Looking Back at 2017 ...

With the New Year at hand, I've been thinking about what I've achieved in 2017 ... and sometimes it feels like not so much!

After reading Lisa Call's blog post  'The Power of The New Year'

I was wondering how many accomplishments I could list for 2017.  When I went back to look at the artworks I had made I was quite surprised to find 18 pieces of finished work and these were mostly of a larger size than in previous years.

There were a number of experiments and some works that did not fly,  as well as one piece that was reworked into a 4 smaller works .... I haven't included these...

I decided it would be fun to see all of 2017's works in a gallery format ..... they are pretty much in the order they were made and you can see the focus has been on the Grevillea Series ....  

Now for 2018 !   

Wishing you a fun and creative year ....

Thank you for reading   CC

Experimenting with Leaves and Landscapes

This last week I have been playing with ideas for my Leaf Series,  in part prompted by the drawing class challenge I shared last week (I'll show you how I'm going at the end of this post).

Decided to try combining a simple landscape with one of my favorite leaf designs and to make the leaves using a 2 step reverse applique to give a line effect.  I wasn't altogether satisfied with the result.  I think it would have worked better if I had used a darker tone for the line element?

This seemed like a good opportunity to try our another idea for adding a dimensional effect, by using what I might describe as free form applique.  In this case I stitched the leaf shapes to the piece along the vein lines so the edges are free to lift and curl.  

I have also been adding some hand stitching for texture to complement the machine quilting which is less dense than my usual style (the hand stitching is  nice work to do in front of the fire on these chilly evenings!!)

And now in a completely different style .... I've added another layer of dark tone to the drawing class challenge piece from last week.   I've used "shards" of dark turquoise silk and covered the piece with some wedding tule to keep it in place. 

I'm still playing with it and there is still the stitching to be added .... what do you think.... an improvement????

Thanks for reading ......CC

Adding Color & "Fugitive Media"

As I was finishing the latest Grevillea piece I wanted to add some extra color to the quilting design ... while there are lots of ways to do this,  my favorite media at the moment is the  NeoColor 11  Watersoluble wax crayons ..... 

 The question is ......  what is the best way to make them permanent on fabric?

This week I discovered an interesting article written for Quilting Arts TV by Kerr Grabowski with the intriguing title " Making Fugitive Media Permanent on Fabric" .   The article advises applying a layer of transparent base extender, normally used to lighten textile inks and bond them to fabric.

So for this exercise I coated the areas of Neo Color 11  with the extender using a paint brush ... the extender has the consistency of a thick cream ... so that makes it easy to apply!! 

This extender can be used to make NeoColor 11,  Soft pastels and charcoal permanent on fabric! So there is more experimenting to come!!

Thanks for reading .... CC

New Grevillea Artwork Underway

This week I 've had my head down,  working on the next Grevillea piece and specifically the stitching ....  

The design has come together with the applique and reverse applique completed.  This piece at 20" x 30"  is somewhat  larger than much of my recent work ... so its taken a bit longer to get to this stage and takes more time to stitch and there is a deadline looming!  Great motivation!!

The big questions now revolve around the quilting and choice of thread color.  After a few experiments,  I've settled on the stitching around  the flowers and the reverse applique shapes, but have yet to decide on the other areas!!  

                                  © CarolynCollinsArt 2017  'Grevillea 8  Detail'   

So back to the stitching .....   Thanks for reading ....  CC

A Bit of "Backward Design"!

I've discovered a new design technique ...  well at least a name for it!! 

I was browsing through on of my favorite textile art books "Stitch Stories"  by Cas Holmes and in a section on collage she talks about a process she calls 'backward design' .....  extracting compositions from a larger design .....  and that's just what I've been doing this week. 

I had a larger piece that I made a year or so ago and although there was a lot I liked about it,  something was missing so I set it aside (.... waiting for inspiration !) 

Inspiration came in the form of an idea from an old sketchbook .... putting the two together meant cutting sections from the larger piece as the basis for the new compositions.

 The result is a series of new leafline pieces on the design wall ready for stitching .....  here are three of them .....

I think this will be a very useful design technique for the future   ..... 

And I can highly recommend ............"Stitch Stories" by Cas Holmes,  Batsford, London 2015    if your are looking for inspiration !! 

Have you tried some 'backward design' ??      Thanks for reading ............CC  

A Question of Background ....

The most recent pieces in my Grevillea series have used strip pieced backgrounds ... a mix of hand dyed and hand printed fabrics to add some variation.  

This approach worked nicely but what if I 'push the boundaries'  a bit ...

Artists often create compositions from small areas of detail in a drawing or painting, scaling up the size to create and new composition.  We used this approach in my weekly drawing class recently.  

We started with a still life drawing and then using a small area of detail from that drawing created a new composition and then added tone and color ......

From one of my Grevillea drawings I made a number of detail sketches looking for compositions with 5 to 7 shapes.  I picked  3 to try out and made them up this week .....

I'm pleased with the way they look ... the shapes and the color combinations.  The plan is to stitch my Grevillea flower drawing onto these backgrounds ... so I'll need to work out the color and weight of thread and the best way to place and mark the design.   

I'm hesitating a little bit about the stitching so I keep telling myself I can always make a new background piece if I mess it up!!!!  

I'll let you know how I get on......

Thanks for reading  .....CC

Stepping Stones in Greens

Over the last year or so I have been working on my Stepping Stones series and have recently completed a couple more pieces.....

I love making these pieces because they let me try out all sorts of ideas on a small scale within the parameters of the series,  but I often wonder what others make of this work ..... 

When I was reading the Introduction in the David Hockney exhibition (see previous post)  I came across a description of his approach by Simon Maidment, Curator of Contemporary Art at the NGV    " [David Hockney] does things his own way and forges ahead in the direction he finds most interesting"  and this encourages me to keep going  .....  

Having made a total of 16 Stepping Stones pieces I thought it would be fabulous to see them all in one place ..... like the David Hockney portrait series at the National Gallery of Victoria !!!

The best I've been able to do is to create this gallery block.  Here are a collection of the green pieces   .....

   © CarolynCollinsArt  2017 'Green Stepping Stones'  Hand dyed & printed fabric, batik

It's got me thinking about a larger Stepping Stones design .....

Do you have a series you are working on??

Thanks for dropping by ...CC