Project 6, stage 2

Normally I work with natural fabrics, either hand dyed cotton or commercial batiks, sometimes with raw silk. For this excercise I wanted to use some - for me - unusual fabrics so I paid a visit to a local thrift store and came home with a collection of synthetic fabrics. Most of them were polyester, or a blend of polyester, some were tricot and I added some velvet to it for more variation. The task for this stage was to develop some design ideas by combining the different fabrics and looking for relationships in texture, color and weight. As it are samples - the largest is 11" long - the designs are simplyfied.

For my first sample I combined black velvet ovals with 2 different pieces of blue fabric: a knitted one and a smooth silky one. I wanted to combine different textures in one design and at the same time different shapes, or shapes in different sizes: 

 The next sample I nicknamed 'Easter eggs'.  It has a printed tricot as base on which a smooth blue and green curvy cut fabric is placed. In between the long narrow shapes are oval shapes (the eggs) cut out from a  multi colored tricot. Both the curvy lines as well as the placement of the ovals represent movement. Again this piece is made from colors which all belong to the same colorgroup with some yellow and black accents.

 This red sample was difficult to photograph. Background is a reddish polyester which has stitched embroidery on it. I placed 2 blue lines on it as contrast using a smooth polyester. To emphasize the contrast - this time in texture - I added 2 rectangulars of a knitted bright red fabric. The two red fabrics show harmony with a contrasting stripe to make it more alive and balanced.

 The next blue/green sample is not my best, but it shows different aspects. I used a thin - almost transparent blue textured polyester combined with a textured light green polyester. Both pieces of the background are the same shape with a rounded cut bottom edge. To connect the two pieces I placed curved strips of the fabric on the opposite site. This way I created a repetition of the shapes and the colors.

 And my final sample for this part is a combination of two red fabrics, a highly textured ne for the background with a dark embossed velvet strip horizontally over it. As a contrast I used black and white spotted tricot strips placed vertically. The strips are all of a different length, some smaller, some bigger than the background. This way the piece really shows movement and your eyes travel over it.

Some observations:
- because they were all (small) samples it is not possible to show a lot of detail in them
- combinations of colors or fabrics which at first hand you would refuse, can turn out really well
- in the past I have used synthetic fabrics for making garments. In those days I did not like them and making these samples confirmed this, I still prefer working with natural fabrics.

Project 4, Stage 2, Exercise 4

The task for this exercise was to place an object/some objects in front of you and make drawings of it. As I had all kind of stamps in front of me because I had been making samples of stamping, I deciced to work with an Adrinka gourge stamp. This specific stamps shows the symbol of supremacy of God.  My first drawing - a bit difficult to see on this picture - is done with pencil. The perspective is not perfect :-), I know but drawing will never be my strongest point. For the second drawing I used Lumiere textile paint.

Continuation of project 4, stage 2

Life kept me away too long from this course, but luckily I have more time available at the moment. Here is the continuation of the project where I left off in May. I picked one of the drawings I did earlier on and played a bit more with it. In the first sample I used a pencil, in the second sample acrylic paints and in the third one thorn paper. The reason that I choose this design, is that I love the organic shapes of it. By now it hardly looks like the original image of the man hole cover, but that is no problem as the man hole cover was only the inspiration source.



 Out of practical reasons the number of the spirals is less and the details are also less. Each sample is around 6"x6".

 For the collage sample the colors should have been much bolder, but my choice of different colors is limited. The background and the circles are okay, but the green is way too light. On purpose some of the yellow circles at the bottom are partly outside the square.

Out of these 3 samples, my favorite is the one done with the acrylic paints. I love the bold, colorful effect it gives with the simplified shapes.

Project 4, stage 2, looking for shapes

Out of my collection of photo's I picked two to work with. Both were taken in Minneapolis. There is a street there down town, where they have the most wonderful manhole covers. If I remember correctly, it was an art project some years ago. With a viewing frame I picked out four interesting parts of this manhole cover as inspiration for some design drawings.

 The other picture was taken at the old mills district. This old metal bridge has such interesting lines. With the viewing frame I picked out - again - four interesting parts as inspiration source. On purpose I picked two complete different type of pictures, one organic shapes and the other straight lines.

And here are some pictures of the drawings I made:

Although I like the comination of the lines shown in the bridge, I discovered that it is very difficult for me to use the lines as design ideas. Of the 8 samples I made there are only 2 which I find slightly interesting: the 2nd row at the right and the 4th row at the right.

To me it was much more rewarding to draw design ideas using the manhole cover picture. This is what I created:



I was able to draw more intuitive with these organic lines and I find the results much more interesting. My favorite is the top row at the right, but also I see use for several of the other ideas.

Project 3, Stage 2 color perception

The first assignment is finished and will go into the mail one of the coming months. Today I started with the second part which is all about color, design, printing and painting. Love those subjects :-).
The first picture shows what I did for exercise 1. I used fabric instead of paper simply because I have much more fabric in whatever color you want than paper. By adding a small square on top of the background although the color of the small square is the same on all of them, it will look a bit different depending on what the background color is. And this is not only with the color, but equally so with the size of the little square. Take for instance the dark blue background compared to the light blue background. The squares are the same, but the one on the dark background looks smaller than the one on the light background. This knowledge is extremely useful to have when you are designing.

My second picture for today, is for exercise two. In this case a small grey square was put on top of different colors of background fabrics. Again although the grey fabric is the same on all backgrounds, they all look a bit different. On for instance the orange one, the grey is much bolder than on the purple one. Just as in exercise one, the size looks different depending on the color of the background. But there is also something more. Depending on the color of the background, it looks like the grey has picked up some of that color. For instance the grey on the light orange shows brighter (more orangy) than the grey on the purple one.



Project 2, Stage 2 mark making with stitches

Again mark making but this time with different white/whitish thread/yarn on a black Kona fabric background. I experimented with different thread and distance between stitching lines. The 'squares' are done with machine stitching, all the other ones are hand stitched.

I am not happy with the couched yarn. It does not fit in with the rest. But that is the good part of experimenting, you find out what works and what does not. Same goes for the spirals. The one at the left is only done once with a thin thread, the one at the right has multiple stitching lines close to each other which make it really stand out. For the lines at the bottom I used a lose stern stich and I have to say I like the effect. It is more flowing than a straight line made with a double running stitch.
What else do I like? The different effect the squares give, depending on whether the lines are straight or more flowing and how dense they are stitched. Each one is different, but they fit very well together too. The loose stitching under the squares I love. I stumbled upon this type of hand stitching by accident when I saw how the couching of the yarn looked like. No idea whether there is an official name for this type of stitching or not, but I will use it more often. My book on stitches has not yet arrived, so I cannot check for a name.