soo

This is part of my work for university and it's kinda hard to explain without the whole lot of stuff online. Tis all in the sketchbook and my blogging is most behind. These are texture samples that are going to be impressed into clay so I figured I might as well post them before they get covered in dusty crap just so I know what they looked like.

...and then I took up knitting

This is my first woefully-equipped attempt at knitting using a piece of driftwood I found on a beach in Llandudno, my fingers (because I had no knitting needles) and recycled silk I bought when I went to Macclesfield.

It still smells a little smoky because I made it round my grandmother's house while helping her out a couple of days this week and I'm not sure what it's supposed to be yet, but I like it all the same. It's nice to try things out your own way without receiving any kind of instruction sometimes.

Some kind of progress

Slowly starting to build up layers on this piece. We got my particular spin on illuminated manuscript, with all the letter forms taken from this old doodle from last year. Originally spelling "In the beginning" the famous phrase that begins a certain controversial old book, this is part of my attempt to recreate a science-based story about the beginning of the universe using religious visual language.

Not sure if it needs more doing to it yet but I'm liking where it's heading. Softened some of the rigid felt-tip lines with water to create a more organic look, to compliment the glass forms. Torn up graph paper, netting and stitching are used similarly to move away from the rigid outline of the squared paper. A lot of religious-based art borrows heavily from nature, so it wouldn't make sense to create an excessively man-made industrial-feeling piece.

Staffordshire Open Art Exhibition 2013

Memories by Mandy Billington, clay and mixed media

Not Another Soul- Coniston by Tracy Barlow, etching

Sketch Snapshots of Stafford by Keri Jayne, pen and ink

Seed Heads in Autumn by Rebecca Doyle, mixed media

Joyous days I have a goddamn phone! hooray! Above are photos taken (by my handy new 2 mega pixel phone camera) from the 2013 Staffordshire Open Art Exhibition at Shire Hall Gallery in Stafford. Exhibition is open til 14th July 2013.

Currently the only way I can get photos off said phone is by posting them on Facebook, so I had to spam folks with fuzzy mobile pictures, which I feel slightly guilty of. Speaking of which, I made a handy little failbook page for this happy little blog which whoever's interested or too polite to refuse my invitation is welcome to like. Who knows, maybe I can trick somebody into reading this shit on a regular basis.

These are photos of Lorraine's initial mackettes

Tilleke Schwarz

WYSIWYG (What you see is what you get), 2006, 75 x 67 cm by Tilleke Schwarz

I also decorated a tiny little box with stitches and excessive amount of eyes because I was feeling paranoid on that day

Lampshaade

Here be a lampshade I started decorating with ribbons and buttons and stitching and wotnot. I bought it for my new flat but my gross old one which is covered in bizarre orange stains (don't want to know how they got there) just will not budge and I've lost my pair of grips so it's stuck on the ceiling and my lampshade is stuck on the table, subject to whatever experimentations take my fancy.

A point of singularity

Hand-Stitched lettering done in my own fair handwriting, it may be illegible but I'm still fond of it

my attempt at a cheesy valentines day card (boyfriend loves that kind of thing)

some pictures of work I did at a workshop hosted by Emily Notman

Mad-busy January simultaneously studying for and NVQ2 in business and administration (excitement, I know) doing work experience at the New Vic Theatre, job-shopping and looking for a flat in Wolverhampton at the same time. I managed to carve out some time this weekend in between packing (moving next weekend yo) to attend a textiles workshop with Emily Notman which was the highlight of my month. Oh my days! It was awesome! I've missed being in a workshop so much! At the same time I was totally out of my artistic comfort zone playing around with fabric, sewing machines and wotnot, which is always great.

Unfortunately most of my photographs look like gobshite on toast so I guess you'll have to watch this space until I can take less crappy ones. Wouldn't hold your breath.

I think this layout will be the one I finally work with. I did the drawing in my book and photocopied it so I can experiment with colours and techniques.

This image is one of the copies is where I was playing around with paints and sewing, but the page isn't completed yet. I need to think more about what kind of colours I'm using so I need to look back at my research and begin a fuckload of material experiments.

Something that started as a random cool idea I had seems to be turning into quite an epic quest of an art project. Nobody said pushing your boundaries is easy, but they did say it was worthwhile, and I hope they're fucking right.

Giggabitchin Traindriver Hat

This is a hat I got from Swanage that I've been customising by hand-stitching around the brim and sewing buttons and feathers to. I think it looks rather rad.

Finished Bird Canvas

That's it folks, first ever canvas completed, and I'm pretty happy with the results. It's simple, bright, experimental use of materials, combined with a more traditional-looking drawing styles, designed to cheer up my grandmother's (sorta dingy-looking) bungalow.

fake feathers, buttons and ribbons stitched onto canvas (18" by 14") with acrylics, oil pastels, fineliner and pencil

other stuff I raided from the library

I want to make a mixed-media textile comic and these are my starting points so far: textures I like, gothic revival Architecture, stained glass windows and illuminations and quilting. I also have a couple of weird looking comics that I took out since it also occurred to me that I'm not massively knowledgeable on those either. I guess it doesn't look like much but these are my starting points so far.

From The Art of Annemieke Mein

just a couple of sketchbook studies from The Art of Annemieke Mein: Wildlife Artist in Textiles

Had a trip down to library to look for some clues as to where my next project might be headed.