Usually I bite off more than I can chew. I know that about myself so, every time I start a new project, I know things will not go so smoothly as expected -as could be expected by others, mostly.
Since the beginning of May I have been busy in four different areas: I am translating a book (food for my wallet), I am following Karen Ruane's online courses on Contemporary Embroidery and An Embroiderer's Ledger, I have been working on my piece for the Group Exhibition themed 'Roots' and during the weekends I work in the Exhibition Hall. I am out of breath just talking about it all. But my piece for the Exhibition is at long last almost finished.
This is the main piece, part of which I showed you in previous entries. The upper part is new and so is the addition of the two bleached wooden sticks underneath.
And these are my roots. They will hang from the main piece with white twine and rest on this rustic wooden plank on the floor. The main piece itself will be supported by a backing made with the same wood. I have been very lucky - and I am very grateful - because a friend who makes wood and iron sculptures as a hobby prepared the planks for me. He cut them, sandpapered them, and put them together (the backing is made up by two planks). Thank you, Javier!
Here you can see the individual 'roots'. As I mentioned in my previous entry, I resorted to some of the things I learned in Karen's 'Embroider, Embellish, Create' class and my roots are nothing more and nothing less than Fabric Beads adapted to my purposes here. Some of you will recognize the white French Knots. The chaotic and undisciplined sprouts are made with raffia. I have two of these.
Another 'root' of sorts. I like the contrast between the finer, more elegant embroidery stitches and my almost random inventions. These Fabric Beads are quite large, the cotton fabric circle I used to make them measured 15 cms (6 inches) across.
This is the only small 'root', made with a 6 cms (2.4 inches aprox.) cotton circle. Partly improvising stitches again.
While making these fabric roots I repeatedly asked myself why my work leaned to the decorative side. There is no rational answer to that. It does because this is how it insisted on coming out. So I obeyed.
Tomorrow I will finish the whole setup and on Saturday I'll take it to the Exhibition Hall. There I will be able to finally photograph it in its entirety and in a lovely setting, so you can all see it too. There.
paintafeeling