This is just a very simple post as I frantically prepare for our Snape Textile Group’s exhibition of work, showcasing our work from a year’s worth of interesting monthly workshops. These are given mostly by external tutors, but we usually have two ‘in house’ lead activities and an annual challenge. I must admit I haven’t completed the latter….I simply can’t get my head around altered books, no matter how I try!
I have enjoyed many of the workshops with the keen intention of finishing them at home, but life has a habit of dictating otherwise and then suddenly I am up to my elbows in the next workshop. So, anyone remembering the subject of two previous posts relating to Decovil, one of this year’s workshops….NO, I haven’t finished it and….YES, I can hear you nattering at me from here! One day I will surprise you all 😁
Our hardworking group leader always plans our workshops 12+ months ahead and once booked, sends out our group programme complete with the websites for all our tutors. Over the last few years, I have taken this opportunity to see what our tutors are creating, what their tastes are and what we might be doing. The result of my homework and exploring ‘G’ online (thank you to all the authors of the info/pix I have used for inspiration) is that I usually go to the workshop armed with lots of inspiration photos….it helps me consolidate my thoughts.
Herewith the projects (in no particular order) I have finally managed to complete and will enter into our 2025 exhibition –
Paper Collage with Sharron Bates
From her work online I knew it was to be a ‘whimsical’ theme on houses, many of which were seaside based. Exploring, I found many other whimsical houses to whet my appetite.
That set me off thinking about my past and very happy times living by the sea (I now live smack bang in the middle between coasts!), resulting in a collection of photo views of my most memorable locations.
The bottom set are of Langstone Harbour (South England). The Royal Oak pub (extreme bottom right) was a favourite late teenage venue, sitting on the footpath dangling our legs over the edge with the tide coming in, particularly when cars parked on the sand were being slowly swallowed by the rising water. The publican would always be shouting for the owner/s to retrieve their car/s. It was extremely entertaining watching the shenanigans as ‘unfamiliar’ motorists tried to rescue their cars particularly those who didn’t want to get their shoes or trousers wet!!! It was hysterical at times and great entertainment. Sadly (er-hmm) they have now got barriers to stop folk parking on the sand – spoilsports! But I digress….
Top is a view across the water to Bosham, further east along the south coast (Bosham is pronounced Boz-am – we always took great delight in listening if folk were local as not far away there is a Cosham pronounced Cosh-um!). Please forgive another digression again related to water…. On the seaward side there is a lower tarmac road which you can access from either end of the village. However, when the tide is in, the road is totally covered. You are probably ahead of me here….we have seen many folk removing socks and shoes and rolling up their trousers to avoid the inevitable knee-deep soaking – sometimes folk just won’t listen to the locals 🤣
Back to the workshop….
Our tutor provided us with ample supplies and examples of how to achieve her houses which we would work onto a page/s of an old book.
There was an amazing collection of houses at the end of the day.
As always, I did follow all the instructions but with my twist on Bosham as my subject! I was lucky as my chosen book had fold out pages allowing me to create the wider landscape format. It does however remain the only picture in what should be another altered book!
Cyanotype explorations with Kim Tillyer
I have not experimented with cyanotype before, in fact very few of our group had, so for me this was to be quite an exciting day of exploration. Our tutor had certainly gone above and beyond in terms of preparation, having pre-painted about six A5 sheets of artist water colour paper of various thicknesses, plus some fabric for everyone, before we then painted our own remaining sheets of paper and fabric.
I was so wrapped up in the process I didn’t take any photos at all.
For those who are new to cyanotype – it is a light sensitive solution made by combining two chemicals (ferric ammonium citrate and potassium ferricyanide) with water. From the moment it is mixed, and the yellow liquid is applied to the surface it is reacting, so it needs to be placed in total darkness to dry. Then the fun begins….
Objects – vegetation, hard objects (keys, stencils, plastic etc) – are placed on the dry painted surface and to assist holding the objects in position, a glass or Perspex sheet is placed over the top. More can be added on top of this sheet, but it won’t be quite so clearly defined. The whole package is taken into the sun and the magic happens….the yellow surface becomes blue with white impressions of the objects. Once this has happened the painted sheet must be washed thoroughly.
It is a quick reaction, only 2-4 mins, and a very addictive process!
I later stitched into two of my watercolour paper pieces with white and copper threads and was honoured that one of them was used for the exhibition promotion poster.
I didn’t really know what to do with my lovely blue pieces but then had an idea – to use most of them (90%) in a collage, which then ended up as a machine stitched patchwork combined with other plain and eco-printed fabric pieces. When I say I used most….I included all the watercolour paper and even the under-paper (used to protect the table) which instead of throwing away I had washed! Everything was carefully machine stitched into and ironed!
The actual patchwork is A2 (420x594mm/16.5×23.4in) in size, so the framed piece is quite large!
Fabric boxes with Suzette Smart
We have had the pleasure of Suzette’s tutorage before, this time it was to be boxes. She has a lovely collage style of work often with birds, which, whilst I’m impressed by and admire, isn’t exactly my cup of tea so to speak.
However, I followed all the making instructions (almost) but did the collage as something I would happily have at home.
We were given two pieces of iron-on pelmet Vilene, kindly pre-marked, one slightly smaller than the other. The idea being that two half boxes would be created allowing one to be the base sliding into the other. We created collages of our fabric (brought from home) which we ironed onto the Vilene and then machine stitched over.
Having examined the tutor’s example completed boxes, I noticed that cutting the shape to her design, meant that the stitching would also be cut and the corners would have raw fraying edges….remember, I’m a neat-nic so, ‘fraying’ struggles to get a place in my vocabulary! Uh hmmm….my brain told me if I cut it differently, I would not cut my precious stitching, and the corners would be folded. I did say ‘almost’! I spoke with the tutor and having drawn and then cut my idea out of rough paper she gave her approval and even took a photo! I have placed both templates in my records file for future reference.
At home I completed both half boxes as fully decorated ‘tops’ having decided to make card/paper bottoms for each, using my fiddly template.
Sea and stones with Rachel Singleton
I have followed Rachel for several years and was looking forward to meeting her in person. She came armed with so many examples, which I loved seeing in the flesh. I was not disappointed.
We had to bring fabric and potatoes….yes, we were going back to our childhood doing potato printing using just a limited palette of acrylic paints….woohoo! It was fun swapping cut potatoes too, which enabled many stacked stone images to be created that day.
I made mostly single prints rather than immediately printing stacked stones, as I had an idea in my head to create a stack out of more 3D stones. I even printed on some very textured fabric as an experiment….both the tutor and I were pleased that it worked. The texture gave me a good starting point for stitching into the stone which I then padded. Thus far I have two 3D stones….I need to make more….so this project remains a WIP.
From sketch to wall with Tansy Hargan
Tansy is another artist I have followed for many years and looked forward to her workshop. She had brought numerous examples of her vibrant collages.
It was a very different workshop in that we had to sketch from real life outside using a ‘viewfinder’ (for want of a description) and a combination of only 3 pens of different colours, types and thicknesses, onto pre-drawn small rectangles on our sheet of paper. We then had to translate our sketches into mini collages, with small scraps of paper.
Setting our mini paper collages aside, we randomly painted larger scraps of fabric with acrylic paint. Finally, using our, now dry, painted fabric and other fabric scraps, we had to produce a larger collage based on our original sketches/mini paper collages, into which we machine and hand stitched.
By the end, although not complete, I had laid out two collages, the smaller (15x15cm) came from one of my original sketches! The larger (23x23cm) was based on the lavender and its shadows. In hindsight, studying the now framed lavender collage against Tansy’s work, I think I could certainly have added even more vibrant coloured stitching….workshops are a learning curve!
Finally – Autumn trees with Fiona Robertson
As I have already written more than intended, I will leave you with my final submitted piece (with a hastily cut paper mount), which is still a WIP, and hope that you will follow its progress in another post!
I’m skidding in on the seat of my pants with this post and almost as a post script….I have just returned from seeing our group’s exhibition which is always very popular and well attended by visitors. We have so many talented members….I will always be in awe and learning all the way.
For those familiar with my posts, you’ll know I often think at a tangent, but I was beaten hands down with this one. One of our members completed the altered book challenge by altering hers into a ‘FULL-size’ Kimono. It is stunning. She has backed the pages with iron-on Vilene and even stitched a long plant design onto it. The handbag is made from the original book’s hardcover.
Now why didn’t I think that an altered book could also be altered into 3 dimensions? As I said above, I’m always learning 😁
I hope you’ve learnt something new lately!
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Along the way we were participants in all the side excursions. Many involved local industry such as lacquer work, silk production, silk weaving and water hyacinth weaving etc, (water hyacinth is very abundant along the river!). It can be argued that these venues are purely for the tourists, and I agree to an extent….All I can say is that without these excursions I might not have been able to, easily, access the sites. What I did see was that we were a small part of helping these crafts to survive, providing much needed employment (often for disabled persons) within the communities, whilst also allowing the skills to be passed on….but this is not a discussion for this post!
