cataloguing my grandmother’s quilts has been a long-time pet project of mine, a WISP. we took these pictures in my backyard with owners holding them up for the camera. though the pictures aren’t “studio quality”, i think grandmother would’ve liked having them photographed outdoors with her children and grandchildren in the picture.
well, i think there’s some improvement in my edging stitching. maybe not marked but definitely some. worked on it tonight during rehearsal for into the woods, and i think it’s finally all coming back to me. (i have 16 words – not lines but words – in tonight’s rehearsal page span, so there was plenty of time for stitching.) (thanks, jude, for the reminder about rolling the edge under before stitching. i’d plumb forgotten to do that.) it’s not perfect, true, but may i never do absolutely perfect stitching. decided to leave the awkward, clumsy, just-starting-out stitches in, though. they are at annelle’s name – annelle as in steel magnolias – and somehow awkward stitches that haven’t yet hit their very own rhythm somehow fit.
p.s. okay, i cheated. made the picture a little on the fuzzy size cause stitches look better that way.
base stitching on autoquiltography one continues. thought i’d be anxious to be moving to the next phase now, ready to move forward and get this annunciated image stitched into existence . . . but not so much. will be glad when i’m to the hand-sewing stage for reasons of portability: won’t lose work time during travel. me, i see the project in its entirety when it’s complete. i see the image i’ve carried around for so many years, and i know what it speaks to me. afraid, though, that all this base stitching just makes for rather uninteresting, repetitive blog entries. thanks for your tenacious patience. will try to make it all eventually worthwhile.
i don’t have any more sense than to show you the poor results of my edging efforts today. (it’s another piece for my dinner party series.) tomorrow will undoubtedly be dedicated to stitch removal and search for that ancient instructional book of stitches.
when i found my second born in shards, i didn’t see a broken creation but pieces that will be reborn into something larger, bigger, more magnificent.
where does this longing to combine cloth and clay come from? is it the joining of polarities, hard with soft? is it the long, long history of both cloth and clay as cultural bread crumbs? is it the way fire transforms malleable clay into something able to stand on its own, all the while retaining the imprints of previous encounters with hands and objects? the way flexible, pliant cloth develops more body, more sinew when embellished and manipulated and when going through fire, is totally and absolutely transformed into an entirely different way of being?
is it the resourcefulness people long before me have shown when gathering clay and cloth and shaping it into something functional, useful, and necessary? do cloth and clay represent the resiliency i’ve seen in so many people i’ve known along the way who start out to make something beautiful with their life, then when things go awry for reasons out of their immediate control, they gather up the pieces and mend, patch, and piece together to make something perhaps even more beautiful?
is it my affinity for place – more specifically, the south – where my life has known, both firsthand and through retelling, red clay and cotton fields? is it even closer – does it have to do with some of my daddy’s family being well known potters and my mother’s mother and so many women before her were avid quilters?
whatever it is – whether one specific thing or an amalgam of many, one thing is for sure: clay and cotton are my tara.
seems cats love cloth with a past, too – enough to peacefully coexist and share the space (at least for a while) on recently rescued cloth. rescued cats, rescued cloth: a likely pairing, i suppose. jude, i sure hope you aren’t allergic to cats . . .
worked on 2 new pieces today, finished neither.
this one is 4 layers: 2 of inkodye, 2 of acrylic:
this one is 6 layers: 3 of inkodye and 3 of acrylic:
Here’s the one i finished yesterday:
not quite sure how i started out with bark
and ended up with grasses and stacked stones.
i like yesterday’s piece, though. it is the quiet, the slow i crave.
maybe i’ll use today’s red as an underneath mat:
when the ubiquitous question “what do you do” came to me, i said i was rather nomadic, rather like a gypsy then i launched into a short string of things i’ve done. it admittedly sounded like i couldn’t hold a job. and while it was fascinating to hear about the experiences of the exhibits of one and the fashion shows of another and the one who just last week applied for a job as a rug designer, i have to say that for the first time in a long time, it felt good to be one who is ravenously curious and dabbles in so many varied things.
i really like this dying technique and spent a good deal of today’s workshop planning future applications of the technique. ray, the instructor, has done some exquisite and functional creations: window coverings, room dividers, closet doors to name a few. i can see doors created with this technique in my future – doors to cabinets and rooms to start with. some things never change.
but first i’m eager to get back to work on autoquiltography one tomorrow.
Technorati Tags:
dyeing fabric, inkodye
so glad heavy snow this morning didn’t keep me from going to the gym, or from going to this workshop led by the patient and talented ray pierotti in leisa rich’s fun, inspiring studio.
working with inkodye (a photo synthetic dye), spray acrylic paints, and colored pencils, we applied numerous layers to untreated canvas. even after 8+ layers, the fabric remains pliable, touchable.
first, selection of inspirational object:
then creation of the “pattern” pieces:
and the layering begins:
near the end of the day:
more tomorrow.
Technorati Tags:
cloth, fabric
today horizontal stitching, going from side to side – which of course makes me look fatter. love how all the stitching is giving this vintage tablecloth-turned-quilt (dare i say it) body. with all the ideas and images that bubble up as i sew, i’m going to have to live to be another 202 years to finish everything.
just a teensy little time to stitch today (so far) and nothing picture worthy as i’m still just stitching, stitching, stitching on what i call the basic, infrastructure level. next stage of unfolding on both works should start soon.
stray thoughts that kept me company today when i shoved the ubiquitous work aside and began stitching on this one “flash image” simply to assuage my soul’s craving:
