Scroll book update

In Don't Scroll Past I showed you how far I had got with the scroll book I'm making.   I had started to stitch in random places.

One of the problems with deciding vaguely what the finished piece will be, is that things don't always fit.  I knew I was going to put a piece of wood at the top for the fabric to wrap around, but wasn't sure what that wood might be.

Then I remembered that I still had some bobbins in a drawer.  However when I got one of them out it was just to small for the width of the fabric.  It wasn't possible to make the fabric narrower unless I undid quite a bit of stitching.

Thankfully I have a very amenable husband who was willing to sort it out for me.  In the photo below, the top bobbin is the original width.  The middle one shows where he cut 1 centimeter of the spindle out and glued the bobbin back together.  He inserted the centimetre piece into the middle of the bottom one which is now the right size for the fabric.

I usually print on the fabric before I start stitching but I thought I would experiment with using the thermofax screen over the stitching.  It was more difficult than usually because of the lumps and bumps but not impossible.  You can find the words of the poem on the thermofax screen here.

I have attached the fabric to the bobbin.  I could continue to stitch the piece if I feel like it.

Fabric bonded to itself around the bobbin

Bonded to the bobbin

Partly rolled up

Completely rolled up

Thanks for joining me today
Bernice

Exhibition Days Away

We went away for a couple of days because I wanted to go to two exhibitions.  We could probably have done both in one day but it was nicer to go at a slower pace.

Firstly, we went to the Willow Gallery in Oswestry to see their current exhibition Stitch by Stitch.  It was lovely to see work made by people I know including Jo Smith, Liske Johnson, Karen Herrick and Cas Holmes amongst others.

Jo Smith: Garden Friends - Red Fox

Liske Johnson: Squinting at the Sea

Sorry ladies about the quality of the photos - I was snatching them with my phone.  It's a popular exhibition and between the people and the lighting it was quite difficult to get good photos. (well That's my excuse!)

Then we went to the British Ironwork Centre. This was part sculpture park, shop, cafe and craft studios. It was also advertising the Knife Angel but we didn't ever find it which is odd because it's very tall.  I'm pleased we saw it when it was in Worcester.

From Oswestry we made our way to the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct where we had lunch and a short walk beside the canal.

A narrowboat crossing the aqueduct

The view from the aqueduct

The aqueduct

From there we drove through Llangollen and stopped at Horseshoe Falls.  I thought this was going to be a waterfall but turned out to be a cast iron weir. It enables water to be taken from the River Dee to feed the Llangollen Canal.

We continued our journing to Ruthin where I had booked us into a hotel.  The view from the bedroom window was fabulous.

I was going to write about both days but we did so much in each day that I will save day two for another post.

Thanks for joining me today
Bernice

Getting Ready

Next week I am going to Littleheath Barn Studio for the first two days of a four day Summer School.  The second two days are a week later.

The theme is Buildings.  I love buildings and architecture and few textile artists seem to use this topic so I was excited to sign up.

However!

Do I use the redbrick buildings I love along the canals in the West Midlands?  Or do I use the beautiful architecture found in Venice as inspiration? 

I decided I would get out all the things I have related to the two topics.

Canals

Books

 

Sketchbooks

Photobooks

My poem as a Thermofax screen

Lots of collage material

Venice

Books

Sketchbooks

Stamps and Stencils

Thermofax screens

Another book, map, photos and postcards

A box of collage fodder and other inspiration

Well, it was good to find out what I had.  BUT!  I'm no further on in my choice.

Come back next month to find out what i did.

Thanks for stopping by
Bernice

On to the next

You may remember my Completing the Tunnel book post where the book was almost finished apart from how to close it.

Well, I made a cord by using some tapestry wool and the zigzag stitch on my sewing machine.  I made a loop at one end and stitched it onto the closeure fabric.  The cord wraps round the book twice and then goes through the loop and is tied off.

But I've still more of silk noil fabric which I could make a book from.

I've these 6 pieces which are 21x15 cms each.  They already have pieces of Bondaweb ironed on.

So what sort of book should I make with these?  Should they be stitched?  Should I add photos?

What about a cover?  Should I fold it and make another folded book?

Questions! Questions!  Choices!  Choices!

Or shall I put the pieces to one side and do something else for a while?

Thanks for joining me today
Bernice

Collage

I've been spending time making collages.  This was inspired by a 10 day class called Collage Makers Summit organised by @drewsteinbrecher.  He had organised 9 other collage artists to join him with a different collage idea each day.  One of the ideas was to use your own photos, and one was to use black and white plus a pop of colour.  A third tutor gave us sketches of layouts we could use.

So I put all three ideas together.  I printed out black and white versions of my canal photos and chopped them up.  I made these six 10cm square collages.

Kellee Wynne introduced the idea of grid collages.  She is currently offering a free course Grid Journal Mini Course.

These are 7cm square collages using my gel prints.  You draw out the grid and work on all of the squares at once with a limited palette of papers.  It makes for a really cohesive collection.

Then I made these four 10cm square collages with the gel prints but adding in some of my photos.

I may go back and add some marks with pens or markers.  I don't think there's sufficient contrast so I may use black.

Thanks for joining me today
Bernice

A gel plate printing experiment

Gel plate printing is so very addictive.  I saw a fabulous reel on IG from @inkslinger_gypsy using things in much the same way as I have used plastic and metal bits on screens for breakdown printing.  You don't leave the bits on the gel plate - you use them to remove paint.

I used Payne's Grey and Copper and pressed nuts, washers, plastic canvas, embossed wallpaper and other things into the paint.  I had put far too much paint onto the plate that I was able to ink up a sceond plate and remove paint in the same way.  These plates were still too wet so I took prints.

First plate print

Second plate print

 I left the paint to dry on the plates and then added a layer of turquoise, peach pink and white.  Yet again there was too much paint so I took some of the paint off with the roller and rolled it onto paper.

This 'print' is where I cleaned the bits I'd removed paint with and then cleaned my roller over the top.

I had put paper onto the last layer of wet paint and left it to dry.  In fact came and edited my photos above and wrote this blogpost as far as here whilst waiting. And then had to use the heat gun.

These prints are okay and will be fine to tear up and use for collage.

However I shall probably have another try at some point.  I will use less paint and mix it on the paint tray better.  I'll use tweezers to pick up the washers as my fingers marked the paint.  I'll leave it to dry longer as you can see where the paper tore because the paint was still wet.  I will also take more time.  I was so concerned that the paint on the plate would dry before I'd peeled off the metal bits that I really rushed and there was obviously no need.

More experimenting to come.  Printing on fabric through the  inkjet printer.

And I'm going to try printing onto bondaweb both directly and through the printer.  Watch this space!

Thanks for joining me today
Bernice

Lots of playing with photos

I have been playing with online editing of a few of my canal photos.  I use a free online editor called Lunapic.  As well as Microsoft Publisher. This post has a lot of photos.  And I mean A LOT!

I used these photos

And now - drum roll please - the edited ones

I also made up several A4 sheets of assorted photos like this one

I have folded these A4 sheets into zines.  I love zines as you can tell

I also printed onto tracing paper and ohp acetate sheets.  Lots of collage fodder ready to work in my sketchbook.

Well done if you got this far.  Actually I only put 19 photos after all.  Fairly average number for me!!!

Thanks for joining me today
Bernice