Visibility

 "Visibility" - a word that has a few meanings, mostly to do with seeing, prominence etc.

In 2017 the Tangled Threads theme was set to a certain size 0.5m wide by 2.0m long. The person who set the theme envisaged long transparent pieces of fabric hanging in the centre of a room to be viewed from either side or transparent fabric covering a doorway.

To be honest, in the beginning I was a bit stunned to think somehow I had to try to merge my current work to this theme. The 2.0m length was certainly a challenge. This piece took me over 3 months of stitching to piece it and hours to quilt it. In my mind it is a drone's view of the streets in a town with the rows of houses and the intersections. Visibility is important when driving around the streets. The dotted line represents the road. I like the way from my fabric selection, the values drift in and out of visibility.

This piece glows with luminosity when it is hanging under lights. I find it difficult to get decent photos of it due to its length. It really does suit our high ceiling house so at this stage I am happy if it never finds its forever home but maybe one day it will. 

Inset 1 and Remnants

 I am thankful to be in a vibrant group of fellow textile artists called Tangled Threads here in the South Burnett. We are kept busy each year creating work for exhibitions in our area. Each year that I have been a member ( except for 2020) due to Sars-Cov-2 we have participated in the Winter Craft Festival in Kingaroy. We make new pieces each year for July then we exhibit at other places after that. In 2018 the theme was Inset and the challenge was to use metal in something. I had been trying out ideas for other focal points in my pieces other than the triangle peaks. I still wanted the shuttered view of a landscape. I came up with this, wanting bands of colour and an image within. This piece is called Inset 1- our Daily Landscape. I also wanted to frame within the focal point so I appliqued 1/4" wide copper foil ( used in guitars for sound reflection) that I sourced on ebay. This is definitely one of my family's favourite pieces. I actually discovered a photo of it ( from hanging in the Kingaroy Gallery) on Pinterest. Mind you they never acknowledged who made it, would have been good if they did.

In August each year, we set the theme and challenge for the next year. We came up with Remnants in 2018 for the 2019 year. For many years I have had fungi on a long list of possible things for inspiration. This piece came about because of the colours of fungi that I have seen on the decomposing wood in our paddocks. It looks a bit "drab" in this photo, but under the lights in a gallery and in our house it glows. I quilted the grey fabric with the colours of the strips and it is very effective. 

 I have been working on The Incubator and Mastermind Program with Lisa Call. This runs for 6 months as a project and I have been busy. Blogging, using Evernote to write about my art, using Excel for inventories is all part of the project. I have been managing to just keep up with it all. As well as doing extra shifts at my paid job, it has been a busy few weeks. On the plus side, I have been working on a couple of new pieces as well. On the home front, we are still waiting ( is getting very dry ) for some rain. Hope I have better news about that next week.

Reflections and Combinations

 The next two pieces I am featuring were both made in 2017, exploring the tracks series further. Both of these pieces were constructed to meet a theme. Reflections was originally made to be an entry in the Mt Perry Art Gallery acquisitive competition with the theme Reflections of Mt Perry. I was verbally told about it and when the brochure came out, it did not include textile art, so it could not be entered. This is an abstract view around Mingo Crossing at Paradise Dam between Gayndah and Mt Perry. I used to spend a few hours there kayaking on the water as the dam filled up after its construction. Sadly the government of the day has seen fit to lower the wall ( due to their concern about some safety aspects of the existing wall) so the levels seen at Mingo then, may not be repeated, so I probably will not be kayaking there again. The floods in 2013 went over the bridge at Mingo and we were told that would never happen, so who knows what the future can bring.

Technically speaking this is a 1 way flip with both sets close together to create movement.

I made Combinations prior to Reflections in 2017, for our Tangled Threads group exhibit in 2017. It had to be a specific measurement of 1.5m x 0.5m. Combinations was the theme selected and for once the theme did not make me have to draw a long string to it. I really like this piece, looks wonderful hanging in my house with the high ceilings.

Technically it is a 2 way flip, straight and close together to create the straight line of peaks.