exploring the mystery of nature with painting & embroidery & mosaic
This little kingfisher started out as a very vague silk painting. I used acrylic inks to create a mottled background and the rough outline of the bird. I wanted the bird to merge with the background to some degree, so I didn’t make the outline too crisp. I had an idea in my head of …
My mother was the first person to really help and inspire me with embroidery. She was the one who made me my first sewing kit, some of which I still have. A little felt needle case in the shape of a hat, the crown holding a thimble, a cover for a small pair of scissors …
I’ve tried to recapture the sense of decoration and opulence I experience while visiting the Alhambra in Granada, Spain. There was so much pattern everywhere, it was quite overwhelming. Not only were there mosaics but also very elaborate plasterwork, and patterned wooden doors with large metal studs. There were also beautiful gardens full of flowers …
I love sparrows, the sound of them chirping in garrulous clouds in bushes and thickets and under house eves. I decided I wanted to make something based on the sparrows that used to come into the garden we had when I was a child and hang on the red hot poker bush, picking at the …
Shimmer shimmer shimmer. It’s taking forever to “sequinize” this peacock embroidery.
I’m still obsessed with grasses and tall flower spikes. I don’t think it’s going to go away any time soon. There are so many texture and colour combinations to be explored and every time I go for a walk I see something new – some little seeds or speckled leaves, or textured pods. I’ve spent …
I only found out about “World Embroidery Day” from the Mahila Community on facebook a few days ago – it was started last year by the Swedish Embroiderer’s Guild Broderiakademin. Here is the Embroidery Manifesto (PDF file in English – opens in a new window). I love the emphasis on peace; in a turbulent world, creating …
Stitches are like plants: they grow organically if you let them, springing forth from the fertile ground of furrowed fabric. Texture upon texture, like blades of grass and stems of weeds, clashing and clustering, bending, weaving and tangling, the threads begin to create their own landscape. A wayside border of adornment that casts its own …
The weather has been so warm and sunny recently (hip hip hooray!) that I’ve been feeling the need to use lots more yellow in my textile experiments – to be truthful the urge to use yellow started last year when we went to Andalucia and were submerged into a wonderful world of sunbaked olive groves, …
In recent days, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking (not always a good thing!) but this time it’s been helpful. I put all my recent finished work up on the walls and took a look at it, noting down thoughts and feelings and thinking of ways to take things forward and make improvements – …