Beginning the new Life Story quilt

Beginning the new Life Story quilt

Unknown 04.30 Add Comment

A very happy New Year to everyone - I hope it will be happy, healthy and peaceful for you...and creative of course!

Now that the dust of celebrating has settled, I've started on a new Life Story quilt. I've drawn it out onto paper, but it's huge (about 8 foot by 5 foot) so is difficult to stand back and look at it properly. I've divided it into pieces (approximately 9) in order to piece, applique, stitch and paint in sections.

Here's the first little bit which will be in the top right hand corner. It's American piecing - straight and curved - and the lines are supposed to be slightly wobbly as I purposely didn't use a ruler.

The centre piece is white cotton as it will have applique on top of it along with stitch and paint.

It's called the Futility of Self Worth, but I'm trying not to make it autobiographical...or at least only in passing.

It's a vehicle for some portrait and figurative work.

Another try at painting quickly in a different style -not every one is a winner!!

Another try at painting quickly in a different style -not every one is a winner!!

Unknown 04.27 Add Comment

By Tom Phillips (1985ish) of Brian Eno. Seen at the National Portrait Gallery, London.

Apparently Tom Phillips is also a composer and taught Brian Eno.

I like the mark making of red lines which lift the turquoise colours.

Could you recognize Eno? Does it matter?








 Of course my rendition just about touches on the colourings, and I used some red paint graphically to show highlights, but it left me feeling uncomfortable and unsatisfied. There is quite a lot of skill in Tom Phillips painting even though it looks like random splodges, and I wasn't quite able to get that. I found it hard to let go of what I knew and what I felt I needed to put in in order to read a face. Phillips didn't put in Eno's left eye and the right is without a pupil or highlight to bring it to life, but he's managed to convey a sense of the sitters gaze and state of mind.

To be honest, it was only by painting this that I was able to look closely enough and register the beauty of it.  Still don't like my own version though. Yuck!! I will take that use of the red paint with me though - genius.

That just about completes the 3 month visual diary. I want to go back over one or two things, but I'll do a posting of all the pages when I've finished. It was good fun!

Beginning a new quilt - looking at portrait styles

Beginning a new quilt - looking at portrait styles

Unknown 07.15 Add Comment

George Mallory, by Duncan Grant in 1912. Oil on panel.

George Mallory was a mountaineer and a friend of the Bloomsbury writers and artists.  He made 3 expeditions to Mount Everest, and died on the last one trying to reach the summit.  His body was recovered in 1999.






As my guests have now gone home :(( and I've cleared the decks of empty bottles and torn wrapping paper, I thought I'd spend half an hour seeing if I could do something in a different style to my usual, and chose the above painting as inspiration.

 I took a selfie on the iPad (note to self: try make up one day) which I then worked on in my sketchbook.

As the sketchbook is still part of my visual diary and includes Christmas, the result is accompanied by a few simple words which sum up this Christmas for me...."Champagne-like joy bubbles through her head."

It conveys all the essentials I suppose, and I've tried something new which is a fitting start to the new year and the new work I think.

Christmas Cheer

Christmas Cheer

Unknown 03.57 Add Comment

 I made this little Advent Calendar a couple of years ago with instructions from DMTV

I thought I'd go through it a day at a time on Facebook, if you'd care to join me!

This will be my last big family Christmas as the grandchildren will be inventing their own traditions in the coming years, and so I've been making an effort and getting ready to cater for 8 people for 5 days - no mean feat IMHO.

Although I have my moments, I'm not a great cook and have got decidedly lazy as I've aged! Thank goodness for the new freezer which is now bulging at the seams.

The creative textile genes are still ticking over although I'm on a go slow it seems, but I will be back in the New Year with renewed vigour and a new exhibition to work towards. I'm looking forward to it and don't worry too much about the fallow times as distancing yourself for a bit is always worthwhile. The trick is to come back at some point!!

So before I go to hang the bunting, and deck the halls, I just wanted to wish everyone a warm and happy Christmas with those they love - or at least like a bit - and a very joyous and happy New Year too. Thank you for sticking with me and reading the blog xx

FREE magazine for textile/art lovers. Links below

FREE magazine for textile/art lovers. Links below

Unknown 05.25 Add Comment

Fabulous FREE magazine to read for free on line - all links at bottom of posting!

Edition 7 of the brand new Through Our Hands magazine is out now and absolutely FREE to read on line (links below) It's jam packed with beautiful images, information and inspiration.

We have some fabulous articles for you this time around from well known Textile artists and some you may not be familiar with yet. We hear from Sandra Meech, Linda Barlow (who's marooned on our Desert Island), Judy Coates Perez, Gaye Lasher, Mathilde Renes, Rachel Wright, and Luke Haynes amongst many others. We hope you enjoy reading it! Do let us know what you think (we promise to read your comments from behind the sofa where we're all hiding!)

 Don't forget the new TOH book is available on line too for £10 p&p FREE to UK addresses until Christmas and £5 to anywhere in the world. Don't be put off by PayPal - you can use your credit and debit cards for one-off payments. 84 full colour pages featuring all the stars of TOH!

Please do share the magazine with all your friends, students, colleagues and any creative people you know. We'd love for this to be the most-read issue yet.

If you'd like a PDF copy of the magazine to download and keep then you can purchase one for £3. We do really appreciate this gesture of support. Creating a magazine like this takes many man-hours and naturally there are costs involved.


 PDF version is £3 (plus any of your own local taxes) Buy Now

 Read for free on line here: http://issuu.com/laurakemshall/docs/tohmagwinter2015/1 

We're having a Beige Saturday instead of a Black Friday!

We're having a Beige Saturday instead of a Black Friday!

Unknown 03.51 Add Comment

SPECIAL OFFER

FREE UK p&p on the TOH book until Christmas!!

This makes it £10 for 84 full colour pages of glorious images from all the artists here at Through Our Hands.

There's also lots of books and small items for sale in the website shop, that aren't available in book shops or anywhere else.

http://www.throughourhands.co.uk/product/through-our-hands-book/

If you let us know when you order, you can often get the artists to sign their own books for you. Laura and I can also ship the TOH book to anywhere else in the world for just £5.

Why not send one to a textile friend as a gift - just let us have the address (there's space on the order form) and any message you want to add.  Or if you're perplexed email us at throughourhands.co.uk@gmail.com

Diary catch up

Diary catch up

Unknown 01.56 Add Comment

A couple of pages to share.

This page is in response to a visit to Alrewas - you may recognize the statue from an earlier posting. As it's been taken from a photo of it, you can sense the solidity of the stone in the folds of the fabric, that's come through because I've copied it.

As it's a black stone monument, I thought I'd try something I haven't done for years, which is to take a page or shape and completely blacken it with charcoal and use a rubber to remove the highlights.

Usually you use an ordinary rubber but because the image is so small in my book, I've used a battery powered eraser in order to get the fine lines. Not sure I like the fiddlyness of doing this particular image that way, but there's tremendous scope for something larger scale and more relaxed.

 

Here's the detail

We recently visited family in Dorset, and this monoprint is of the pier at Boscombe near Bournemouth. We arrived on a beautiful sunny day, but by evening the wind had started to whip up into a storm.

It was the tail end of storm Abigail and hit the coast during the afternoon of 14th November. The sky was dark and streaked with red. The sand blew into our faces and it was difficult to walk against the wind and the outlines of the pier were obscured. But we managed it and ended up in a very nice pub. This coloured and layered monoprint is how it felt to me.

And this was the pub!  I loved the atmosphere and wonderful drawings and photos of Chaplin dotted around the rooms, including this one of Einstein.  I used black and white acrylics to get this effect, and again, used a photo to copy - one that was in the pub.