Finished

... after really considering to throw it out!

This was the plan, remember? Collage and crayon on paper, thus forming the starting point for transforming it in textile. Picture is yellowish because of artificial light inside the house

detail of the finished panel. I have especially been struggling with the upper right corner. As you can see, the upper part is unlike the design, it felt too empty and bleak to me. So I started adding fabric to the left and upper part, but then the yellow was even more useless, pastel like, soft to my taste at least. Depth was wat I once again was looking for and in a courageous mood I took my brisles and acrylic paint and simply started: in the beginning it worked out fine, but as I gradually mixed some more colour in, something strange happened, that is I became too brazen and optimistic! I even applied a kind of rusty colour to the far right upper corner and that is when I realized that I had gone too far... So I put the work down a few days, I hung it on my design wall and it did not make me happy, at all. When I was talking with my daughter on the telephone about this, she suggested: why don't you just throw it away??? (my daughter does not make art!) I must confess that the idea sounded very attractive to me, so I took it down again, rolled it up and was about to throw it in the garbage, but I could not, I simply could not do this, after having worked on it for so many hours. Thus the idea came up to cover it up, to hide this ugly rusty paint and with renewed energy I rummaged through my fabrics until I found this silk piece. After auditioning several others, I choose this one and I think it works. Not that I am very enthousiastic about this work, but that maybe because of the strange, for me unusual way of making it. Whatever, it is finished! On the above picture you can see the corner I had troubles with, the satinstitched finishing and some complementary French knots I added.

and here it is in full; it measures 41 " x 17 "

Thanks for visiting!

Finishing...

... this one. Designed and started a few months ago, then set aside when I did not know how to proceed

because I wanted slightly more red/pink in this area, it provided an opportunity to practice French knots, I love to make these now... will need to buy a lot more embroidery yarn in the States next summer, before going back to a euro country...

the ocre fabric I have used in several art quilts by now, I love the text, the fabric has an overall grafiti look and is easy to use since it does not fray. Initially I had it sewn into three pieces of garment, but then decided that it was even better in artwork, so went recycling again!

The work is almost finished now, I just have to satin stitch the edges and voila: my latest work, just in time for Art in the Park, February 12. Next week will be used for preparing everything, making some new business cards and several other chores. As always: thanks for visiting!

Regina

'Don't worry, 'bout a thing...

I had to think of this famous Bob Marley song, when I finished my latest work. How true it is, at least for me, now...

Do you remember this work? you can read the story here:
http://mostlyturquoise.blogspot.com/2012/01/challenge.html

the finished work has some yummie details and in fact I knew how to continue when I found back this picture of an unknown photographer that I've had in my stash since ages. You may know that I have a 'fling' with all things Indian and one of the ways this comes to the surface, is my love of cooking Indian food. And if that's not possible, then at least eating these delicious dishes. So that's when I got triggered in this direction...

one of the borders was a black/neutral stripe. Since the integrated food picture was a golden curry like colour, and since I always like a bit of sparkle in my work, I covered the white parts of the striped fabric with tiny gold lame patches by fusing

some parts of the fabric got a tiny apply of blue-grey acrylic to add some depth

and this is the result! In the end this self imposed challenge turned out to my satisfaction, I am happy with how it is now.

This way of working, of changing ufo's into a finished work of art, is quite interesting! While you have to overcome quite some obstacles, the work changes and you really go with the flow of the work. I thing I stick to this method some longer...

Thanks for visiting my blog today and eh.... I love reading your comment!

Regina

Challenge? Struggle!

my experimenting this week did not bring much pleasure until now, I can tell. But because I showed the start, I found enough courage to show the work as it is now. Ugly! After I toned down the yellow I was trying to get a greenish-yellow for the centre part. Of course I could have looked for a piece of fabric in that colour in my stash, but it had to be possible to achieve this so wanted colour via acrylics. So, I mixed white, blue-grey and just one drop of Peynes Grey acrylic paint and covered the centre part with it: oh, the whole peace looked dead boring!! I let it dry overnight and tried to look at it with 'fresh' eyes: I then saw that I had to leave the idea of greenish-yellow behind and maybe should now focus on similar values as the border to the right... a mixture of several blues followed with the above results. In the meantime the work is getting stiffer, but I don't mind that at all, just had to cover the unpainted areas with matte gel medium once again to catch up with the amount of stiffnes. You can still see the underlying colours shining through, but hey: I'm not finished yet...

There is some red/orange part that now seems to stand very alone and does not make sense at all (anymore), so that likely has to go also. By now I am wondering why I did not simply take a canvas to start with, but at the same time I am determined to make this into something, at least, ok. To be continued...

Challenge

Yesterday I was ready to start a new work and the overall feeling I had was going towards something red, something warm. So I looked into my stash for warm colored fabrics and found back this ufo. Started it, as is clearly visible, in June almost five years ago... The piece reflects the mood I was in at that time: it was graduation time at the highschools, but it was also a time that on this island happened some stupid, useless accidents with quads that took the life of people the same age as the graduated students. Somehow reading all this hefty stuff must have influenced this piece of work. However, while looking for other fabrics I decided to finish this one first, meanwhile trying to incorporate my most recent way of working...

the border and centre fabric was dyed by me; though I still like it, it feels way too strong for what I have in mind now, the amount of yellow is overwhelming, so that is the first part of this challenge, to tone it down and make it more subtle.

first I cut the fabrics into a square format of about 16", after which I ironed it onto double sided fusible web and then stitched the grid. I covered the work with a diluted layer of matte acrylic gel and put a wash of titanium white acrylic paint after drying on the orange-yellow centre. This is how it looks right now. I have a color in mind that I want to accomplish, but do not dare to mention it here, because I am not sure it is possible.

New developments next time!

This and that

On Facebook I have a weekly storyboard that is called Tropical Thursday. Last December I decided to post the original pictures on my blog here, since the storyboard does not come out nice here. However, with these pictures on blogger I provide some background info that does not come on Facebook! The first picture above is of the entrance of Fort Amsterdam in Curacao, former Dutch West Indies. In this centuries-old fort the government of this island is being situated. This arcitectural style is very 'Curacao-ish', as is this yellow colour, e.g. you can see it in the old countryhouses all over the island.

There is a wonderful antropological museum in the centre of the capital Willemstad. It is called Kura Hulanda. A big part has been dedicated to slavery, as well as impressions, documents and items from African countries where many slaves originated from at that time. The picture above is from a wall that is situated at the museum's entrance square. The text speaks for itself, the top one is in Papiamentu, which is the language of the islands of Aruba, Bonaire and Curacao.
The Papiamentu language consists of Spanish, Portuguese, African languages, English and very little Dutch

Kura Hulanda was constructed by remodeling one of Willemstad's dilapidated neighborhoods into a luxury hotel. You can walk through the little streets and get a good impression how it was
back then. There are many Dutch influences, like these tiled roofs, whereas the shutters make them tropical of course.

and in closing this post:

this is how my latest work turned out. I intended to over paint the whole with a lighter colour, and started with the lower left and upper right corner. This provided a depth that I liked, so I decided to stop with the paint there and then. The picture fragment was a bit too much standing out alone, so I adhered a little piece of fabric with the ciphers and the final addition of the little gold squares. It is finished now and I must say I like it... on to the next one.

Enjoy your Thursday!

New work

I am making some new work, that is intended to be shown at Art in the Park next month. As it will be my last time of participating, I have set myself an ambitious goal... The work shown here is a combination of collage and quilt tecniques. In fact you could better choose ugly fabrics for these are easier to paint over, as is part of the process!

this morning I added the paper fragment and stencilled the white letters. It is drying now, next time it will look totally different I expect. Will keep you informed, more to follow...

Hope you have as much fun creating today!