Sun Drenched

Just before I go off for a sun drenched weekend I wanted to show you my new work.  I've been working on a collection of small landscapes for a new print collection.  I thought it might be interesting to take photos as the work progressed and I've embedded a slideshow in this blog's sidebar.  Let me know what you think!

New Day

Full Moon

Sun Drenched

Quiet

Found!

Whilst having the requisite January studio clear out, I found these collograph plates that I made in 2004.  I still love a pile of bowls, and some of the other work I have created along the way refers back to these images.  They were a turning point from design to creating a picture, and I don't recall using the sun and moon in my work before these.

Night and Day

Reflection 17cm x 12cm

Orange Sky 17cm x 12cm

Here are two smaller pieces I delivered to Thoresby Gallery this week along with some other work.  I was aiming for a more abstract image and more of a textile mark.  I like playing with the shapes and the link between the symbolic and abstract elements, how one creates the other.  I still have alot of images of kantha stitched textiles and quilts on my inspiration board and I have been craving working with cloth, perhaps scaling up and working larger.

Did it!

 Sunrise 30cm x 30cm Mixed Media SOLD

 Echo 30 cm x 30cm Mixed Media

 

 Evening 30cm x 30cm Mixed Media SOLD

 Moon 30cm x 30cm Mixed Media

I'm really pleased to be able to post the completed work for the Thoresby Gallery. I like the balance between the four pieces and really felt that the mixed media style started working for me. I'm inspired to carry on working in this way and want to do some work that's a little more illustrative. I like the landscape but would like to introduce a human or animal element and might use some poetry as a starting point. I've been reading Ted Hughes but finding it a bit bleak, though very much anchored in the landscape and natural world. I've been looking too at Aesop's Fables, a favourite from childhood, with their anthropomorphic animal characters and morally sound conclusions.

Aswell as wanting to keep up the pace with the framed pieces, I've a renewed energy with the tapestry work. I like the process of editing a mixed media piece and simplifying it into shapes for tapestry. I'm excited too to try and interpret "Moon" above for tapestry. I love the pallette and some of the random marks and touches of heightened colour. I'd like to do a series on trees and tree of life motifs as they have such a strong cultural significance in textiles from around the world. I have an idea to try tapestry weaving on an inkle loom so I can weave images but on long bands and break out of the restricted format on the frame loom.

As usual, there aren't enough hours in the day!!