A felt Picture
While making little bags I also made a small picture. i suppose it would count for the first quarter challenge. happy-new-year-prepare-to-be-challenged/ i hope to do somthing a little more challenging before the quarter is over. I like little pasture scenes. I started with a piece of black prefelt and then laid the blue sky and pasture. I thought I took more pictures but it seems I didn’t.
This what the back looks like. I wrapped the coloured fibers around the prefelt . I use black prefelt because it will intensify the colours. If I used white it would take the colours towards pastel.
This is the front side felted. I made the contours of the meadow by using a multicoloured roving I had. I think it lets you give the meadow some texture and shape without painstakingly adding tiny bits of colour. I added some clouds to the sky and some flowers to the meadow with some soft silk and little white blobs of sheep as place markers for the next part.
I added the sheep using some embroidery floss and french knots.
Then added the heads and ears. I used a grey for the sheep that are farther away. I think it worked.
At this point it could have been done but I needed something else. Your eye goes to the middle and it is empty. I discussed it over on the Felting and Fiber Studio Forum and I decided some trees were needed. I only know how to do one kind of tree that looks half decent so ever greens were next. I did them in a medium green and then when back with fewer strands and added some darker stitches to give them more depth.
Here it is finished. I had to trim the top off so it would fit in the frame. I always seem to make to much sky anyway so that worked out well enough.
I looks quite nice in the frame. The frame seems to pop it out. I didn’t realise how many scratches it had until I took a picture. I will have to paint it. It is not a great picture, ther was so much reflection. this was the best compromise between the light reflecting or having a clear shot of me in the glass.
I need to learn to embroider more then far away evergreens and sheep. A little cabin or a nice oak tree would have been a nice addition to the picture. I am thinking of buying Moy MacKays book. Do you have a favourite art felt or how to hand stitch pictures or art books?
13 thoughts on “A felt Picture”
Lovely picture Ann and your French knot sheep are glorious! You can’t go wrong a Moy Mackay book, very useful tips and lots of inspiring photos of her work too.
Thank you, I really enjoy making sheep.
What are the thoughts about framing felt pictures. Glass or no glass? My preference is no glass. I also like to attach my piece to a going piece of wood and hang free. BTW love these little 🐑!
Thanks Jackie. I like all those ways a of framing and use them all. I like glass as it protects the piece form dust and moths. I am not sure if I will leave it in the frame. I think it may be a bit small.
I really like your painting. I love landscapes too and your sheep are so cute! I am also a big Moy MacKay fan and find a lot of inspiration in her work. After wet felting, I usually have to needle felt a correction or two to the picture if I need to keep a certain pattern or design feature. Then, I generally follow the technique of free-motion machine stitching, then fill in more details and subtleties with embroidery–nothing too fancy, but usually a lot of different colored embroidery flosses get introduced. Framing is always the challenge for me, mostly because I prefer to frame with a mat and non-glare glass. It can get really expensive, even if I assemble the frame myself, so I only use the non-glare glass for really special work. To show off the natural edges of your felt painting, the most inexpensive yet effective framing I’ve done involves a piece of foam board. I buy a big sheet of foam board from an art supply store (usually black) and cut it to a size slightly smaller than the natural shape of the felt painting. I have both stitched the picture to the foam and lightly glued it. Sometimes I use sticky-back velcro to fasten it to the foam board. If you aren’t familiar with sticky-back velcro… you peel off the protecting tape on one side of the velcro, and, with both velcro pieces stuck together, stick the piece to the back of your work. Then, unpeel the other protective tape from the velcro, position your work over the foam board and press the sticky side to the foam board. If you need to remove the picture with this method, you can just pull apart the velcro to remove it from the foam board backing. I cut and attach as many pieces of velcro “pairs” as necessary to keep the piece from sagging anywhere. This is a really light-weight method to hang a felt painting and can easily be used with the 3M removable picture hanging strips (with confidence that the picture won’t fall off the wall and shatter!). 😀
Great explanation of the process you followed to make this lovely picture with the amazing sheep.
Thanks Pam. I wish I had taken more pictures.
It’s a lovely picture Ann – the french knot sheep are fab!
Glass does protect the felt from dust and you can buy non-reflective glass – you don’t know it’s there.
Thanks Lyn, I picked up 4 f these frames cheap at the second hand store. I could wish they were half as deep as its a bit dark. I may have to try building it up with some cardboard. that nice invisible non glare glass is nice but expensive.
The trees finished the job off well Ann. I thought you were going to needle felt them, nice technique.
Thanks Tracey, I am glad I surprised you.
Lovely sheep picture Ann. I usually skip the glass even though it does protect the work.
The trees really pull it together Ann. Love the sheep. A Moy book is always a good investment.