Elephants of Rajasthan

Over Easter, I visited a fantastic exhibition of Howard Hodgkin’s Indian Miniatures at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford. This fabulous show included many works by the court painters of Rajasthan, including some lovely paintings of elephants. I actually visited Rajasthan while I was in India this year, and saw images of elephants everywhere. Though the photos I took of elephants aren’t all great works of art, they’re still good fun.

“Elephants Fighting” detail. Collection Howard Hodgkin

“Elephants Fighting” detail. Collection Howard Hodgkin

Textile Artwork: On the Silk Road (Part One)

In 2010, my daughter Isla spent six months studying at Peking University and in August my husband went out to visit her. They spent two weeks travelling together along the ancient Silk Road in the far west of China and took some wonderful photographs.

Xinjiang Province is exotic even in China, and the photographs reveal the alien landscape that has fascinated Chinese storytellers for centuries. It is a region that holds many surprises: immense wind-farms stretch across the Gobi desert for miles upon miles; Turpan, the grape-growing capital of China, is a strangely green oasis nestled among terracotta mountains; and the ancient remains of the Great Wall are nothing like the restored sections far to the east, but rather resemble bleached mud-brick hillocks.

These bold forms, carved against a rugged and parched landscape, became the inspiration behind two embroidered pictures – I’ll be writing another post soon to tell you more about the different processes I used to make them. For now, here are some of the images that captured my imagination.

“In The Shadow Of The Great Wall”

“Gobi”

“Gobi” Textile Wall Art

“In The Shadow Of The Great Wall” – Textile Wall Art

Great Wall Remnant Gansu Province

Ruined Watchtower on the Great Wall Jiayuguan

Great Wall at Jiayuguan

Crescent Moon Temple Dunhuang

Megadune near Dunhuang

Grape-Drying House Turpan

Ruined City of Jiaohe

Grapevines Turpan

Flaming Mountains Turpan

Windfarm near Urumqi

Cake!

I’m not a big fan of icing, so last Christmas I decided to decorate my Christmas cakes with marzipan and dried fruit. It ended up being lots of fun and one of my friends liked them so much, she asked me to make one for her dad’s birthday.

Studio Blinds

After we had converted my studio, I started to personalise it. One of my first projects was to make a set of window blinds out of scraps of fabric that I had been given.
I experimented with different detailing techniques as I went along, mostly working freehand and unplanned. Here are some photos of the finished blinds (you can see them folded up in my Home Sweet Home post):

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Macau: A bird’s eye view

These photos were taken at around 1000 feet up, through the (green) glass floor of the observation deck of Macau’s TV Tower. The surrounding city is full of clean curves and geometric shapes that you never get to see at ground level, and I love that there are patterns that repeat – the zig-zagging paving below, the zig-zagging footbridge in the third shot, and the circular eye-shapes everywhere.

Brooch Experiments

This brooch is one of my favourites. The photos below show my experiments with different ways of folding and shaping the fabric – sometimes the same cut-out shape can be moulded into completely different forms. After finding a shape that I like, I embroider the surface, finish the edges and stitch the final form together. Then I add the beads and the brooch pin.

Under The Sea

Here are some shots of another brooch that I recently finished. I drew inspiration from sea creatures, combining orange velvet with a bright blue frill and iridescent beads.
Hope you like it!

Silk Paintings

Silk painting is another technique that I love to experiment with, and a few years ago I created these hanging panels. I collected leaves to use as templates for resist techniques, used salt to add texture to the water of the pool and the river, and the rest was painted freehand.

Hope you like them!

A Clockwork Orange

A little while ago I was given a collection of clockwork pieces and was immediately inspired to incorporate them into my jewellery. When I am crafting I am often struck by how my work evokes old memories, and, to me, the clockwork has come to symbolise the interplay between past and present.

Here are some photos of my latest creations:

Textile Sculpture Commission: 4D Sphere

Last year, I was commissioned by Samvado, a Cornish sculptor and a fellow member of the Cornish Crafts Association, to make a textile sculpture.

He asked me to create one of his sculptures, the 4D Sphere, using my fabric.
Here are a few photos of the work in progress, and some images of the finished piece.

You can visit Samvado’s website at: http://www.samvado.com/

One Final Shot

Another View

The Finished Form

Another Angle

The Plywood Armature

Making the Shape

Fabric Making: Some Samples

My jewellery making starts with creating the basic fabric in a mix of colours and textures, this is then cut into shapes ready for stitching, shaping, and further embellishment.

My husband and I often work together to prepare the sheets of fabric, and here are a few that we’ve just finished:

Hong Kong: City Lights

The slow shutter speed on my old camera had a few benefits, including the way it turned Hong Kong’s glaring city lights into electric abstract images. Here’re a few of my favourites.

India: fashion and fabric

I had an incredible trip to India earlier this year, and saw some spectacular sights.

The bright lighting of the first three photos works in combination with the bleached stone surroundings, forming the perfect backdrop for the vibrant fabrics worn by the women.

Indigo-washed walls frame the final two pictures, contrasting with the red and yellow tones of the clothing.

Textile Art: Dragon

A little while back I took part in the Cornwall Crafts summer show at Trelowarren. I wanted to create a much bigger textile relief than any I had previously designed, and the result was Dragon. A bigger piece meant a lot of different challenges; there were difficulties that were never an issue for smaller pieces, particularly how to keep such a large surface interesting whilst maintaining a sense of unity of form.

Designing the Template
I began by cutting smaller scale paper templates in order to explore different shapes. The relief was cut from one piece, then shaped and stitched into a three-dimensional form. I cut out a template from fabric of roughly the same stiffness and flexibility to my own fabric to confirm that the design would work.

Making the Fabric
I used the same techniques as on the smaller pieces, but much more attention was needed to make sure that the entire surface flowed together. Different parts of the dragon were shaded in bronzes and golds, and white was used as a highlight. Alex cut brass tubing into lengths, which were added to provide contrast and structure.

Framing the Dragon
I wanted the background to be an integrated part of the design, and so rather than use a plain colour fabric, I used Japanese shibori techniques with indigo dye on silk. The silk panels were mounted over canvas onto wooden frames, and then finally the dragon was hand-stitched onto the silk.

New Jewellery

Photos now up on Flickr!