Gifting.

Carol loves to make items for friends and family.First was a gift for her granddaughter.This adorable pony with colourful braided mane .It is designed to be a place where hair slides can be kept together.

Next is this bag for her son-in -law .It is made from a pair of trousers of his  no longer fit to wear .

It’s perfectly acceptable as a holdall and will have another life.

Next some leggings and 

and a ladybird.

And some ideas from Bristol Stitchers .Above using organza to transfer markings when using a motif in embroidery which leaves no mark as the organza is removed .

And using purée tubes to create baubles.The metal is flattened then ‘embossed ‘ with a biro before being coloured with a sharpie or Posca pen.

 

Quilters ,natural pigments and fine crochet .

 

 Debby had taken a course with Susannah Crook www,susannahcrook.com on  using Natural pigments .

They created a colour palette then explored using it by using thin and thick ,mixing and mark making .Some lovely earthy tones.

She and Fumi had both created little samples in  a Quilters Guild challenge .Each had been given a postcard size piece of Shute Lane fabric and invited to ‘make it their own’. Debby had an owl and had added a feather appliqué and worked into the fabric with Inktense pencils then stitched and created an edge to finish.

Fumi stitched each leaf by hand to quilt the surface  and added a lacy edge.She has a tiny mouse in the bottom right corner.

Fumi had been doing more teeny crochet ,creating a sleeve to house a piece of slate from the Lake District  and finishing with a tiny fern. 

She had also made this small pouch with added embroidery. Please excuse the out of focus!

 

Visual Narratives.

Sue has treated herself to a top of the range Bernina which has so many features.The machine included a two day course to begin to see what is possible .Below is one of the samples she produced .It has inbuilt patterns but these can be manipulated and altered ,and unique patterns produced by inputting .We are sure she’ll get to grips with it and will soon be showing what she can do .

She has also enrolled on Sally Tyrie’s Visual Narratives course with Fibre Arts Take  Two .Liz did it a couple of years ago and inspired Sue with her results.While out on walks near the Severn Estuary she was inspired to take this area as her inspiration. The course explores photography ,drawing collage and a variety of print techniques to create a personal response..

These are her first foray into collages made from manipulated images above and below using tracing paper to ‘knock back areas.

A very different way of exploring ideas.

Jenn too has enrolled having taken a while to decide.She has used the Greenbank cemetery for her inspiration.These are some of her collages using images  printed on a variety of surfaces.

Tea bag paper ,tracing paper and rice paper have been put through an inkjet printer using a carrier sheet.

Turning the images to black and white was done using her I-pad , with the various filters etc.

Both Sue and Jenn are taking their time to work through the various elements.It will be interesting to see how they progress.

 

Printmaking.

 

Kirsten brought  her workbook from her university course.She has been mark making and using the darkroom to experiment with what can be achieved below.

She had also been using tetrapak which gives a really good accessible surface for printmaking ,cheap and easily used at home .She used this for her Christmas card ,seen top left in the previous post ,and featuring a pine cone .

She continues to belong to Printclub ,where they produced this concertina book containing everyone’s print on the theme of ‘Feast ‘

Her latest project is using lino and screen print .She was worried about registration but was shown a relatively simple method .As you can see it turned out well.

Alison has also been exploring Lino printing at Spike Island .

These are multi layered 

and multi coloured also requiring a good eye for registration. 

We love seeing the wealth of ideas and techniques available with print .

It’s that time…….

We met as usual but our December meeting always includes an exchange of  hand made Christmas cards which are picked randomly out of a basket. This year’s are above.With show and tell and business done we sat down to enjoy a buffet prepared by us all .

Our after lunch activity this year was provided by Jenn .We made tags using a variety of papers and some hand dyed sari silk ribbons.

We forgot about our monthly prompt until we had gone home .Debby has suggested RENEW Which seems very appropriate.

 

Going wherever it takes.

After finishing  work for ‘Found ‘ at Prior and ‘Collections ‘at Acearts  with Stitch Textile Artists , Jenn decided she  wanted  to spend time having a go at whatever took her fancy. First was a little one page book she filled with quick drawings of plants in her garden seen from various windows. 

These were then photographed and enlarged before being printed in black and white.She has no idea if   they will lead to anything but it was a pleasurable occupation on a dreary day.

These pieces are the from the Textile Artist Stitchclub free workshop.When seen last they hadn’t been dyed in tea .The one above had an inclusion of some rusty metal hence the greyed colour.

While at Ammerdown with STA Sian gave the group a challenge related to a piece of their work .Jenn did that but wasn’t very inspired so she used some wire to create seed pods and used the technique of silk paper making and covered some with that.

She signed up to  the short Collage Fodder course and enjoyed some of the classes .She loves seed pods so used those as inspiration for these tags ,using papers created  with Brusho to cut them from and some hand dyed silk ribbons to finish off.

Finally she took an evening collograph course with The Printroom run by Steph Renshaw .She  was intrigued how you could make a plate and produce prints in two and a half hours.Hers are below based  on a still life drawing and an abstract using leftovers.

Steph uses sticky back plastic so there iss no shellacing  and waiting for it to dry .It works really well and Steph is so knowledgeable and generous with her teaching.Jenn will explore further at some point .

 

Surfaces and skies.

Debby is teaching two classes at Stoke Lodge on a Monday . They involve mending and Sashiko .With this in mind she had been put her embroidery to good use .

A cashmere sweater had been eaten into holes ,rather than discard Debby had used perle and crewel to make a feature of the damaged areas.It will  extends its life and serve as a teaching resource.

She had recently used some of her work and photographs to take advantage of Prinfab’s swatch size 3 for 2 offer .She usually has them printed on velvet as it enriches the colours and is such a luxurious surface. When she wants to quilt or add stitch she has them printed on cotton as stitches tend to disappear on velvet 

She and her husband visited Venice recently and she was taken with surfaces around the city.Old walls and doors offer a wealth of colour and shapes.They wandered the back streets and visited venues showing work for the Biennale ,including Elias Sime who exhibited in Bristol earlier this year. She came across a shop selling pigments and couldn’t resist buying Verdigris ,lapis and Venetian red !

 

Sue had put the finishing touches to her workbook to accompany her Found pieces at Prior. It is good practice to have something to remind yourself and always a good resource to dip into .

She had been busy making clothes for her grandchildren ,one such example the hoodie pictured.

She was also excited to trade in her sewing machine for a new and updated version .She has the opportunity for a two day course to explore the possibilities.She has already been experimenting what it is capable of .

 

  

There are some patterns included but she is able to add in her own and mix them up .

Sue continues to attend watercolour classes and is making excellent progress .Some are U3A and some run by Paul Weaver who she likes as a teacher.Recent subject matter included Dramatic skies,Still life and portraiture.

After seeing the work that Liz did with Sally Tyrie’s Visual Narratives course ,she enrolled.Sally’s advice on beginning to research a topic was ‘to look for things you like ‘ With this in mind she has started to take photographs on her walks and is already feeling energised to begin.