Paisley inspired design

The little quilt I made for my personal shrine (see my previous blog post) is made from a piece of material I printed. The design for the printing stamp came from a doodle that developed into a larger work.


I'm currently playing with this and cutting the drawing into sections to see how the elements work alone. The arrow at the bottom looks a little like a christmas tree to me...and I'm big on christmas trees! I'd like to try to recreate some of these designs in free-machine embroidery either on a backing or as a lace form.

Personal Shrine - mini quilt

I've begun work on some mock-ups for some personal shrines that I want to create. They've been in the brain space for a while and have now made it to the 'sketching-ideas', 'making-notes, and 'test--creation-markIII)' stage. This is very advance for me...some ideas never make it off the thought-board.

This current test-creation is for a small personal shrine with a number of inner boxes and display shelves. Each little box and shelf is dedicated to an area of my life that is precious to me in some way. Fibreart/creativity/quilting/beading are all in this category...so first creation for the mini shrine is a miniature quilt.

The quilt is created from some fabric that I snow dyed winter before last. It was then printed with a personal design that I created. I used som- felt that I was given by a patchworking friend as the wadding.

Mini-quilt; paisley printed, snow-dyed cotton

Giving...

This is a fibre art piece I've been working on for some time. I was inspired by the work of Susan Sorrell (http://www.creativechick.com) and took an online class with her. I made a series of little collages but couldn't decide what to do with them or how to mount them. Finally decided to add a few other techniques I enjoy. I covered a canvas with layers of fabric and took to them, layer by layer, with a heat gun; then bound the whole with a golden thread, to reinforce the giving/gift idea.

The background fabric of the collage was snow-painted, stamped, and free-machined. Various images and a word from magazines added, then the piece was embellished with embroidery and beading.

Edinburgh Inspiration

Took my daughter to Edinburgh for a long weekend to visit a friend of her's who recently moved there. We flew by the dreaded easyjet ... and the snack menu now includes...

"Snakes on a Plane"

I took some time to go sightseeing and looking for those inspirational shots you have to snap. The skyline is full of amazing spires. This one close to my B and B really caught my eye.

And then there was the gorgeous green across the road...

I have more of these to come but there's a bit of work to do editting first.

Peace of Snow

I find trees fascinating. I'm always drawn to pictures of trees, especially trees without leaves highlighted against a setting sun or clear blue sky. I've always found them a beautful thing to look at. And when it comes to trees in snow against a clear sky...that's beautiful and incredibly peaceful.

Here are a couple of my favourite photographs of trees and snow taken this winter.

Coping with Fear

In the days following the devastating 12.51pm earthquake in Christchurch the events continued to fold hour by hour on the internet news sites. I sat glued to the screen. The pictures horrified me, bringing the carnage closer. I needed to capture some record of those moments; I created a book in response.

I trialled a number of different book styles, meandering books, accordion style with foldouts before finally deciding on a book that looked like it was barely holding it together.

The book consists of six leaves, the front cover and an additional tag. It is bound with large loops of wire to represent the famous 'No 8' wire, with which anything can be fixed. The front cover design was inspired by the terrible damage done to the Christchurch Cathedral, the heart of Christchurch city and the lines on the seismic drums recording the earthquake. Each page of the book focuses on one image that particular affected me. These were printed out, torn from the printed page and then crushed up before being spread out and loosely attached to a sheet. The edge of each page is decorated in red and black watercolour pastels brushed off another card. The attached tag has a quote from the Mayor of Christchurch, Bob Parker.

"You have to believe me

when I say we can do it,

we can get through this

by leaning on each other

and finding a strength

we didn't know we had."

Responding to Fear

Somethimes things happen that we have no control over; your car bursts a tyre at speed, a parent is diagnosed with inoperable cancer or the city in which your friends live is shattered by an earthquake. At 3am (Italian time) on the 22 February 2011 I was wakened by a text from my son. Christchurch, New Zealand, the place of his birth, had been devasted by a 6.3 magnitude earthquake an hour earlier at 12.51pm (NZ time). The closeness we celebrate through internet connections shattered. Our distance from home became impossible to cross. Our worst thoughts could become a reality. As the day dawned in Italy we were able to begin to get in touch with close friends in the city and more and more news filtered out about the massive devastation of one of our favourite places.

I needed to do something, anything.

To cope with the turmoil of emotion I started to do something creative. I turned to my fabric and my love of celtic design. I chose a design that appealed and spent hours adapting it to work in fabric. The repetitive nature of the applique stitches was soothing and allowed my mind to rest. In a celtic knot there is no beginning or end, and every intersection alternates weaves. Under, over, up and down, always and endlessly. This is life, the circle of life of the planet.


Celtic design in Canterbury colours