Playing in May

I haven't posted much lately but this doesn't mean I haven't been busy, both out there in the real world and in the quiet of my workroom.

First, remember the flowerpot? I haven't touched it since I last posted about it here, but I've added a little more paint and I think one more painting session will bring it up to the point of stitching. At last! Here's how it looks now: Mostly I added highlights, and it just needs some shadows on the white flowers and a little more paint on the edge of the step.

My friend Tricia was working on a piece at Fibrecircle this week and it really confirmed for me that this needs hand stitching, not machine. The Jan- Irvine-Nealie style of stitching isn't what I have in mind but rather using seed stitch so suggest the roughness of the brickwork behind the flowers. The hard machine line will be too strong. Stay tuned!

I've also been making quite a lot of monoprints on fabric. I have always been interested in monotyping and monoprinting but I recently bought a book called "Monotype: mediums and methods for painterly printmaking" by Julia Ayres, which has made me quite excited about the process again. I mostly make this kind of print with fabric paint left over from whatever project I've been painting on, but I think perhaps the monotype may just be the main activity for a while! Here's some things I've begun lately: A simple monoprint pulled from a glass plate and then over-painted.
This is a straight monotype (not altered from the original print) made as a coffee mug insert.And here it is in the mug:
This one was the ghost of the first print, over-painted. The designs need to be quite bright to be visible and exciting under the thick plastic outer layer. In this one the plate was repainted, with the original image as a guide. It was inverted before printing, and then over-painted once it was dry. They are all very different, aren't they? That's the fun part about making monotypes and monoprints!

I've also begun painting another of my "paint rags". It's an odd shape - 21 1/2in x 8 1/2in. Originally it looked like this:
It immediately said "boats on the shore" to me so it was set aside. I envisage the larger ship as a hulk, dragged up on the shore and left to fall apart, with the smaller boat pulled into its lee. I was trying to capture the rust and rough texture of the old boat, but I still have some way to go.

I've been trying to organise my paint rags a little lately. I haven't been marking them in any way and sometimes it's hard to remember what each one looked like before it was painted or printed again, to keep my records straight. So I am giving each one a number (I'm up to 60 already, so St Peter better not call me too soon!)and that should allow me to track each one as it gets painted or embellished, until it finally ends up in a work of art (or in the bin!). I know, you can take the librarian out of the library....

Time for an update

Remember that paint rag I talked about here? And a couple of other times - look under Flowerpot. I've done some more painting on it a few times since it last appeared here, and it's fast approaching the time when I'm ready to add some stitch. You may know I'm a bit obsessive about process, and I record the growth of pretty much anything I make (bigger than an ATC!). So it occurred to me to go back and look at how things started. I got a huge surprise, and I think you might too. Here's the very first, from April 2007, and the most recent (last week) photos.


I'm pretty sure photo 1 might have already had some deliberate painting on it by the time I photographed it. I'd already roughed in the pot shape and added the splodgy background for the brick wall. I'm more rigorous now about photographing likely paint rags at the beginning, but this was the very first one that I ever decided to make into a specific work, instead of just being used when I needed a certain colour fabric. From my notes, the original had the coloured splodges, when I'd wiped my brushes, and a pale apricot background, when I'd used it to clean off a palette.
Where now? I think it needs a lot more greenery, so that will probably happen next time I have the paints out. And I need to add some more shadows to some of the flowers, and maybe add a touch of orange-pink to the yellow roses.
(Sorry to those people who liked the pot left undefined. I let it sit for a long time but I just didn't like it. Guess you'll have to paint your own now! See how easy it is?)

Flowerpot

While I was painting yesterday, I managed to put a little more detail on this paint rag. The Love-in-a-Mist flowers are suitably spiky now and I added shadows to some of the flowers and the pot. It's really starting to look like I imagined! I think I might need to give this piece a bit more sustained attention, instead of just adding a bit when I have the appropriate colours mixed.

Paint Rags - Flowerpot

Remember this from a couple of days ago? When I was painting yesterday, I had just the right colours on my mixing sticks to add some more flowers to this piece. One of the colours I had mixed was just right to add shape to the flowerpot. It's really starting to come together now, isn't it? Pretty exciting for something that started life as a paint rag!

Paint Rags - Flowerpot

I've had two very productive days, but sadly, none of it was making art! I'm very hopeful of getting into the workroom for some productive time tomorrow. It's Anzac Day, a public holiday here in Australia, when we honour those who have fallen in war. The returned soldiers will march in the city, and afterwards probably get drunk and play two-up. It's the only day in the year when this gambling game is permitted.

Since I have no progress to show on current works, I thought I'd share one of my paint rags. A couple of years ago, I realised that the rags I use to clean up after painting were often as interesting as the fabric I was painting. So I started using better quality fabric, first homespun and now quilter's muslin, for the cleanup and to use up leftover paint. I now have a collection of very interesting painted fabrics to use as a basis for stitch.



This one will probably be worked on first. The splodges of colour reminded me of flowers, so the last time I painted, I used up leftover paint to add shadows on what will be a pot, and to add a random brickwork pattern behind the shapes. I have no plans to work on this any time soon, though!