Story Telling through Collage

I had a fabulous day last Sunday.  I was invited to run a collage workshop at the Write Around the Murray Festival.   At the end of the day, I posted of FaceBook:

A fabulous day. A fabulous workshop. Fabulous people. Says it all.     Had a ball faciltating a collage workshop as part of the Write Around  the Murray festival.       

My fabulous workshop participants made it work. I thank them all for their enthusiasm, laughter and sharing with me and fellow participants.                                                                                                                                                                                                   I have been given permission to share their work and here are a couple of photos.  Every one was so engaged to the last minute I forgot to get a group shot and photos of all the works made.   (Please seek permission before resharing these images).

 

Here is what we had up on the white board - a tad neater and clearer than it was on the day

STORY TELLING WITH CREATIVE COLLAGE

Collage – torn and or/ cut paper and glue                         Paper – heavy enough to hold collage

Photo montage – magazine images& photos                    Cardboard                                           

Assemblage – above/orand found objects                         Timber                                                

Mixed media collage –  “the kitchen sink”                        What else ?  Natural substrates         

Booklets, postcards, concertina, scroll, min, maxi            Archival – acid fee                            

                                                                                            Found papers not archival               

 

How will you tell your story:                                             GLUES:                                              

-          Realist                                                          -  Glue Stick                                      

-          Surreal                                                          -  PVA (White Glue)                         

-          Cubist                                                           -  Aleene’s Tacky Glue (if heavy)    

-          Abstract                                                         -  Paper Cement - bookmakers glue

-          Fantasy                                                           -  Gel medium - glue and glaze     

-          Geometric                                                                                                             

-          What other style or format can you think of ?                                                      

What is your story?                 How do you want to tell it?             Be inspired by the image

TRUST THE PROCESS

Much metta  

Donna

Grandmother's Garden and return to stitching

I have had a burst of soft sculpting and created some grannies and aunties for my exhibition Grandmother's Garden.  It was fun but exhausting.

 Grandmother’s Garden included an installation of hanging pieced hexagons.  The installation is a play on the quilting pattern of the same name.  It is a tessellating pattern which builds upon itself.   I have used old embroidered table cloths, tray cloths and napkins.

The earliest hexagon template that quilt researchers have found was made in England in 1770. Hexagon became one of the most popular patterns in England by 1830.    The pattern at that stage was know as honeycomb or hexagon.

Hexagon patterns bloomed in the United States in the 1930s under the name Grandmother's Flower Garden.  Many pieced quilts used fabric remnants or repurposed cloth to create a very distinct pattern.

I ran a couple of workshops during the exhibition and we paper pieced small bowls - we used old table linen and it came up a treat!

Its been a while since I put a needle into cloth with a decorative purpose in mind.  But glad to say I managed to lay out a fabric collage of sorts and started stitching.   Thinking they may become small bags.   Or just a piece of embellished fabric.   But trying to stitch sustainably and looking to my stash rather than buy new fabric and threads.   More later.

Working towards exhibion, visits to Melbourne and Sydney

Part of Grandmother's Garden Installation for exhibtion in mid 2018

What have been up to since last post?   Not really hands on in the creation stakes.   Spent time in Melbourne keeping appointments and dodging rain.

I did get to op shop though and was pleased as punch as I picked up a lovely vintage tea pot, sugar bowl and milk jug which will complement the Grandmother's Garden installation I am working on. I am recylcling old and vintage embroideries  and playing with the hexagon shap which us the basis for the quilt pattern Grandmother's Garden.   In doing so I am remembering special times with my own grandmother who always set a "proper" table with embroidered table cloths and napkins.

And I picked up a couple of books on drawing fantasy figures.   Thinking they will have some inspiration for sculpting faces and different body forms.   One of the books set out its drawings based on the skeleton – much the same as the life drawing classed I had been going to.  Sadly the classes have missed out as they are on a Sunday and I seem to have been away from home for about the last five!!

And this last weekend I went to Sydney and caught up with an exhibiting group I am part of to finalise plans for our joint exhibition in 2018.    The deadline for finalising works to photograph is 1^st of May – only a month away!    There will be a bit of panic between now and then as I have looked at my calendar and a lot of time has been blocked out already.   But I am a long way along and  when I review what I have done much closer to completion than I thought.

Whilst in Sydney I was taken to Designers on Show exhibtion.   It showcased and sold work of  Australian artists and designers in all mediums and included fine art, jewelry, homewares such printed designs on linen, hand made one of a kind hats, bespoke shoes and knitted items.  I could go on.  But instead I will go again next year.  It was inspiring.  I purchased a couple of cards of works by Jane Stapelford and one of her peg people.

I have been reading up on Olmec, Maya and Aztec civilizations and got information and a couple of sketches into my visual diary.    It has been fun and I have started a collection of ideas for a body of work.  

I am intrigued by the saying “as drunk as 400 rabbits”.   A group of Aztec gods called the Centzo Totochtin (also known as 400 rabbits) were associated the agave plant from which an alcoholic drink called maguey was made.  They partied hard it seems!  It was belived that the rabbit first discovered maguey by nibbling on an agave leaf.  Maguey was a ritual drink in Aztec times and the population at large were not permitted to drink it.    If you are interested you can find a little more information here .

My mind is humming with the thought of cartwheeling and leaping rabbits and how to make them😊

More Fey Folk = Art Dolls

Feathers from a vintage duster and an old silk scarf

Gum leaves for wings

Paper bark wings and recycled fabric

I have found that I have been working in a series by default.    I have been making these little art dolls for a while and finding that by repeating I am learning and exploring.  All that I have read and heard has said this but when I have set out to do this on purpose in the past I have failed.  I was encouraged to make more (thank you Penny) and ended up with a number of little art dolls. :-)

I have been using odds and ends, buttons collected over time, vegetation collected from walks with the dog and from the garden.  I have recycled/repurposed/upcycled clothes and fabrics given to me.
Friends know I have an interest in repurposing and I get given great things,   I love the vintage feather duster I was given.   You can see I have used some feathers in one of my fey folk above.

I have made little faces from either polymer or air dried clay and then made molds with which to easily create more faces.  They distort a little when I pull them out of the mould do they have familial sort of resemblance but are not exactly the same.  There are some that have no relatives -  the fellow with the bottle brush twigs wings in the photo above is one.

More Repurposing

Well not really repurposing but redirection.

I have a grab bag collection of threads and button given to me or so irrestable that I had to buy them. Remember I have a penchant for op shops.

Sealable and celephane bags of lovelies end up in an enormous tangle. But I have learnt to live with the fact that I am inspired by the mass (should really write "mess") of tangled colour that calls out to and inspires me.

Recently I have been making brooches.  They will end up for sale at the Tryp(s)tich exhibtion by the Wagga Wagga group in October.

Flyer for Exhibtion

Woven Brooch

Dorset Button Brooch

circles and spirals

I have a fascination with circles  and spirals – the latter often come into play into my stitching.      

Recently, I have been working on Dorset buttons with a view to incorporating them into a piece.  The buttons formed part of my show and tell at tthe August Stitchers Plus meeting>

I tend to photograph interesting circles – 

or make things with circles -  this is a close up of a tree installation - the circles were originally part of a table cloth which became worn with time and found new life here.

I used paverpol to harden and weatherproof the fabric.  The fabric was strectched over purpose made rings and the paverpol acted as a glue as well.

Seed of an Idea - an outdoor fibre tree.

A close up of  motifs

Add cthe tree form I had to wotk with can be clearly seen

Inside looking  out.  It is interesting how different views   give a different look - light from outside drains the colour and makes coverage look sparse.  

I was (and still am) involved in a project at our local Library in a joint project between the Embroiderers' Guild NSW and the City of Canada Bay (my council area) in the creation of 4 tree installations.  The Council created 4 tree forms and sought expressions of interest to fibre artists to create a fibre installation to cover the the forms - one pf which was to live on a first floor balcony.

These are photos of the tree I made to live outside -  it has a western aspect which was challenging - the strong Aussie sun is a cruel mistress when it comes to colour.  The motifs are from  a repurposed table cloth and treated with a water based fabric hardener which is weatherproof.  The colours selected reflect colours used internally.  I used aluminimum wire which is a wonderfully sogft and a breeze to bend.

Thanks to Paverpol Australia for their sponsorship and support in this part of the project.