I guess they liked it...

Visited the Royal Easter Show yesterday in Sydney with my parents who are over from the UK for a few weeks not just to pick up a showbag (of course), but also to see my pieces in the Arts and Craft exhibition.  I had entered 3 items this year - 2 bags and a wearable art piece - and was so pleased to get 1st placings for them all!

I'd checked this on the website prior to going but then found out only once we got there that my wearable had also received an "Award of Excellence" and was in a separate display cabinet!  Mega chuffed....

This was the contemporary Elizabethan piece that I described in my last posting so well worth the effort with that nightmare couching on the bias....

The photo below shows one of my bags that won, in the felted accessory section.

For those of you that might be interested in how it was made, here are a few photos taken during its 'creation'.

embroidered felt for the main bag

'endless' cords for the lattice

threading the felted rings on to form the lattice effect

a bit of twirling and voila..

And would you believe I don't have any photos of my last bag.....later honestly....once it returns to me after the show....

Hope you all had a good Easter!

Wearable art - contemporary Elizabethan

After researching strapwork for Module 3 I got interested in the design features and dress of the Elizabethan and Tudor time and decided to use that as the inspiration for a wearable art piece.  This work is not part of my C&G diploma per se but I wanted to try out some lacework features with applique that might become part of my 2nd assessment piece with metals.  That design is forever changing (sorry Sian) but will get there!

So here are a few photos of the wearable corsetted tunic that will be part of an exhibition in Aus around Easter.

The bodice is made from panels of layered chiffons embroidered and distressed, overlaid with machined cords, and panels of hand dyed silk velvet couched with a gold fibre.

 The lower 'skirt' is made up of 3 sections with godets inserted to give fullness.  I appliqued diamonds (to repeated the shapes in the bodice) of velvet and more distressed fabric fairly randomly but fading towards the bottom.  They were edged in couched cords and some of the 'blank' diamonds were cut away to give more transparency and lightness.  Further pieces of 'lace' were sewn using cords on watersoluble fabric and attached to the chiffon to echo the shapes.

The bodice is fully lined by the way, and is fastened with machined cord through eyelets.
And in case you're wondering, it looks much better on the mannequin than yours truly!

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Sketchbook competition

My thanks to Sian and her 'judging team' for awarding me 2nd prize in her recent Sketchbook challenge with my selection of 10 pages.  I am looking forward to spending my voucher at Art Van Go.  They have such a wonderful online catalogue that choosing only a few items and not the whole shop will be the problem!
I suspect the ordered items may appear in my next assessment piece, but then there are those Markal paintstiks.....and you can't have too many Pink Pig notebooks....See what I mean?

Congrats, of course, to Anne and Jen on their awards.  It was lovely to look at their work and the other entrants on Sian's website - amazing how different our styles can be.

And many thanks to friends overseas and in Aus for your kind comments.

Textile Artists using construction techniques

For chapter 12 of this module I've looked at work by textile artists that involve some of the construction techniques I've been studying - knitting, weaving, wrapping, etc

I've arranged the work on 3 A3 boards with a few comments on their techniques.

My 2 favourites have to be Adrienne Sloane and Nora Fok.  Adrienne I was lucky enough to meet in Australia when she came over from the States and taught a workshop for ATASDA in 2009 and gave a talk on her work the preceding evening.  I love her thought-provoking pieces in bold colours.  I learned how to manipulate shapes and try out some strange 'fibres' in my knitting first from her.

Nora Fok I first read about in 2001 just when I was really starting on the C&G path and was finding how exciting textiles could be.  Her 'knitting' just amazed me and I love the delicacy of her jewellery.
As if only to prove to myself how dexterous she must be to achieve these pieces, I had a go knitting with the nylon microfilament she often uses on 4 needles.  I had read in an article that her needles were about size 9 or 10 so that seemed achievable.  The photo below shows my 3rd or 4th attempt at knitting this fibre in the round to make an i-cord (of a sort).  It's about 20cm long so is by no means miniature but I still found it incredibly difficult to control and impossible to give smooth edges to the shape - even more in awe now!

There are many wonderful basket makers in Australia, eg Virginia Kaiser so I have included her on the next board along with Shuna Rendel from the UK who creates lovely sculptural pieces in similar materials.
Anne Jackson's quicky subject tapestries involve a double half-hitch knotting method that I'm in the process of trying and gives a lovely 3D quality to the work.   Jan Truman weaves copper and stainless steel wire into striking sculptures with glass and fabric, while Julie Kornblum from USA weaves colourful sculptures using fabric cords and recyclable materials.

On the subject of recycling, I love the work of Chakaia Booker involving recycled tyres and wood woven together, and Ryan Lytle from USA who has used recycled materials and wire woven together.
Michael Brennand-Wood always produces wonderfully colourful and detailed 3D works that combine wrapping and weaving of rigid materials into pieces with great animation and life.
Jessica Preston, not strictly a textile artist but more of a textile designer creates fabric work with an almost origami like intricacy of manipulation that I love.

Sketchbook pages "Looking into..."

Here are my sketchbook pages for Sian's Distant Stitch competition entitled "Looking into....".

Many of you know of my love of making handbags 'on the side' to my City and Guilds studies so I decided to "look into ....my basket of handbag bits" for this.  Here is a selection of those buckles, catches, feet, etc so that you know what I'm on about!

The sketchbook pages following are all A5size.

1 and 2 are graphite drawings on page washed with diluted procion dyes.

3. uses watercolour pencils and fine tipped white and black pens

 4. Drawing in chalk pastels on black.

 5. is a collage representation in printed newsprint.

 6. Rubbings in oil pastels over O- and D-rings then schematic shapes of clips and twistlocks cut out of page to reveal black page below.

 7. Page cut into strips from centre, folded back and woven to give a link to the original basket, and to allow the viewer to look inside at charcoal drawings and embossed aluminium cut shapes.

 8. Monoprinting in 3 layers to build up 'drawing' made from the back of page

9. Monoprinting in several colours on page over shape resists.  Resulting coloured resists glued offset to give shadow effect.

10. Partial drawings in oil pastels, page washed in diluted Procion dye solution, dye removed with thickened bleach drawings, free machining of repeating shapes in black thread.

Many thanks for the challenge, Sian. I tried to include as many different types of media as I could but I found (like Jen I think) that it made the selection of only 10 all the more difficult!