While the garden grows I am at work in my studio...

While the garden grows I am at work in my studio.

A new work. 

The challenge - how to express what is the province of Alberta on one double-sided panel?

I decided to depict the diversity of landforms in the province - landforms shaped by glacial and tectonic processes.

The schematic with a beginning sample. 

Cutting out the shapes.

I decided to focus on the interlocking shapes of the different regions and I felt colour would be a distraction. I auditioned a variety of different unbleached cottons from my stash. I selected mainly handwoven cottons from India. I washed these fabrics and lightly tumbled them dry to allow their different weaves to naturally collapse into wrinkles unique to each cloth.

Problem - how to make a neat double-sided join?

Solution - couching hand-made jute braid from India that I just happen to have in my stash, patiently waiting until needed.

The different landform shapes have been joined.

Yes, the landform edges do need more definition.

Hmmm, not sure about the outline. Is it too dark? Too wide? Does the whole panel need a wider border?

I added a border of a wider jute braid.

Nope - I don't like the way the outline of each shape takes away from the feeling of the different landform regions being related to each other. So I unpicked all of the braid on both sides.

I sewed on a much thinner jute braid.

Much better. 

Now to block the whole panel just enough to make it hang straight while not flattening out the natural landform wrinkles.

I think this must be the first work I have made without the use of my trusty irons.

Fun with Fibre...Cloth & Wood - An Annual Art Group Exhibition at Tulista Gallery

Dale MacEwan

email - dalemac@telus.net

Each year, around June, a group of 5 local artists install an exhibition in the Community Art Council of the Saanich Peninsula (CACSP) gallery in Tulista Park, Sidney.

Dale makes pieced and quilted compositions reflecting micro views of the landscape she lives in. She often incorporates her photographs printed on cloth and fabrics she has built up with texture using printing, stencilling, and stamping, all in her distinctive warm pallet.

Heather Corbitt

email - khcorbitt@gmail.com

I am going around the gallery to show you how each artist has set up a mini studio to work at during the exhibition. 

Heather makes wearable art garments and landscapes by building up very small pieces of fabric to produce multi-layered textured cloth. Her fabric of choice is dupionni silk.

Maya Brouwer

Brouwertree 

This setup offers the viewer a unique opportunity to talk to each artist about their work or to just watch them at work.

Maya makes large pictorial art quilts. Many of the fabrics she uses she has herself dyed, discharged, and added surface design elements to.

Kathy Demchuk

website

Each artist sets up a display of their work around their work area. Most of the works are for sale.

One of Kathy's techniques is to draw a resist on the ground fabric before dyeing it. Her signature style is to tell humorous stories that make the viewer chuckle. Kathy also makes jewellery using beach glass she has collected from local beaches.

Peter Demchuck

website

I have heard some viewers ask for special finishing requests, place orders, and commission new work.

While Kathy is beachcombing for glass, Peter collects driftwood. To quote from Peter's website, Besides giraffes, I carve bowls, make yard birds from driftwood, and do some wood sculptures, mostly of fish.

It is interesting to visit the gallery several times over the week to see how work is progressing.

And to sample Kathy's daily fresh batch of cookies.

Cryosphere - Hydrosphere completed and out there

Cryosphere II - Hydrosphere, 80"h x 50"w, machine sewing, dry felting, stuffing; nylon, polyester, net, cotton, beads, glitter, Timtex, cotton and rayon thread.

An exploration of the way water changes its molecular structure each time it shifts from a frozen state to a solid-state and back again. It is a process known as a phase change and is unique to the water molecule. 

Stuffed icicles of frozen water with bead-filled ends.

Attaching all icicles and flowing water panels together.

Attachment to the hanging device

While visiting hardware stores, fishing stores, pharmacies, a haberdashery and chandleries I bought clip-rings, lure swivels, silicon hair ties, tapes of hooks and eyes and nylon cord. I worked with them all to find a hanging device that would allow the panels to hang freely, hang straight and reposition themselves after being moved.

I settled on the tapes of hooks and eyes.

I bounced ideas off Ron, my resident problem-solver. He made a solid wooden frame to hang the work from.

All packed and ready to go with one and a half hours to spare - just enough time for a shower before I have to leave for the gallery. 

At the gallery attaching the hooks to the eyes.

Velcro to hold on the pelmets. An eye screw and carribenna type attachment to hold the wire to suspend the work from an overhead beam.

Cryosphere - Hydrosphere was my entry in the recent Vancouver Island Surface Design Association's annual exhibition 'Current Threads 2016' installed at the CACSP's Tulista Gallery.

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.

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.

VISDA 'Current Threads 2016' Artists with their Work

Judi MacLeod 'White Lady,' white linen, manipulated white cotton, hand and machine stitched

Judi led the this year's Current Threads exhibition committee. She led the hanging and compiled the artist statement binder among many other tasks.

A close up of 'White Lady' because my poor photography didn't really show any of the texture.

Committee member Sarah McLaren with her 'Van Gogh in Yellow,' cotton, silk, tulle, organdy; edge turned machine applique, free motion embroidery.

Sarah organised an elegant afternoon tea on the gallery verandah during the artist reception.

Committee member Dale MacEwan beside her work 'Nature's Patterns' (bottom - Karen Selk's work on top).'

Dale manipulated and printed on cotton 2 of her rock pattern photos then machine stitched into them.

Among the many tasks Dale worked on were registration and the show sitting schedule.

Many thanks to this year's Current Threads exhibition committee for doing an excellent job showcasing VISDA members work so well.

During the artist reception, I managed to catch 2 other artists with their work.

Susan Duffield 'Ragged End of Life' - stitched textile fragments mounted on painted canvas.

Louise Slobodan 

Top - 'Ancient Pathways' - a collagraph printed on rust printed muslin with stitching. 

Below - 'Arbutus Landscape' - Photographs printed on rust-print cotton with hand and machine stitching.

The exhibition is on for another week. I would recommend you visit if you are in the area.

Vancouver Island Surface Design Association's 'Current Threads 2016' exhibition at Tulista Gallery, Sidney

Laura Feeleus 'Heartfelt'

VISDA's annual exhibition is on at CACSP's Tulista Gallery in Sidney.

Works by Lori Mudrie, Terry Phillips, Donna-Fay Digance

The exhibition is on until Sunday 4:00 pm July 31st.

Works by Barb McCaffery, Margie Preninger

There will be an Artists' Reception on Saturday 2 to 4 pm July 23rd.

Works by Bryony Dunsmore, Sarah McLaren, Jo Ann Allen

Many of the artists will be in attendance. It will be a great opportunity to talk to them about their work. 

Works by Sarah Mclaren, Morag Orr-Stevens,

As this is an annual event for VISDA we are already working on our 2017 exhibition.

Jo Ann Allan 'Song of the Earth' 

Any work a member finishes between now and the date of the next exhibition is eligible to be shown.

We are working on several exciting ideas for next year's venue.