Tree Fragments

Tree Fragments

I posted about felting in silk paper with real leaves here. Now the question was, what to do with it? I decided to create another fiber collage similar to this one.  I still had more of the green background material and another piece of silk paper so I decided to combine those elements.

Here’s the silk paper. It was made with natural silk color and you can see the silk still had some vegetable matter in it. No worries, I had plans to make it more spotty!

I found the green background fabric and here is the felt on top of the fabric. I like that there is some of the orange color in the green background to tie it together. I then decided to cut the grey edge away from the felt and just have the silk showing on top.

I sketched a tree on to tracing paper and made sure that it was the right size for the piece. I wanted the tree to overlap the leaf piece. Sorry about the quality of the photos but tracing paper doesn’t like to have its picture taken.

I then painted the silk paper with acrylic paint and let it dry.

Then I hand stitched the felt down to the background fabric. You can see how it looks here with the edge of the felt cut away.

Then I cut out the tree and glued the branches on that needed to be glued down. So the tree is in one piece but hasn’t been attached yet. I am trying to decide how to attach the tree. I am leaning toward gluing it on at the moment. I think stitching it will be difficult but I could hand stitch it down. What do you think? How would you attach the tree? I could fuse it down with fusible too but if I was going to do that I should have already added the fusible before cutting the tree out. Hmmmmm….

 

18 thoughts on “Tree Fragments

  1. Lovely, I like the ideas Ruth.
    Do you want a bare tree? If not you could try ‘fly stitches’ which would create the illusion of some foliage. The fly stitches could match the background colours so as to blend in, then maybe just a few of a brighter colour. Ditto with individual chain stitches – these might replicate the birch/aspen leaves.
    BTW have you tried flipping the tree (maybe your paint won’t show if you do) to bring the focal point to a more third/central position (you know me!).

    1. Thanks Antje! The leaf idea with stitching is great. But I think it will be bare. The tree was actually supposed to be the other way around but I messed up the transfer of the design. The focal point will be in a better position when I staple the fabric to the canvas I bought.

  2. Hi Ruth. I would opt for hand stitching as that would add even more texture and it could tie in all your colours. Just a thought.

    Carol

  3. It’s looking lovely Ruth! The colours work together beautifully. I think stitching into silk paper would be tricky in this instance, so I would try fabric glue.

  4. Love the interpretive nature of your collage. Perhaps allow the tree to float with just a view “slings” of silk thread supporting it at forks of trunk and branches.

  5. The bare tree looks really good against the felt. It looks like a birch, with the horizontal marks on the silk. Could you use a few horizontal stitches so that it continues the birch theme? Or wouldn’t they be enough to hold it in position?

  6. A nice piece Ruth. fusing probably would have been best but like you I would have thought of that after I cut it out. Glue seems the best solution. Will you add anything else to the picture?

  7. I just saw thet you decided to go with fabric glue! I was thinking of hand stitches to follow the markings of the tree, little lines and knots. What is the tree made of?

    1. Yes, I went with glue since the tree is made of silk paper and is fragile. I was afraid the stitches would split it.

  8. The silk paper was perfect for a birch. Our river birch died this year and we had to have it cut down. So, seeing your tree makes me happy. Like Lyn, I think glue is your best option since the silk is so fragile. It’s a shame you hadn’t thought of fusible earlier, but glue will do the trick. Looking forward to seeing it finished.

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