WAC#4 - more lines

Week 4 of the challenge for 2017 - and further exploration of the Uluru theme through use of line. This time I use two different threads through the needle and another in the bobbin. This gives a rich textural feel to the work. By building layers and connections through the physical act of free motion work into a soluble base, the act of creating mimics the connections between people and places. I got to thinking about the spaces in between the threads - filled with that which we cannot see but know exists. Dreaming. Stories. As Ankie once taught me, making the invisible visible.

I am using the same bowl as the basis for this series of works - the common thread and using the same hoop as a limiter / constraint for the work. Looking forward to the following weeks.

Remember that shower scene?

It seems so long ago that I took a selfie in the shower - printing a series of fabrics that have been  incorporated into a free range log cabin quilt - unbelievable freedom and able to use a number of hand dyes, printed and reworked aubergines and deep rubines - contrasted against black and white mono-prints from a wonderful day with Ankie King. Loved thread drawing and stitching  using  Aurifil threads - from SAQA Signature Thread range.

Colour wheels and weeds

Finding the next layer can be tricky - and these pieces of delicately dyed silk give a beautiful depth to the new piece of fabric. The cats claw (declared pest and noxious weed in Queensland) leaves beautiful seed pods for printing and they litter the ground after the wretched vine has flowered. Like the weed, the seed pods get lost in layers of detritus until they are forgotten. Road testing the next step can take days ... too close a colour match and the layer gets lost, too much contrast and there is a risk of layering for layers sake.  For now, time to watch and wait for the moment of knowing.

Screenprint breakdown

My first experience of breaking down a screen print was during a "play day" with Ankie King a few years ago. I had been printing from a lino cut and Ankie invited me to load the lino cut with dyed print paste  and place it directly onto the silk screen. Once the screen had dried for several hours we "pulled" clean manutex over the dried  paint and created an abstract version of the lino print. As the clear manutex being pulled across the screen started to break down the dried dyes, it took up the blue dye and this added another  element to the subsequent prints. I really liked the unpredictable outcome and the way one lino cut could be used in so many different ways. Long after the prints had been set, I rubbed them with gold Shiva, using the original lino cut to pick highlights and add movement to the prints. I've started to stitch them ... and I'm still using that lino cut.

The latest edition of Down Under Textiles has a great article on Breakdown Printing by Dijanne Cevaal where Dijanne talks through the process and provides so many ideas there may not be enough fabric or life left in me to try them all ... 

Tea bags and rust

A precious day with Ankie yesterday - and her WMBM - where 50 tea pot bags later (with the assistance of some Sulphate of Iron and Caustic Soda) we had rusted our way through old hospital bed sheet, organza, various weights of silk, pelon, interfacing, PFD cottons and anything else that would stay still long enough to be "dunked and dipped".

We started with 50 pot bags and two huge jugs of boiling water left to draw and cool while we caught up on all sorts of others things - like State of the Art Quilt 12 and Beneath the Southern Sky - both of which are due in another 5 weeks or so - then it was back to the tea bags.

The recipe and process we used can be found at http://essellesbabble.blogspot.com/2006/04/rust-solution-dyeing-tutorial.html  and the results are limited only by the order of dipping, length of time in the solutions and ... it's an endless supply of outcomes.

Nothing better than a heap of fabric drying on the line - in another week they'll be ready for washing. The interfacing came out like sheets of tanned parchment - so there's the foundation for journal pages - which will be made into a book of ... textile art samples. Thank you Ankie - a great day.

More from "Nested" exhibition

Ankie King's works from our recent Nested exhibition were suspended from the gallery ceiling and appeared to float, at eye level. Each nest was hand crafted - each petal individually made - Ankie's artistic use of paper fibres, hand dyed fabrics, silk, beading and found objects.

Ankie King @ the Queensland Quilters Quilt Show



This weekend is the Queensland Quilters' Quilt Show in Brisbane - what I wouldn't give to be there. Ankie King's exhibition of "The Lady Dyed the Blues" is worth the trip into South Brisbane just to see her Indigo dyeing techniques expressed in the form of quilts, kites and jackets. Congratulations Ankie!

Lying on concrete

Ankie, Sue and me - all on the concrete floor in the name of "Nested". Here we are, on the rained out opening night in front of the Wedding nest (also below, created by Sue) and Rio Grand del Norte I and II. Can't wait to show you Ankie's exquisite pieces seen suspended in the background. All pics are thanks to Kerri Jessep from Jessep Photography who photographed the entire exhibition and artist portraits on the night. I'll post more from the Exhibition over the next few posts.

Nested exhibition - 4 weeks to go!

Here is a sneak peek of "Nested" a joint exhibition with Sue George and Ankie King at the Art Factory Gallery, South Brisbane from 13 - 19 October. In informatics, nested objects contain other objects of the same kind.  Nested information is organised into layers of related information.  Nested objects are recursive, characterised by repetition and recurrence, where interpretation requires numerous, successive executions. So the three of us have created our “Nested” works. The exhibition comprises 40 - 50 nests ranging in size from 3  - 100 cm cubed.  Nested will be an exhibition of 40-50 “nests”.  Some are sculpted from porcelain slip, others slumped and hand pinched porcelain clay. Some are sculpted from hand dyed textiles, fibres (natural and manmade) and found objects. Opening night is Thursday 13 October - from 6pm. If you'd like to share the evening with us, please contact me (ali at aliquilts dot com dot au).

Progress towards Nested Exhibition

We're only 8 weeks away from "Nested" opening at the Art Factory Gallery in South Brisbane from 13-20 October. Sue and Bruce worked tirelessly yesterday on the structure of our major piece - giving it form. Over the next few weeks, Ankie, Sue and I will give it life. Can't wait to see what happens and you are more than welcome to come along to the exhibition to see the result up close and personal!

More surprises - the genesis of another of the exhibition pieces - followed by an experiment in wire, paper mache, bandages and silk. There's nothing like the excitement of hooking into a theme and hanging on for the creative ride. 

Indilogo Cabin

At a recent Boonah retreat the WMBM dropped off a bag of Indigo and rusty fabrics, dyed with Ankie King and Maxine O'Toole and waiting patiently for me to give them purpose. Indi-logo Cabin was the response and now it waits patiently to be quilted ... probably this weekend. The backing is my favourite piece of dyed fabric to date - the jellyfish  streaming across an endlessly deep ocean.

Paint + fibre

Between the 2QAQ group, Dale Rollerson and Playways have taken me and my machine to creative places I did not think I could imagine ... my only complaint is that the possibilities are endless and the WMBM is frequently a "studio widow". He will manage. His mantra is that I should follow my dreams, so long as that doesn't mean he has to leave his dreams to participate in mine. Art quilts and aviaries - it's a marriage made in compatibility. 
Painted some sheets of vliesofix over last weekend and  bonded them to felt perhaps to be rotary cut, re-purposed and start a new life as a journal cover. Played with Tyvek thanks to an envelope received from the US some months ago when playing tourist ... I'm getting into the painting and loving it.
Used all the copper thread offcuts from a different project with silk that I'd dyed at Ankie's some time ago to make another ....(you guessed it ) nest and played with wafer thin sections of silk fibres carefully bonded with a hint of Angelina fibre and now have a possibility for another nest or bowl .. albeit with  a fragility rating of "fairy floss".

Lines on lines

Lines

Whenever a "break in the traffic" occurs, an ongoing hand sewing project emerges. Lines. Lines of stitching. Lines of fabric. Lines of torn strips. Lines of lines. Lines on lines. These pieces are from the indigo dyed fabrics and threads with Ankie King. All the lovely lines.

Shards of silk

Progress is being made! "Shards" is how I've reconstructed the hand-dyed silk piece made with Ankie last year. I wondered how silk could be cutting and sharp? Shards ...
The stained glass look of the pieces is being quilted in mini-shards with gold shiva used to show the passage of light across the quilt face. Haven't decided on a binding - most likely some of the indigo fabrics, again dyed with Ankie.

Silk Dyed scarf - chop chop

The first of the hand dyed silk scarves I did using gutta resist and procion dyes was with my friend Ankie. The scarf has been bonded to vliesofix and cut into smaller sections, pieces and individual triangles and is now being fused, bit by bit, onto hand dyed ingido fabric - again from a session with Ankie. I'm still fusing - and am wondering why I cut it up and repieced it when it doesn't look substantially different from the original. The end plan is to hand stitch  and embroider, in a similar fashion to Dreams Debris. I love smaller, and therefore really portable projects and am happy for them to be UFOs for as many train trips to meetings, waiting room visits and anything else that gives me 5 or 50 minute blocks of time to do "something".

Journal to quilt - progress



Sewn together at last

At last the pieces are together - which means it's back to the drawing board of sorts. This piece becomes the "blank canvas" for the next layers of the quilt and the andrenalin is flowing. In truth it's flowing because one of those long slithery brown things and I just had a conversation over in the entertainment area. Basically we agreed to go our separate ways, fast. Once my knees stop wobbling I'll go back using the "lightning never strikes twice" theory.  A bit of personal growth - I didn't scream or carry on this time. Just scooped the little dog up under my arm and headed back to the house. And another thing ... only someone who's NEVER come face to face with one of them could suggest that if ever bitten to stay calm ..... yeah right. There's not enough valium in the world at that moment . For now it's back to the studio

Journal to quilt - the indigo version

Indigo version

The decision to go "blue" was easy. After mucking around with different colourways and "literal" fabric,s the pile of Indigo from a day with Ankie was screaming to be used. I'm most grateful. The original journal drawing now looks like this and I'll start working on the individual "paddocks" and other pieces this weekend. My only complaint about being in a frenzy of creativity is that life speeds up and it feels like I'm hurtling through the living and working dimension. What has been good is to run out of time to keep going last Sunday  - and enjoy a margerita with Lorraine - because standing back and taking a breath is somethingI forget to do. The door to the studio is closed and I won't open it until tonight ..... progress will be posted over the next few days.Feedback always greatly appreciated - any comments on the balance / flow (or lack of it)? Feel free to contribute, and thanks.

The original drawing



From journal sketch to fruition ... PYO fabric

 


Gulf Swirls

I used to spend a lot of time in little 'planes popping about the Gulf and Cape country in far North Queensland. That's when I started journalling in a serious sense - trying to capture the brilliance of the landscape and the trance that kept my face pressed to crackled plastic windows - imagining the land below without the milky UV battered overlay of plane plastic. I learned to draw at anywhere between 5000 and 12000 feet ... turbulence notwithstanding. Sometimes the eddies and currents between Mornington island and the mainland were hypnotic.  

Earth Lines I

A few hours later the landscape changed to infinite layers of orange and blue and spinifex sage. The rise and fall of the dirt was as captivating, to me, as the dugong that grazed nervously near Bentink Island. Always the lines ... the stitching lines.

Direct print

The linocut was the result of the dirt lines and Gulf swirls. In its original form, it became the basis for some experimenting on silk ... which was the subject of a much earlier blog  ...  and now (in a modified form - more work, more detail, more flow and hopefully more balance).

It lives again with direct printing onto fabric and became the basis for a screen print where Ankie showed me how to dissolve the dried print in manutex over several scrapes. We made three or four individual pieces of fabric - as the number of passes over the screen increased, the manutex did a great job of breaking down the darker dyes ... the result (below) was quite delightful and unexpected. 

Silk screen breakdown with manutex