New Directions in 2014

Hello "strangers"!  Where did the year go?  My new hip (named"Lexus") is healed up, I turned 65 (yikes) and have entered the world of Medicare and Medicare supplements.  In November we also celebrated our 45th anniversary with a trip to Kauai, Hawaii.  Back to Minnesota cold.

This year I've taken some new directions, with art quilting on the back burner.  Two years ago I took a weekend collage workshop from Laura Lein-Svencner and followed it this past May with a weeklong collage class at  Dillman's near Lac du Flambeau, WI (the wild north of the state).

It's a fascinating new direction for me.  The process begins with altering many types of paper such as National Geographic pages, dictionary pages, etc. with gesso, Citrasolv, NevrDull (yes that's how you spell it), stencils and acrylic paint.  These papers are coated on both sides with acrylic medium, dried, then layered and fused with a heat tool.  Paint is brushed on, wiped off, more layers are added and the composition grows.

Here are some samples of my pieces from 2014.  The first two pieces (birds) and last two are 8" x 8" and the others are 6" x 6".  All are mounted on wood panels about 1" deep.

Wishing you all well in the upcoming New Year.  Francie Ginocchio

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Irene MacWilliam - Nature

I was asked to be a member of "Crossing Oceans"  an invited group of international artists from around the world, each offering their own unique perspective on the chosen theme of NATURE. Textile artist Jane Rollason is the curator of this group. Members of this exhibiting group are: Jane Rollason (UK), Hilary Beattie (UK), Charlotte Yde (Denmark), Irene MacWilliam (Northern Ireland), Bergen Rose (US), Dijanne Cevaal (Australia), Lin Hsin-Chen (Taiwan), Ineke Berlyn (UK), Frieda Anderson (US), Christiane Kuhr (Germany), Elaine Quehl (Canada), Pat Archibald (Scotland) and Kay Haerland (Australia)
see
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Crossing-Oceans-Textile-Artists/1444364839182803

I was asked to produce 6 pieces for the above group. It was suggested we make pieces 24 x 12 inches either portrait or landscape. I made my pieces as 3 sets of 2 using black and white striped fabric.

Vine Leaves Red

Vine Leaves Green

Flowers in Vase 1

Flowers in Vase 2

Bird and Flowers 1

Bird and Flowers

Lines or circles

Lines or circles, that is the question. Originally my idea was to continue working with my theme of 2013 - lines - as I still have a couple ideas. But for one of my online groups Stitched I picked the theme circles. For this group we have to make 4 quilts per year. It is now early March and I have completed 7 and am working on number 8. Overachieving? Maybe <gr>. Or I could choose circles for this group as well? Or I could work with both lines as well as circles? At the moment I just don't know.
Any way here are pictures of the circle quilts I have created. There is one more which I cannot show you yet, as I will be helping Kelly on the Fire blog in August.

Duck!

Overlapping Circles

Within the Circle

Circles never End

Life is like an Onion

Throwing Pebbles into the Pond

Moving On!

I have to admit....coming up with a theme or concept that truly inspired me for the coming year seemed a bit elusive.  Not sure why. Perhaps because I just finished up two major projects and needed some "brewing" time.  But....a few days off made the difference it seems.

My pieces for 2014 are going to be from some of my favorite photos of old (and rather crumbly) barns.  I'm so excited to get started on this series.  I don't think it will be as close to realistic as some of my recent work. At least in  my head there is something I want to try out.  I'll keep you guys posted along the way!!

Here are just a couple of my photos that are begging to be translated!! I even have their titles already!!

Patchwork

Coming Unhinged

Windswept

The hard part now is to pick out the remaining three. There are so many that I truly like!! I'm thinking I will do the six for this group for this year but I don't think it will be the end of the series. At least if they turn out like I see them in my head!!!  And we all know how that sometimes goes!!

Now to come up with a name for the series.....hmmmmmmmmm.............

Today is the day.....

Just stopped by the studio to finish up putting things together to take this evening for my art show opening.  SOOOOOOOOO nervous....and excited.  Thanks to all of you who have gone on this journey with me toward my 2014 goal of a solo show.  I'm finding it quite nerve-wracking.  I've been in shows before but only with a few pieces and a whole lot of other artists.  This is the first time it's just me.  Good news AND scary news. The success or not...all on me...

OK...gotta think about something else now.  Like what the heck to wear!!!  Still haven't decided.  Perhaps coveralls with paint all over them????  Sheesh....no idea.  Can you tell I'm nervous????

I'm planning on taking the whole weekend OFF!!  No schedule....no plans....just winging it. Probably catching up on some much missed sleep?

I'll report to you all next week...photos and everything!

Final piece started

So...now I'm on the fifth and final piece for the show.  I wanted to follow the "life" of the pecan from sapling to final purpose.  And the final purpose of pecans is TO BE EATEN! -- preferably in a pecan pie or pecan waffles!

I'm working on the Pecan Pie first.  I printed a copy of my mom's pecan pie recipe (which she got from her mom) on an 8" X 10" piece of silk organza.  Now I'm working on the slice of pie.  Screen printing is done on one of the dyed fabrics I did for this series and I'm just filling in with a lighter brown color wash to give it some depth.  I took this photo so you could see the un"washed" pecans and the "washed" ones.  When I'm finished with this wedge, I'll be using this for one of the textile additions.  I have some hand dyed and spun wool from my niece (keeping it in the family ya know) which I have braided and will be using it for the fluted outer "crust"

I was struggling with this one earlier today. I took a break for an episode of Frasier and a cup of Earl Gray tea.
 B R E A T H E..........

Came back to the studio and things started falling into place a bit better.  It might change a bit before it is done but at least now I have the complete piece in my head.

The working title for this one is Final Purpose. Not totally what I want but I'm currently brain dead.....
Any suggestions are welcomed!

Gonna grab some dinner now. Not sure if I'll make it back out to the studio. I think it would be best to go to bed and get a new start tomorrow.

Winter Harvest completed!!

At last! It is completed and ready for the photographer on Tuesday!

I used some of the crushed pecan shells on the tree bark.  And I filed down some half shells to add to the ground cover and one falling from the tree!

Here it is!

WINTER  HARVEST

(keep in mind...these are my photographs. They will look much better after Shawn gets a hold of them!)

#4 Winter Harvest - plan to be completed tomorrow!

Well, I'm having a blast!!!  Was working on this piece today and had a brainstorm.  I have bark cloth (thanks Wil!!) and my tree has bark........so........I took bits of the bark cloth, adhered them to the "tree" and then painted them in.  So far I have done the trunk  (well....in this photo TWO of them are painted in.  I left the other two naked so you could see the difference)  In actuality they are all painted in now.  I'll be adding some to the larger limbs, then some crushed pecan shells (like in Emergence). The pecans on the ground - that is how we harvested them....shook the limb and they fell down among a good bit of twig debri and then we picked them up off the ground - I have screen printed in the black "shadow" of the pecans.  Then I will screen print over that with the brown.  I also have several half shells of my real pecans which I'm thinking about adhering among the screen print ones.  There will also be several tufts of grass sticking up.

So....here it is so far. The bit on the left of the tree is still a bit wet which is why it is also a bit shiny. The top and bottom bits have not been painted in yet.

WINTER  HARVEST

update

The separate artist pages are updated.

Piece 3 - Complete!!!

Just put on the finishing touches!! Whew! Looking forward to your feedback!

EMERGENCE

Here is a close-up of the main branch.  The branch over the textile part is made from bark cloth Wil gave me from Africa. I'm afraid I matched the color for the painted part of the branch so well you can't actually see it in the photo.  The other bit you might be able to distinguish in the photo is that I used crushed up shells from the actual pecans off the tree on my mom and dad's farm in Texas.  The current resident was kind enough to send me a bag of them!!  How cool is that????

The fourth canvas is underway and the fifth (and final for now) has been started!! 

One more poppy

One more poppy piece before the year ends.  I did an experiment with thickened dye spread on a plastic mat and pressed fabric over the surface.  The dye bubbles and moves so it's very upredictable (but fun).  I used some cardboard poppy shapes as a resist.  The left side is a piece of shibori with the same dyes; I used clothespins as my resist.  Poppies are free motion stitched and I heavily machine quilted the background  It's small, only 12" x 12".  Happy New Year Everyone!  Hope I can remember my password..... Wil, can you help???

All Together Now

I have just been looking at the pieces each artist has done so far and I have to say that I am liking the way the pieces look together!! Not one to have worked much in a series or anything before, I can see how this concept is beneficial. Great work everyone!!!

Weeds can give us drugs - Irene MacWilliam

12 x 24 inches 30 x 60 cms
I am using the same technique and fabrics as in my other pieces that I have already posted. I used steam a seam light for the various bits of the foxglove; as it is repositionable this made it fairly easy to get an arrangement that pleased me. Al the fabrics are painted, dyed, stamped etc. I am still not sure what I think of this series, some days I quite like them and other days I feel dissatisfied, I think because they are not in the usual strong colours I tend to work with. I am aiming to do 6 pieces to these dimensions although I will be switching to a new theme for 2014.

2014

I hope you all had a happy Christmas and are looking forward to a new creative year. But it is also time for some thinking :-). Do you want to work with a new theme in the coming year or expand on your present one? Just let me know and I will add it to the blog.

Third Pecan piece on its way

Yes.....before you gasp....I DO know what day it is and how soon Jan. 9th is.  But am I panicked???? Ummmm....yes.....just a bit!

Anyway, the third piece is currently called "Emergence".  This is just the background (a blue wet acrylic color wash.  Dabbed out the "cloud" effect with a paper towel when the paint was still quite wet.  Next I stitched in the textile piece.  Added bits of brown (a pounded fabric from years ago) since the branches would be prominent in this piece.  Then did the grass and began the infrastructure of the tree branch itself.  The "star" of this piece is a screen print of the pecans when the covering opens up and the pecan (as we are used to seeing them) is revealed.  That will be for tomorrow along with some leaves. OH and a stretched piece of bark cloth (like the trunk of The Sapling, will be the continuance of the branch on the textile part. It is sopping wet and stretched out to dry at the moment. And one more thing, I have shelled a bunch of pecans from the HUGE ancient tree in from of my parents former homeplace in Texas. They were sent to me by the wonderfully kind current resident. I will be pulverizing the shells to adhere to the larger parts of the limbs for texture.  I did a test piece and really like the results.

Emergence

I do have the other 2 designed and the materials assembled...just need to execute them.  

Somehow I had hoped this would be a more conversant group. But then, I haven't been particularly great at that myself on a regular basis I suppose. I'm hoping it is because we are all so wonderfully involved in making awesome art!  I just know that I for one would LOVE to have some feedback.....even if you don't like a piece.  It helps us to improve and learn.....    just sayin.......

Poppy Assemblage

Hello All,

I am puzzled about what to do next with this piece; it's a complicated one created with DSP (same batch of dye as Birch & Moons).  Using cardboard cutout poppies, I printed on two pieces of white silk which then were fused to the hand-dyed background piece.  Then --- an experiment!

I've been laser printing onto gampi (rice paper) for collage and decided to try adhering a small piece with matte acrylic medium on a sample of fabric.  It worked, so I printed the cluster of poppies (lower left), ripped off the excess paper, and adhered it with the matte medium over one printed silk section. Gampi becomes more transparent when it dries.  This has been pinned on my bulletin board for a couple months because I'm not sure where to go next with it and haven't been back in my studio since mid-Nov.  Might put it away for a while and when I re-discover it maybe the light bulb will go on.

Weeds - Children Make Daisy Chains

Another piece in my series on appreciating weeds. 12 x 24 inches or 15 x 30cms

I screen printed a child on an a mockup of the green earth and blue sky. It seemed OK but a tiny bit pale so I added a bit more grey and printed the children using my own handcut stencil on my actual piece. Horrors they looked far too dark. Left the piece for a few days and then decided to overprint the children with a paler shade of grey. I did this by carefully placing the stencil over each image and then placing the screen to add the additional fabric paint. They were apppaling like plasticy extrusions!! They looked worse each day, then a friend suggested covering the piece with organza. In my unusual fabric bag I found  a sheer organza with flowers and leaves so applied that to the children but it was such an improvement. Not sure if it was the answer but I added the daisy plant, looks more like the button daisies than the wild ones but I have had positive feedback about them so will leave it as it is.

The sky and ground were made with stencilling, dyeing, sun printing etc. The green daisy band and binding were sun printed. This will make my third piece posted – I only started half way but I am working on another piece and hope to have six in this collection so if it is Ok with members I will post them as I complete them.

Now to get my head around thinking of something for 2014. Posted on a gloriously warm day in December, unusual for here in Northern Ireland. 

Finally Completed

Just completed the finishing touches on the second piece in the Pecans Series - Summer Grove.  I am very pleased with how it turned out. Hope you like it.  Now on to the third piece!!  Time is getting rather short.  Glad I have them all pictured in my head!!  (note - the strip across the top is actually straight...just an anomaly with the actual photo.  Can hardly wait to get them professionally photographed!!)

Summer Grove

The Grove continued....

Yesterday I painted the grass field for the grove of pecan trees.  Today I painted in the first tree on the canvas.  There will be two more painted trees and a textile element as part of the sky that will hopefully be completed by the end of this week.

Here is a closeup of the first painted tree. I used the same thermofax tree branches that I used on the textile. It seems to work a bit differently on canvas.  

Eclipse

Central portion of a 12" x 20" DSP piece titled "Eclipse".  Background was created with two pieces from the same print batch and moon eclipse(es) are fused applique from leftover fabric.  Randomly machine quilted, not finished.  Am home on Day #9 recovery from right hip replacement and may not make the six for this year!