things.  Once I had journalled about it I could change what I was doing.  I looked at Jude Hill's blog Spirit Cloth and grace Forest's blog windthread and found the change I was looking for, that is,  I became conscious that much as I now love and enjoy working with books and papers, I don't want to let go of working with textiles - so I am bringing textiles back into my personal creativity which I will share with you later.  On windthread I found a post that changed my whole concept of weaving.  I always thought of weaving as humdrum, flat, and uninspiring.  This post shows such a different perception that I am utterly inspired by it and want to incorporate it into my new piece - no I'm not scattering, this is the personal piece that I won't be using in a book form.

One way in which I thought I could change would be to try out the Picasa photo program that is on my computer.  I took an old photo, of a silk embroidery from a couple of years ago, and in Picasa changed it to Neon.

Silk embroidered Gouldian Finches and Ulysses Butterfly

 Cool!  How different is that?

The meaning of art and craft

Out for a walk by the river at 6am today (already 25 degrees Celsius, forecast 40, which is over 100 Farenheit) found this piece of bark below a gum tree.  I loved it because it shows that "creased" effect they get around where branches form, where the bark looks like a stocking falling down.  Gums lose bark every year.  It's a great surface for kids to paint on.

Before the day became too hot and I retired to my book to read, I worked on some pages for a book called Layers of Meaning.  I stopped myself from writing what it all meant when I remembered this post by Aloquin, where she reminds us that art doesn't have to have a meaning, it can just be art (or craft).  Aloquin has some interesting posts - I've only just discovered her blog - it's worth going to the link and then catching up on other posts.

Do you, the blog reader, also feel you have to justify what you make with a specific meaning, or a reason for creating it at all?

Hen Party

Couldn't resist it .....

Time to waste online

Now that I have finished at college, I am enjoying having Mondays at home, where I can spend time doing what I want.  In practice, what I want usually turns out to be spending time surfing the net, before looking at my weekly plan (yes, I do one most weeks) and picking out the task I want to do most - usually artwork of some kind.  Other tasks don't always get done or not for some time.  This week I'm making another book, in which I retell fairy stories with my own twist - I don't always agree with the endings of the traditional fairy tales, so when I tell them to children I make the endings fair.  That's what I'm doing in this book.  All the characters in the book are played by my own chooky sketches - I'm getting better at drawing them in different situations so I thought I'd extend that into a book.  This is a paper book but I recently put my chookys into a scroll made of tea-dyed leftover calico; after some reverse applique (recycled blouse fabric)  and colouring with crayons, topped by cretan stitch embroidery, and using dowel found along Linear Park, I decided it was interesting enough to post on my website.  You can see it, with details, here at this link.

Chooky Scroll, detail of the beginning

Being a chook fan, you can imagine how pleased I was in my net-surfing to find this watercolour (scroll through the images at the bottom to find the chicken) of a chicken on the website of Heather Holland, a local artist I met recently through Port Community Art Centre.