Saying Goodbye Again

I had a lovely day sitting outside hand stitching 'Walls Talk'. It is so calming to be hand stitching again after doing only drawing & research for the last 3 BA (Hons) modules I have completed. But I have to admit I have been putting off doing doing this hand stitching because it is remedial work to solve the hanging problem the work was having.
I had already said my goodbyes to this work thinking I had sent it off to Korea for the Craft Biennale in October. Now here it is back again. It is like sending your child out into the world where you are excited they are healthy, happy & strong, ready to make it on their own. Then they appear on your doorstep again.
Like a child, 'Walls Talk' just needed a little more loving care before it was sent out into the world again.

Walls Talk Goes to Korea

I posted updates about this work, Walls Talk, during its creation. When it was complete I entered it in the 2009 Cheongju International Craft Biennale in Korea. This event is the Cannes Film Festival of Fine Craft - the work of over 1000 artists from more than 40 countries is exhibitied . Canada is the guest country this time (Italy was last time), so the Koreans have built the Canada Pavilion, a 10,000 sq ft gallery space. So Canadian Crafts Federation ran a competition called 'Unity and Diversity' to get work to fill the space. When I read the theme of the juried competition I knew they were thinking of my Tyndall stone wall. So I entered it. And it was accepted!

Yesterday, as I wrote out the 4 pages of instructions on how to install it and while I packaged it up, I said goodbye to it just as Martha Cole has recommended we do to our work. It was the last I will see of it for nearly 4 years. It will hang in the Alberta Craft Council gallery along with 29 other Alberta works, until June. Then it will be crated up and shipped to Korea where it will be on exhibit for the 40 days of the biennale, until November.

After Korea there are a number of opportunities for it, depending on which event it is picked for. There is going to be a book published on the 120 pieces being sent from Canada. Dr Sandra Alfoldy is writing an essay for the book about the state of craft in Canada based on the work and there will be bios on all of the artists. All great stuff.
I'll give you reports on Walls Talk's journeying whenever I hear anything.

Walls Talk

Walls Talk is finished - 120 hours of stitching!

John Dean is the photographer. He always does a superb job with my work.

There is lots of clear detail, which is important with this work, particularly because it is all about the materials. Click on the image to zoom in on the detail.
John can see light and he understands textiles are not watercolours. He deliberately sets up lights to make shadows. These images have shadows to show the texture which is one of the most distinctive elements of fibre art.

John's colours are true. Compare his images with my snaps in previous Walls Talk posts.

Walls Talk

Working on building up the focal point of the wall.

This is a large fossil form caught in the stone.


I will have to move the stone blocks around, remaking the wall each time to find the most pleasing arrangement.
Block #7 is having a bubble bath.
I used a lot of old yarns, worn clothing torn into strips and threads that have waited a long time for their day. Also, I dragged these blocks to many places to work on them whenever I could. One day, while sitting on a boat stitching, we both got covered by a salty wave. So they all needed a good wash before being blocked.

Hewing Stone

I am hewing the last stone for the Tyndall wall. Each day I have been washing and blocking a block once it looks as though it has enough of the detailed stitching.

But I won't really how much is enough until I can see all of the blocks laid out side by side as a wall.

Walls Talk Progress

One of the Walls Talk blocks told me it was finished so it went into a soapy bath for a good clean.

Then it was blocked, right side down, and left to dry.

I use a system of wires and pins to block stitching and knitting.

Walls Talk

I'm back stitching in earnst on my Walls Talk (I think that is its name). I have made 8 blocks of Tyndall stone to make the wall. I now have to add lots of detailed stitching to build up each block. Tyndall stone captured lots of different fossil forms so I'm working their shapes into the stone.

Tyndall Stone Wall

I am making a Tyndall Stone wall.

I have prepared my palette, just as Julia Caprara says to do. Torn strips of fabric...

..lengths of thick yarns, tapes, ribbons & threads are ready for building up in layers on the burlap base. I have 3 stone blocks under way. I'm not sure how many I will need to make a wall.
I'm now thinking the title should be something like 'Walls Talk'.

Progress with Stitching

I am adding on the 2nd layer to this Tyndall stone work by weaving in a variety of thick yarns & tapes. I want to show fossil/organic shapes that are preserved in the stone as record of the physical past -the 'stitched in stone' idea.
I also want to record the social history of Winnipeg, when people arrived and stayed while they 'outfitted' before continuing their journey west to their new homesteads. I am including materials that are reminders of what these homesteaders may have taken with them. I have woven in torn strips of bedsheets, felted wool yarns to suggest woollen blankets, women's head scarves, also Indonesian batik & Indian cotton to reference the different cultures that made up the population of the city.
With these 2 ideas going through my head as I work I haven't come up with a title yet that pulls them both together.

Julia Caprara's Funeral

It was Julia's funeral yesterday. On and off, all day, I was thinking of her, her family and all of their friends and how sad they must be feeling. It has been a help to me to get stuck into some stitching, particularly when this new work is in Julia's buttonhole textile technique.

I have worked the first layer of torn fabric strips and lightly felted wool by weaving into a burlap backing. The late afternoon sun has made it look a bit yellower than it is in reality.

I have assembled the palette for the next layer which will be thick yarns threaded through loops of the first layer. The photograph is my inspiration - a fossil in a chunk of Tyndall stone.