Metallic Assessment piece

My thoughts / inspiration for this second PAP came from the faces and design work in chapter 12 of module 2, and my penchant for lace and cutwork.  I originally wanted to do a hanging of some kind largely using metal shim, to create a posterized mosaic portrait of metal fragments set in lace.

I liked my initial attempts at creating a mosaic

but found difficulty in both producing a large enough range of different metal tones providing enough detail with the size of the metal pieces.  As Sian pointed out either my pieces had to be very small (which might mean the appearance of metal might be lost among the lace) or the hanging would be need to be very large.

I rethought things and decided to stay with the mosaic idea but incorporate it as lace into a wearable garment with recurring faces appearing in sections of the garment.

The very bad sketch on the left shows a basic corset construction for the bodice which will have lacings down each side, (one real for garment to get on and off).  Details of the straps are undecided at present.
The side panels will have metal shim shapes attached in a mosaic effect, while the centre front and back panels will have the 'faces' feature in metal shim and embroidery.

The volume and length of the skirt I am undecided about but I want it to exist in layers of translucent fabric so that I can have faces embroidered and cut out in different layers, all seen overlapping together.

At the top of the skirt will be a lacework of metal shim fragments in 3 or 4 sections but each will be unattached to the fabric layer beneath it.

I began by preparing my copper shim (acquired from Art Van Go in the UK thanks to my 2nd prize in the sketchbook competition).  I didn't want it looking obviously like copper so I patinated it to a dark auburn /almost black surface using liver of sulphur gel.

The mosaic shape I chose was a stylised facial profile, at least with a nose and mouth on both edges of the shape (not too obvious in this photo I have to admit).
I decided to use natural dyes to create a subtle colour palette of fabrics that I might need, so used dried eucalypt leaves, boiling about 300g in a mesh bag in about 6l water for an hour.  I added a couple of teaspoons of ferrous sulphate as mordant, as I wanted a dark metallic tinge to the colour rather than too bright.  I removed the bag of leaves and added the fabrics, cotton first before the silk ones, simmering for a further 30mins.

The resulting fabrics and threads - ochre to grey:

To cut a long story short, I've made most of the bodice to date:

The free machining to attach the metal shim mosaic is done in metallic thread in a crisscross fashion like lacing.  The background fabric is dyed silk dupion. The corset has a fairly stiff thickish batting (used in bag making) backed to the fabric, to give it structure.

The front panel shows a posterized image printed on dyed cotton scrim (bottom left) with some surface embroidery, more embroidered faces in metallic and white thread and the main image in metal shim and cut organza sheer.  The faces and images are all from my own photos.
The back panel is similar to this with different images.

More will follow hopefully.....

Resolved sample

For chapter 13 and the required resolved sample I chose one of the designs in chapter 12 that I'd created using a section of an original photograph.

13.1

In order to integrate the photo a little more, I drew into the design, particularly the photo strip, with white and blue crayons to attempt to link the strips.

The original photo I printed out onto thin canvas, the kind used to print banners, so that I could embroider into it without hoop support.  The 'strips' of colour were made by embellishing wool tops into the canvas from the back.  I didn't want to give the appearance of solid felt but I did want to cover all the photo background and create soft edges to the strips.  The canvas was also selected because it withstands the needlefelting well without distortion.

13.2

At this point I added in a piece of his ear into the design to give a bit of balance to the sample.

To cut a long process short, here is the finished sample with a couple of closeups. 

13.3

The sample is sewn mostly using underside couching / cabling with cotton perle 5 and 8 in the bobbin, but I've also used whipstitching for finer lines and shading areas.

13.4

 I used copper metallic thread to give an indication of the original underlying layer of orange paint in the blue background of the paper design, through specks of whipstitch.

13.5

The sample is approximately A5 size taking around 5 hours to compete.

Let's face it again!

Sorry, but "more faces" just seemed a bit of a boring title for the remaining part of chapter 12.

12.15

After the silhouettes, I looked at sections of the face, particularly my husband's face and ended up with a kind of animated drawing of his features.  A bad version of Homer emerged, thanfully husband never goes near my blogs.

Using a couple different decorated papers I cut out the sections and played around with them in various designs, omitting a few and duplicating a few others.





12.16



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12.19


I think I prefer the 3D look.

I did some drawing exercises based loosely on his face using wax candle, oil pastels and watercolour inks.  Like other students before me this got quite addictive - these are just a sample:

12.20



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These were torn vertically, some horizontally, to divide up their facial features then rearranged to develop a series of designs.



12.25

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I then thought it might be fun to replace some of the features with 'real' photographed features of his.

12.30

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12.33

I think perhaps further integration of the photo elements needs to happen with additional lines on top and if I take any of these into a resolved sample I would do that.

Chapter 12 - Head and Face designs

I decided that while I was in the sketching mood and had my pencils and paints out for the sketchbook days I would jump a little in this module and tackle the chapter 12 option. 
The stick figures of chapter 11 seemed very similar to work we did at Urchfont 4 or 5 summer schools ago so thought I'd take the chapt 12 option.

I have no excuses for selecting a few Australians' work in my collection of portrait technniques but I started with Lucian Freud since I loved an exhibition I saw in London last year.

12.1

My sketches began to look a little "Spitting Image" but then I love the sculptural look and depth to his portraits and I tried to convey that with only pencil line.



12.2



Adam Cullen is Australian, a winner of the Archibald portrait prize, whose portraits are almost 'childlike' in their simplicity.   Marlene Dumas' faces have a ghostly quality about them, concentrating almost only eyes and lips, but these are completely different from the simple faces created by Kathryn del Barton in which the eyes are enlarged and lips doll-like.

John Brack, an Australian from the beginning of the last century, painted elongated angular faces although in not such a distorted fashion as Picasso.

12.3

This year's Archibald winner, Ben Quilty, uses heavy thick strokes of oil paint in his distinctive portraits but conveys manages to give expression and personality to his faces with clever use of colour and tone. 

12.4

I tried to avoid heavy shading in my pencil version but rather to use pencil shapes to represent the position of tonal areas - my own painting by numbers bank canvas!

 

12.5



I next used a silhouette of my daughter since I thought her ponytail might add some interest.  I cut out several copies in decorative papers that I had prepared in the last module, cut them up and played with various designs.  In most arrangements I simply used a white background as the shapes became confused on the patterned backgrounds I had to hand.

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And a couple with a little more colour to them:

12.10

12.11

 I then looked at using the silhouettes repetitively like pages of a book but wanted to see all the 'pages'.  I made several examples varying the transparency of the paper using eg. tracing paper, tissue, cellophane, but settled on using a laminating machine. 

12.12

 I trapped various eyes and mouths in the laminate and sewed heavy lines of stitching as in Picasso and Ponce works of art, and created a 3D piece using several silhouettes.  The photography of this proved difficult of course but you get the idea?

12.13

12.14

The rest of this chapter will follow in another post.