We’re halfway through May already! Sorry for the late update of April, but I’ve been busy taking care of my garden after winter. And since April has been filled with the comming of new life., my April-book is filled with prints using new leaves from the garden, both directly and some gelli-prints with the leaves as stencils. Not so many to choose from as it was still early spring, but I used the few I could find. Unfortunately, I was halfway through cutting my sheet of paper when I rembered to take a photo:
And here are the finished Book of April:
Corona is still affecting our daily life, even if the society has slowly started to open up.
I have been enjoying Bobby Britnells on-line course «Inspired by Ben Nicholson» and here are some of my results:
My prints on textile are still on my design-wall waiting to be processed.
I hope you have enjoyed this little update from my studio.
Two weeks ago, I were supposed to be in Stavanger for the annual meeting for the Norwegian Quilt Association. I had sendt in two quilts for the exhibition and one to the competition. Then came Corona and everything shut down. The meeting has been postponed and my two quilts for the exhibition are on their way home. My entry for the competition now awaits new time for the meeting, hopefully somtime in the autumn.
I cannot show you my quilt for the competition, but the two for the exhibition I can
This first one is called «Light and Backlight». It is in two parts, Cotton and silk, machine and hand quilted. It is a rather personal quilt, because the danser is ME! Way back in my youth!!! But still a part of my history, I danced classical ballet for about 18 years, back in the 70’s. The last years in one of those little «free» dancing groups which appeared outside the established companies at that time. I used an old photograph and traced. The grey cotton fabric, a reused sofa-cover, together with a little too soft wadding gave me some troubles. Even if the quilting is rather even it was almost impossible to get those clean straight bindings. It is too soft and I have to live with that.
My other quilt is a re-use of one of my very first, and not so good quilts from 2002.
Originaly it was my first attempt at Barghello. Last spring I decided to sacrifice it, tried first to bleach it, but the fabrics didn’t want to give up any colours. So instead I painted the background, machine-embroidered and painted the dragonfly and handstitched the background. It is based on a haiku by Matsuo Basho:
This dragonfly
can’t quite land
on that blade of grass.
We had an early spring this year, and March was filled with beautiful crocuses, so of course my March book had to be filled with crocuses. As I started by drawing, stencilling and printing.
Cut it all in pages and made myself another book:
FrontThe bindingand the back
Now I have to find a theme for my April book. Wait and see….
I hope you all are well wherever you are in the world, we shall manage this. Take care!
Last day of January already! I started the year by finishing several projects. First, I made the last pieces for my internationel group project with TexNet2. Our first exhibition will be at the European Patchwork Meeting in Sainte-Marie-aux-Mines in September.
Next I made the finishing touches on some quilts for the Norwegian Quilters Association’s meeting in March. Unfortunately, I can not share these with you yet.
But I have also been working on some new inspiration, first, just playing around with scraps and thread, some Slow stitchhing:
I don’t know where this will lead me, time will show.
And I spent most of january studying stones in my garden, at the beach and in the neighbourhood, drawing with Fineliner and Inktense pencils. First I just filled a large sheet with random drawings:
which I then cut up and made into a little «Stone Book», with the possibility to fill in more later:
It is a small book, only 9,5×9,5 cm. But I love the format.
I have made myself a promise to publish here a little more often, I just hope I can fulfil that promise…
I love concertina sketchbooks. Some years ago I made several like this:
and this spring I have filled one of them with paint and snippets of photos taken in my old garden, as a memory:
the back is printed using stencils and gelliplates
Yesterday I decided it was time to make some new ones. I started by cutting long strips of Fabriano 160g paper:
folding them:
and make some nice covers:
The blue and the golden one are covered with some nice handmade japanese paper I bought in London a few years ago. The two in front I’ve made for me and my sister to use in our holidays. They have a nice thin gift vrapping paper as cover.
I did cut and fold 6 books, but have only covered 4 so far. Now I just have to fill them with summer memories and maybe ideas for new work…
It has been more than a year since my last entry, and much has happened since then. Most of the year I have been working hard to finish my accredited course in Machine Embroidery, level 3. My final piece were this Muff, the design inspired by the Oseberg Viking ship
.The back is decorated with a row of old knives
and it is lined with fur to keep my hands warm.
After a long winter, it looks like spring is finally here. These crocuses are popping up through the icy ground
even though the rest of the garden is still covered in snow.
One of the things I have been working on lately are these Dragonflies. I digitized some drawings, my machine embroidered them and finally I painted them to make them stand out from the background.
I will try to be a bit more active here on my site, I am also working on some changes. I hope you like what you see.
Last year I made this row of trees inspired by the pattern on an old Egyptian bowl. And the last couple of days I’ve been playing with them and try to fit them in my new wallhanging.
First I made a quick sketch to get my ideas on paper. Next I scanned the original drawing and fed it to my 6D Design Creator, and one of the options I was presented with was this stylised version. I liked it so much that I had to let my embroidery machine do a bit of work:
I have also started on another version, using freehand embroidery on water solluble plastic, and I guess time will show what comes out of this.
Just a short update on my studio. It is now finished, the outdoor needs a bit more painting before winter is here. I’m just waiting for the right weather.
These windows on the side wall gives me good working light and no sun. They are facing north.
And inside I have just finished painting the last coat on the floor so I can’t go in and take more photos. But it is just an empty room.
This weekend I will start moving in all my boxes. And I need to get some shelves and other furniture as well. But finally I can move in.
It’s been a long time since my last entry. There is still much work to be done with my new page, it is a work in slow progtress since much is new to me.
Well back from Festival of Quilts with many ideas to work on, but unfortunately, too little sewing. I have worked hard to finish Module 5 of C&G Level 3 Certificate in Machine Embroidery, with the result of my Portfolio presented in 3D. I made a zigzag book, with 10 of my designs:
The back of the zigzag is decorated with a repeat pattern
and some of the pages have pop up elements
I have also been playing a bit in my sketchbooks, acryllic ink rolled on with a vine cork
and best of all, finally my studio is being built in my garden
I have been waiting for this all summer and finally the building has started. I just hope I can move in before Christmas.
And next year, i can start to fix the garden. That is all for now, hopefully my entries will come more frequently in the future.
It’s nearly 6 months since my last entry, and most of this time I have been clearing my old house, packing everything in boxes, moved to Tonsberg, and unpacked everything again.
So yesterday, I needed to do something creative again. I took an old sheet, wrapped it around some old tools i have inherited from my father, poured over about 3 litres of tea of various kinds, wrapped it in plastic and left it in the garden overnight.
The result when I opened it today was gourgeous:
Such beautiful marks.
Just now the piece is in the washing machine, hopefully the marks will survive. I don’t know if I want to keep it as a wholecloth or cut it in smaller pieces. Time will show.
