AliaK's blog

making some geometric fabric folds on cotton since my copy of "Shadowfolds" book by Jeffrey Rutzky and Chris K Palmer arrived. this one is called "Fujimoto's twists" — it's a mixture of stitched squares, triangles and lines, and is a bit like smocking. I need to iron the front side flatter, but happy with how it turned out. I'd drawn the pattern shapes freehand instead of tracing the pattern as the book suggested, so the shapes are slightly uneven compared to the examples in the book, but I'm OK with that. makes it a bit more organic.

they don't take too long to make either — I made this sample over a couple of hours whilst watching tv.

front side:

back side: (actually I like this also as a front side — might do another)

Shadowfolds book:

I sat down again to my stitch noodling frame today to relax and play and tried some thinner cotton. this time double stranded sewing thread. tried some button hole stitch — still my favourite ever since discovering Junko Oki's work — especially her circles, last year. the first row is a row of straight edged button hole stitch. for the second row, I noticed the thread was settling into the fabric in a more organic way, not wanting to stick to the straight line. so I let it go, and it made this really nice organic, jagged line which I really like. it's a bit closer to an open (loose) cretan stitch, but also looks more like a heartbeat, or simple audio waveform. sometimes it's worth letting go of your plans to find the better line.

I've started the "sketchbook now" class to practice more drawing techniques for my sketchbook, and in lesson one we need to do some tests of our materials. I've used some from previous class exercises, which I hadn't added to the blog, so adding them here as part of this class' notes. the watercolour washes tests were exercises from Fred Lisaius' class "Fall Watercolours". I'll add more tests here as I work on them

these are the watercolours I'm using most often — a mixture of Schmincke and Winsor & Newton pans:

testing different lines & pen textures:

watercolour bead washes:

watercolour wet in wet wash:

watercolour double wet / flood wash with salt added for texture. I used table salt and since the paper was thick, it didn't work too well

more watercolour washes, on thicker, handmade paper

watercolour pencils (texta zoom brand) and pens to see what they looked like with added water:

I'm trying techniques for the fabric manipulation part of assignment 3 and came across this note called gorgeous fabric manipulation (velvet) so I tried it. I only used very small fabric samples to make initial tests, and I should have used a heavier weight fusing/interfacing as the velvet is heavier fabric than the light fusing I tried. apparently this works well for silk too

Use a cooling rack that has both horizontal and vertical grids. place velvet upside down and with a pencil push little bunches of fabric through. Take a fusible interfacing and then place on top of tufted velvet (wrong side) and iron. The grid should have little feet on sides so that the velvet is not crushed.

at first I couldn't understand what she meant by using the pencil — I thought she meant to put holes in the velvet, so I only tried this on a very small piece, in case it didn't work out. which it didn't. but I did like the grid indentations in the velvet, so the experiment wasn't all lost. I was going to try a metal collander also but the holes were too small for the velvet — perhaps silk would be better for this as it's lighter fabric, though it would also be a hard surface to iron.

I'm reading "Drawing Projects - an exploration of the language of drawing" by Mick Maslen and Jack Southern as recommended by Sandra Flower, one of the OCA Textiles tutors. it looks like a very thorough book with some theory as well as many practical examples and exercises and analysis of artists' work. at the start of the book is as section "What we know and what we see". whilst this might seem to be a basic, easy concept, it's one that I have forgotten so am including a couple of quotes here.

prior to this, the authors talk about how children draw what they see - "the drawing incorporates the child's knowledge and experience [of the pond] as a whole body experience perceived through all of their senses, and not just through their eyes, or from a single point of view. In some ways, this is children's drawings at its best, and perhaps it exemplifies something of what Picasso was searching for when he is reputed to have said that he had spent 80 years learning to draw like a child." (page 10).

today I went to a workshop called "drawing with thread" at the Art Gallery of NSW where we played and tinkered with stitches and coloured threads. it was taught by Alex Falkiner and was lots of fun. Alex showed us how to use different stitches to recreate drawing marks, different lines and block colour techniques, and to ask ourselves "what would happen if ...", and to find the whimsy, playfulness and randomness in making. there were a mix of fluoro colours which I hadn't used before, so it was fun to try. very relaxing. Alex also spoke of making things that don't *have* to be functional. this is something I need to practice - previously I've don't mostly functional craft making over the years

it was great to see fellow OCA textiles classmates Judy and Eva at the workshop too — Judy wrote a post about the day at https://fibresofbeing.wordpress.com/2014/11/21/t1e1p1-workshop-alex-falk...

lots of great discussions also, and names of other artists to check out - recommended by Alex plus others in the workshop.

as part of the work on my "bee" theme, and as part of the closing assignment for "Year of the Fairy Tale" illustration class I've been taking this year, to learn more painting techniques, I'm doing an illustration for a Fairy Land zine on magic animals. of course I chose the bee. but as "bee" was already taken, I decided to be more specific and chose the "Australian sugarbag bee" aka Tetragonula Carbonaria bee, which is one of the native bees of Australia. this is a stingless bee, though it can give you a bite instead.

collating info here about the sugarbag bee as part of my research. another Australian bee I like is the blue-banded bee. there are a number of coloured bees native to Australia, which are different to the introduced yellow coloured honey bee that everyone is used to seeing.

for the illustrated page, I need to write a line about why this is a magic sugarbag bee, and draw a matching picture.

---
Australian bee websites:

Sugarbag Bees blog http://www.sugarbag.net

Sugarbag Bees facebook page https://www.facebook.com/sugarbagbees

Aussie Bee http://www.aussiebee.com.au

Kin Kin Native Bees http://www.nativebees.com.au

I've been trying out my new artgraf water soluable graphite tonight with another drawing of a bee for my theme. I think it's sometimes called watercolour graphite. I put water in the lid and found my paintbrush and tried it out. I haven't got the bee shapes right yet but I love the variations in lightness and darkness of the graphite. there's even a slight shimmer and sparkle to it in this dim light. will see if it's still there in the morning daylight.

I shouldn't have tried the background wash though.. :( don't like it atm

another in (hotel room) biro practicing hatching (with wonky bee shape still)

folding. like origami paper folds memory
memory of clothes and sheets and other home linen as you grow up with it
the article about newborn baby cloth wrapping
memories of clothes, the feel of fabric. comfort. protection

expand later. initial notes

created http://www.haptichuman.com to collect info about these ideas

making squares and rectangles using contemporary smocking from square wave patterns. it's based on the lozenge pattern. getting the hang of it. I drew the square waves by hand so they're not perfectly even, so the squares sometimes don't line up perfectly. but I like the 3D shapes they make. I need to iron/press these too to see the effect. I like the puffy (un-ironed) version also

I saw this cool photo of waveforms placed next to nature waveform patterns, so I wonder if an audio waveform pattern could be used as a smocking guide also. worth a try to see what happens

next I might try some shapes like Matija Čop used in these 3D architectural based garments. there's so many fabric manipulations on pinterest too. I've pinned some on my textiles page to remind me to try them also

textiles

- make a mind map & taxonomy of craft vs art (fine art?) & map textiles into this
-- applied function, purpose
-- containers, coverings, adornment, tools (hand), machines

- plato's forms

- machines - sadie plant article

- craft objects found all around the world from archaeological digs. in the future will they find all of our landfill, rubbish and think it was our art/ craft? how much will dissolve/break down?

- early. biomimicry by humans let us survive and evolve. look at bee flower petal nest

craft as biomimicry
art as self

http://www.textilecentermn.org/art-speaks-art-vs-craft/
http://australia.gov.au/about-australia/australian-story/contemporary-te...

I've been making dragonscale (reverse smocking) using Michele Carragher's instructions (she is the game of thrones' embroiderer). I finally got it to work, after unpicking the first few attempts (& realising I've done it on wrong side of the fabric - right side for regular smocking). I'm using this as part of the fabric manipulation topic in assignment 3 work. I'll use this page to add more details and summarise it (with other samples) on the assignment page later.

notes for the pattern:

first attempt - I had only drawn the dots, not the triangles and became a bit lost, so these two didn't work out. I unpicked them and started again.

next time, I drew the triangles as a template onto the fabric also. this helped a lot, and I managed to make it correctly this time

the right side of the fabric - this shows the smocking pattern, but the "dragonscale" uses the other side, so I actually made the whole piece on the wrong side of the fabric. oh well. know for next time.

the wrong side of the fabric - showing the dragonscale. I need to iron/press it to flatten it, though I like the puffy pattern also.

some more progress

today I went on an etching / print workshop at the ownership project gallery / print room in melbourne. learnt a lot. i made some prints to try different techniques, levels of colour depth, plate cleanup, colours, timings. used one of my bee drawings so I can add them to my theme work. falling in love with printing. you can get some very detailed marks with etching (with practice!)

i'll add more pics / steps later when on the computer

mono / black print

adding colour to sections

ghost print

coloured and hand painted selected colours

http://www.ooed.org/learn/understanding-contemporary-art-fall-2014 started this week. very interesting so far - speeding through modern art. use chrome if using ipad, safari is broken

i'm making notes in my workbook. might post photos here. I've read you take more in/remember more when handwriting notes than typing. but if i get time i'll try type them up too so i can search later.

week1:

I tried making a bee from washi tape, but it turned out a bit wonky. I should have drawn the outline first instead of taping from memory. it was a good exercise in blending colours and creating texture and patterns and shapes though.