Exhibition in Truro Cathedral

At long last the exhibition that everyone has been planning for a long time is nearly here .... with lots of help from members of the Textile Maids: Jane has created St Piran Quilt all by herself, Sue and Carolyn (as Beyond Patchwork) have have made the St Enoder banner, and Chris has helped with the design of of St Budoc.

Lets hope it all goes with a swing! 

Chris

THE SKIN CHALLENGE -             "CATCH OF THE DAY"

At first I was thinking about hair or fur but then I decided to base this piece of work on the silvery shoals of Cornish Pilchards.  Which were caught and preserved and eaten - skin and all.

I started by making a stamp, but I didn't use it in the end, except for in my sketchbook.
I did a drawing of a fish, painted it and reproduced it over and over again.
I then printed it on fabric, handmade paper and lutradur.

I then layered it all up with a batik and some knitted cotton. Sprinkled with glitter.
Topping it off with a lurex mesh.

I used metal shim to make the fish embellishment and added Coconut Shell and Wood Beads.

FINISHED! now on to Doorways.

Janex

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Monochrome compositions

Our first attempt at blogging, with helpful instructions, thank you Margaret, and photos, thank you Chris.

Some of our group interpreted this last month's challenge of "Monochrome" as working in one colour, and others as working in black and white. But yet again, what a varied response! Here are some of the results.......

A few of these have already had mention on this blog, so we won't repeat things.  The others are by some of  the newer members to the group:  someone working in her favoured palette, using skills recently picked up from Sue & Carolyn on collages; three little felt calves appliqued onto a raw edged patchwork background inspired by a workshop from the Somerset Textile artist Viv White;  a lovely ethnic design using an embellisher and finished by adding handmade paper beads; Thermofax  screen printed seedheads on another collage background of vintage fabrics with machine and hand embroidery and last but not least a  glorious white snail in the bottom corner with machine embroidery using thick thread in the bobbin and trapunto techniques.

 At this meeting established members brought along their finished challenges in preparation for the exhibition at Heartlands in September, WOW!! were we impressed.The work was so varied, inspirational and such a visual delight.

There are not  many more monthly challenges now before our exhibition at Heartlands, and we are really beginning to focus on that, so lots of busy and exciting days ahead.

If you can come and see our work there you will not be disappointed. We are also fundraising for sewing machines to empower women less fortunate than ourselves in less developed countries, so please come along and support if you can.
Thanks for reading,
Debbie & Barbara

The joy of Monochrome ...

I have loved doing this challenge, probably one of my favourite yet, when you see my piece you will understand why.....I used - buttons, a shell, lace, silk rod, paper, string, cut and sew fabric and paper, florist netting, tissue, silk string, organza, lace made with dis-solvable plastic, wool, raffia, webbing tape, pin-tucks, couching, re-verse appliqué, hand stitching, machine quilting and a stick wound with wool etc. as a colour study.

As you have realised by now I had a good hunt around and found any object, piece of fabric or paper in the relevant colour that I could recycle to create texture and interest.
However, once I had finished the quilting and left it hanging on the wall for a while I thought it looked a bit flat, so out came the white acrylic paint which finished it off nicely.

It's now stretched over a canvas and ready for the next meeting...

'Cornish Cream'

Sorry it looks a bit grey in the photo, it's actually calico and white.

Thanks for reading,
Sue

No sand…just pebbles

My piece in response to the theme 'monochrome' developed from a trip to my favourite beache on the north coast, Porthtowan, with a friend who was visiting. The winter storms had changed the beach so much that I hardly recognised some of my favourite rocks where I have sat and sunbathed many times over the years.

Lots of the sand has been scoured from the beach leaving vast expanses of dark grey rocks that weren't exposed before all the bad weather.

It all felt rather depressing as we walked along. But then I noticed all the grey and white pebbles under my feet and suddenly thought maybe here is my way into the monochrome piece...

So I collected as many different pebbles as I could get home, and then photographed them as my reference for the piece of work.
















While I was thinking about this project spotted a remnant of black fake leather in local shop and suddenly it all started to take shape in my mind.  I liked the idea of a contrast of textures and slightly unusual back ground this might provide.

I made my pebbles using a range of techniques: acrylic painted Bondaweb on black and white felts, Tyvek painted with black ink before heating, and some by making collage of mesh and fibres between layers of dissolvable fabric. Then I stitched them to backing fabric with a very fat wadding to give them as much height as possible. Once all the pebbles were made I dropped them into pre-cut holes in the leather and then attached them with zigzag stitch around the edge of each pebble.

My husbands response when he first saw it finished was "I don't know if you are genius or just very weird!" Here is the final result. You decide!

Thanks for reading, Chris

MONOCHROME “ERTÉ ZENTANGLED”

On hearing what our challenge was, my first thought was  "Zentangle".

This is where shapes are split into sections, then in-filled with simple repetitive patterns.  Basically doodling using black ink on white paper.

(Apparently a technique developed by Maria Thomas and Rick Roberts.)

I fancied incorporating this technique with an Erte' type fashion drawing.  I have this super book of "Fashion Drawings and illustrations from Harper's Bazar by Erte'.

The book is mainly in black and white and is very inspiring.

The Erte' greyhound type dog is not to my taste, so I thought I would go for a plumper variety.

I triple stitched the outline and in-filled with hand and machine embroidery. Painted some bits. Echo quilted. Trimmed.

And finally finished it off  by embellishing with crystals that look like diamonds. Bling Bling Bling. Lovely....

Finished and I am pleased with the result. 

Janex

Your Gift: A Sewing Machine...

Have you heard of Send a Cow? Well, as sewing is such a big part of all our lives we have decided to raise fund to Send a Sewing Machine.

At each meeting we are holding a bring and buy sale between ourselves, over the course of just three meetings we are heading towards our target of £60 which is the cost of one machine. Of course we want to send more than one machine, so will continue with our bring and buy and we'll also have a donation box at our exhibition in September, we'll keep you posted on our progress.


As always it's interesting seeing everyone's interpretation of each challenge, they all differ but still sit so well together. It was rather spooky when this subject was pulled from the tin considering the recent weather conditions.
Here are some of the pieces...

'After the Rain'Challenge

Thanks for reading
Sue