Lesley Turner: body of work

Showing posts with label body of work. Show all posts

Monday, March 25, 2019

Articulation's Salish Sea Biosphere Study Sessions

Jellyfish in the Shaw Centre for the Salish Sea.

Articulation has had 2 week-long study sessions exploring Vancouver Island's coastal areas. The first was in 2007 and based in Duncan while the second was ten years later in 2017 and based in both Sidney and Tofino. All areas are within the Salish Sea biosphere boundary which is the overarching concept tying this study together.

Sunset on Chesterman Beach.

The Salish Sea biosphere is a vast area of interconnected habitats where living organisms are found - in the geosphere of soil and rock, the hydrosphere of lakes, rivers, and oceans, and in the weather systems in the atmosphere.

Articulation members walking the trails on the west coast - Wendy Klotz, Leann Clifford, Amanda Onchulenko, Donna Clement.

Researching in Vancouver Island's Maritime Rainforests involved walking the trails, recording sensory experiences in a journal, taking photographs of both minute details and the soaring grandeur of ancient trees, and reading both fiction and nonfiction with forest settings.

Lunch break while looking out to the sea.

Articulation members experience the same visual stimuli and discuss what they find and see during the week together.

Leann Clifford ready to go look for whales.

Watching the sunset from the beach.

Donna Clement explores mud flats while the tide is in.

Leann Clifford and Ingrid Lincoln and jellyfish.

Shaw Centre for the Salish Sea is an ideal place to learn about local sea life.

Taking the ferry out to Sidney Spit. Amanda Onchulenko, Leann Clifford, Ingrid Lincoln, Donna Clement.

After a shared experience spent exploring an area and keeping the broad concept in mind, Articulation members go back to their individual studios to produce bodies of work that reflect their individual responses their experiences. It is always a treat when the resulting work is exhibited to see how each artist visually translates their particular area of interest.

For more about Articulation's Salish Sea project check out Articulation's website and blog here and here.

Also, Donna Clement's blog here

Friday, September 28, 2018

WAR: A Personal Response Exhibition by Articulation October 16 to November 29th 2018

Articulation is very pleased to be exhibiting in the Sidney Museum, Sidney, British Columbia from October 16th to November 29th, 2018.

The exhibition coincides with the 100-year commemoration of the signing of the Armistice Treaty, the official end of World War I in Europe.

While the museum will feature displays full covering Canada's history of involvement in wars until the present day peacekeepers, Articulation will be taking a more personal look at war.

Unlike other studies where Articulation members research together, this war project research was done in their own time. It involved talking to family members to gather war stories and searching through family archives for war-related memorabilia.

I found other source material in many different places.

War displays started popping up in front to me when I wasn't expecting them such as the informative war display in the Mary Winspear foyer, in Sidney.

Around Remembrance Day there were moving displays to think about.

I studied uniforms in military museums.

I photographed war memorials whenever I saw them. This one is in Blenheim, New Zealand.

I caught this one in passing on a rainy day.

I began to recognise their familiar shape and looked out for them in every small town we passed through.

I was particularly interested in the airforce because my uncles enlisted.

Google is a treasure trove of early war photographs that say so much.

I visited war museums in England, New Zealand and Canada because they all played a part in my family's war stories.

I was particularly interested in learning about the Lancaster Bomber because my uncle flew one. I visited the Bomber Command Museum of Canada link in Nanton, Alberta. They have one of the last Lancaster Bombers and allow the public to climb up inside the plane. I was able to sit where my uncle would have sat.

I began to focus on the textiles of war. It was something I could relate to.

I found the uniforms most interesting.

I studied the materials, the construction and how items were attached.

I read a number of books and watched many documentaries on war.

It became overwhelming. I let ideas percolate and captured them in a large notebook. In time a theme emerged.

I began developing my ideas while collecting materials. I asked people to help me collect specific items. Carol bought me auction lots of military buttons and uniforms. Barbara gave me her husband's airforce uniform to work with. Friends gave me their husband's and father's worn and stained handkerchieves. I live in a very supportive community for which I am so grateful.

I do hope you can make it to the exhibition in the Sidney Museum where you will be able to see how all 6 Articulation members went through a similar process before they were able to begin to tell their personal war stories.

Thursday, June 22, 2017

Eco-Threads Exhibition at Coast Collective, Colwood

Eco-Threads is a juried exhibition put on jointly by Vancouver Island Surface Design Association and the Coast Collective in Colwood, on from June 28 to July 9, 2017.

There will be an artists' reception from 3 to 5 pm followed by a themed fashion show from 7 to 9:30 pm.

All of the work juried into the exhibition and all of the garments in the fashion show have a connection with recycling, re-purposing, or reusing. Some are the result of a studio practice that is kind to the environment while others are about the environment.

The lovely image in the exhibition poster is Bryony Dunsmore's work.

Douglas-fir: Wind Drawing

I am happy to say my entry was juried into the exhibition.

It is about a Douglas-fir tree in our back yard. The middle part is a drawing done in ink by a branch of the tree on a windy day. The different fabrics are from old bedsheets. The middle one was composted under the tree canopy before being drawn on.

The exhibition is one of many being held during the Northwest Weavers Conference being held at the University of Victoria. The conference theme is 'Treddle Lightly.' It is completely sold out but the exhibitions and the Merchants Mall are open to the public.

It is going to be a fun weekend.

Monday, June 5, 2017

New Work: 24 Synesthesia Colour Studies

I continue to work on my Synesthesia colour studies.

I used lots of thread on this one.

For each colour, I also work in paint and fabric to show a range of tints, tones, shades and intensities of each colour.

I went pretty dark with this colour - mmmm one of my favourites.

When I am in full swing all of the horizontal surfaces in my studio are in use. While one thing is drying I can get on with something else.

Making progress but still lots to do to finish this series.

Friday, August 12, 2016

Yukon Cryosphere II, Hydrosphere - Work Continues

Working with slippery synthetic sheers I can't keep the large pieces of fabric under control. Solution - hang them on the wall and take down as needed.

My current problem is to find a method for making a soft material appear hard.

I have made tapered tubes. They need weights in the bottom to keep all lines vertical, the way water falls and freezes. I considered lead fishing weights but couldn't find any small enough and they would all have to be painted white.

Solution - Beads. I cleaned out my white bead stash then scoured all thrift stores in a 20-mile radius. I sorted them by size and made 3 different soup mixes.

The beads are successfully doing the job of weighing down the points but now the tubes don't look substantial enough. I have decided to stuff each tube with fine interfacing. It took a long time and was hard on my hands.

To give my hands a break I started making the flowing water panels - cheesecloth dry-felted onto flat sheer tubes.

I am laying out the flowing water panels to see if I had enough of them and enough variety in length and width.

In the meantime, in the back of my mind, I am working on how to hang these individual tubes and panels. Percolation time, again.

Tuesday, August 9, 2016

Work In Progress - Cryosphere II, Hydrosphere

I have the idea for my Yukon panels in Articulation's 'Provinces' exhibition.

I want to show the phase change when water hardens then melts.

I have settled on the colour scheme - white (not yellow-white), silver and cerulean blue.

I haul out from my stash all of the light to sheer fabrics in those colours.

I collect up all of the threads, papers, and embellishments in those colours.

I draft up a pattern for the size of the panels and cut it out in Tyvek.

Pinning the different sheers on the wall gives me an idea of their transparency and drape.

It is looking distinctly bridal in the studio.

Sampling, sampling, sampling.

I am sewing on different layered fabric sandwiches searching for the look I have in mind.

The burning and melting station is set up.

I test all of the fabrics and sandwiches with a heat gun and a burning tool.

I don't want brown so anything with cotton in it is put away.

I have settled on the colours and fabrics now I need to sample to find a technique that best expresses the idea. I have made lots of drawings and compiled many lists in my workbook.

Now is the 'percolation' phase. It takes time for the ideas to sort themselves out. I record these ideas in my workbook and continue sampling until the way forward is clear.