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Sunday 10 February 2019

Inspiration in everything!

I'm often asked what inspires my work.  Well, how long have you got?

There really isn't an easy answer to this as I'm inspired by so many things.  Sometimes I get so much inspiration from one thing that it leads to a series of work.  This was so when I began to see rusty objects over and over again and the more I saw, the more I noticed rust in many other places.   This overload of inspiration lead to two series - Corrosion, which was inspired by the rust itself, and Oxidisation, which used fabric and threads dyed with the rusty items.

       

      

I have always had a great fancy for maps which lead to my series Seen From Above.   The inspiration came from contour lines and map symbols as well as the layout of settlements.  In several of the pieces maps were used as part of the design.

        

 

I haven't worked on a series for a few years now although certain images keep coming back into my work.  Beach Huts make an appearance now and then, together with anything connected to the sea.  This has been since we moved closer to the sea which we visit to walk several days each week.

When I look back in my sketchbook to see where the inspirations for each piece of work have come from, I find that most of all it can be just one image seen on that day that has immediately caught my eye and I see how I can interpret it on the page.  Sometimes literally, other times it just sparks something else.

In the last week my sketchbook has continued, although with only a few pages left, it has become increasingly difficult to take photos each day.  The first couple of days used prints from my stash as I wanted some quick days because I was starting a quilt this week so my time was precious.

My stash included several painted papers that I completed during a C&G Creative Sketchbook course I did in 2009.  Inspiration for part of my work on this course was torn and painted layers so the first page was a piece of one of the papers which started as a print of an image which was rubbed with layers of markal wax crayons and then topped with a layer of painted bondaweb.


I find some of my Gelli Prints are inspiration in themselves.  This next page used a gelli
print which was made with stencil of squares in different sizes.  I felt the paper itself was enough on it's own so I just added four yellow squares.


On Instagram this week someone I follow shared a piece of work which included prairie points
 which reminded my just how much I love them and have often included them in my work.  I was therefore inspired to make paper prairie points from gelli printed paper which I placed onto a gelli printed background.  I added the cross stitches as  reminder that they can be stitched in cloth too.


Another page was a 'naked' gelli print made using feathers and lace which was enough not to add anything to it.


We managed a couple of beach walks this week and found thousands of shells had been washed up in great big clumps.  I took photos of the shells and then manipulated them in Photoshop.  I'm not good with Photoshop and tend to just fiddle with the different effects until I get something I like without remembering what I've actually done, so I find it difficult to repeat anything I like!

I found a little saying about shells that spoke to me so simply wrote it over the shell background.


Using another gelli print, I drew several mandalas which I just love whether I am stitching, crocheting or drawing.


I recently treated myself to some Gelli Minis so tried them out for one of my pages, just using the triangle shape and various stencils, stamps and bubble wrap to add some texture and the highlighted using a white Posca pen.


February is Congenital Heart Disease Awareness Month and because my grandson Samuel was born with CHD I always remember it in some way.  This year I made him star of a page with hearts  and background which were printed using my gelli plate and a foam heart  shape.


Back to using my gelli print stash, this time I turned to my wooden printing blocks for inspiration and printed a design using one which I feel is a peacock design.


And finally for this week, today's design came about while I was thinking about designs for some embroidery I am planning at the moment.   I want to use stylised flowers, leaves and trees so this was a way of having an initial play.   I printed the green for the leaves using skeleton leaves to add texture to the gelli plate and for the background I used a print block I made year ago with card and string to live the bark of a tree.


Sunday 3 February 2019

#makearteveryday continues, even on holiday!

My sketchbook continues to occupy me each day, even when I was on holiday in Gran Canaria last month.

First a catch-up of the few days before we went.....

Rusting compound over stencil on watercolour background
Fabric collage with stitching and buttons
  
   
Wooden stamp with added pen drawing

Collage lettering on map background

At the beginning of January I thought about leaving it until February before restarting my sketchbook, mainly because of the two week holiday we had planned.  After much though I decided to go ahead and started to put together my art kit to take.  I kept it small, just taking watercolours and brushes, drawing pencils and pens, glue stick and some coloured fineline drawing pens but off course I found that I wanted so much more, particularly acrylic paints and gel medium.

Despite struggling with supplies, I found that inspiration was all around me and I never struggled with ideas each day.   I took photos while we were out, collected ephemera here and there and generally kept my eyes open at all times.

Collage of cut paper - inspired by wind turbines

Pen drawing - no explanation required!

Pen drawing with watercolour
Pen drawing with watercolour and ephemera background
Hexagon shaped collage of guide book picture



Painted paper collage - strelitza nicolai

Pen detail on watercolour background - cactus inspired
Collage of ephemera gathered on day out on a bus
Watercolour with pen - shadows on hotel canopy
Collage of sugar sachets
Tea stained background with collage of teabag packets
Mark making with watercolour using various tools
Pen drawing

Painted paper cut-outs on watercolour background

Paper collage on watercolour background

To finish the month, I made use of some of stash of painted papers.


Gelli printing on book page

Collage of torn, layered and painted paper

Thermofax print of cactus image on acrylic painted background
The sketchbook is becoming very fat now and as it nears the end of the book it is becoming more and more difficult to get good photos.  I am thinking now about what to use when this one is complete to make it easier.


Wednesday 9 January 2019

Looking Forward

 I gave up writing new year targets and goals a few years ago and as it made no difference to the amount of creativity that happened during the year, so I see no reason to change!

My plans for the year so far are to take part in Contemporary Quilts Journal Quilt challenge, restart working daily in my sketchbook and complete a 'year of stitches', all of which are underway.

Journal Quilt

This year's challenge is a little different to the previous few years in that there are guidelines for each set of four months.   The first set (January - April) must include a sewing technique, preferably one that you do not usually use so that you are more challenged.   Suggestions given were applique, reverse applique, traditional quilting, EPP, foundation, trapunto, curved piecing, chenille and collage.

Straight away 'curved piecing' jumped out at me as it is one technique I have never used.  I have tried it with disastrous results which I vowed never to repeat again.  If a curve was required, bondaweb and zig zag stitching was the order of the day!

I have also been drawn back to rust recently and together with indigo dyeing I decided that as far as possible I would use the two for each of the quilts.  I discovered rusting powder so no more wrapping fabric around bits of metal!

So, for my January quilt I made two drunkards path blocks using some rust dyed fabric and some very old indigo dyed fabric.  It must be nearly 30 years old as I remember doing it while doing C&G in the 1980s.   I consulted the web for instructions for curved piecing which was worthwhile as the two blocks were made with no unpicking and the seams layed flat!

The addition of free machine quilting in a circle design plus some hand stitching using perle cotton - another technique I intend to use on this year's quilts - completed the quilt top.  For the binding this year I am using a patterned fabric from Jim Holtz Eclectic Elements range called Travel Labels.  Once cut up the colour is perfect for the binding.


     

 Year of Stitches

I have also decided to challenge myself to regular stitching by making a commitment to stitch during every month.  I have seen various challenges on Instagram so went for a circular format divided into each month.


This was the starting point.  It's only an 8" frame so hopefully I will be able to keep it going.  So far it has been very slow stitching but I do have lots of ideas for the next few weeks so I will catch up again at the end of the month.




Finally for this beginning of 2019, I have restarted my daily sketchbook with the intention of creating some sort of art each day.  Once again it will be a mixture of sketching, collage, mixed media, stitching, in fact anything that takes my fancy or inspires me on that day.

So far this is what I have completed....

Pen and watercolour sketch

Collage of sweet papers

Pen and watercolour sketch

Acrylic paint layers

Pen Sketch

Collage of Christmas stamps and lettering

Acrylic paint stamp with watercolour wash

Layer of silk organza of printed photo with machine and hand stitches

Collage of gelli printed tissue paper