Lacey Mew

Here is a preview of progress on my latest project.  Of course it includes a little bit of needle lace.  I am continuing to explore traditional needle lace techniques while researching other materials in relation to it.

Tentatively titled "Lacey Mew."   While lacey is obvious, the word mew has many meanings among them is an old English meaning that relates to a cage for hawks, as well as a place of concealment.

Myung Urso

Myung Urso is a South Korean artist with several degrees including an MFA in fibre arts.  Her style of combining unusual materials to make jewelry is fascinating.  Wood, fabric, yarn, paper, gesso, and wire are just some of the materials that Myung uses making works more sculptural than jewelry.  I admire this artists daring in combining materials together with a jewelers skill while employing the rawness of fibres.

http://www.myungurso.com/work.html

Ernesto Neto

The artwork of Ernesto Neto is tactile and curious.

http://www.designboom.com/contemporary/neto.

Upcoming exhibits

A touring exhibition titled Hats from a Life Lived includes one of my fibre pieces titled Creative Hands.  This exhibit features many wonderful women artists from Winnipeg and is curated by artist Colette Balcaen. The show is scheduled to be in Neepawa and Portage La Prairie for August and September 2014

Hats from a Life Lived

In Neepawa at the Viscount Art Gallery. An opening event is scheduled for August 13, 2014 from 1-4 pm. The exhibit will remain in Neepawa until the end of of August. 
You can see more about the show and the centre here: neepawavcc.ca

The entire exhibit then moves to Portage La Prairie to the Portage and District Arts Centre.  It will remain on display from September 2 - 27, 2014. 
 For more information about the arts centre see:
 www.portageartscentre.ca

This project was fun as the curator Winnipeg artist Colette Balcaen invited artists to participate in a project of altering vintage hats to represent subjects and people who were of influence in our lives.  My hat was influenced by three women in my life who inspire me to make things.  My mother, my grandmother and my mother-in-law.  Each image illustrates their favourite creative pastime.

I chose needle lace as the method of creating the images and then went about the process of learning how to make needle lace as I had never tried it before.  Needle lace is a form of lace making that allows you to create a fairly detailed image using just thread and a needle.

I started by drawing an image on a piece of paper and then couching a thicker piece of crochet thread onto the paper to act as an outline.  Once this is done then smaller thread is used to basically create a decorative grid of thread lines and stitches to fill in the image. I even took some liberties in creating my own stitches from the more traditional. Then the entire thread image is lifted off of the paper by cutting the couching threads and gently clipping them away from the finished project.  Each image was then tacked onto the hat.  I am very pleased with the overall look.

Machine Knitting

I am enjoying using an old Bond Machine knitter that was a gift from my mom.
Its a bit finicky to use but the results are quite nice. This machine is called the Incredible Sweater Machine identified by the fact that the needle bed is in two parts.  Its first incarnation was the Bond Original which came out in 1981.  The inventor Roger Curry named the machine after Bond Street in London apparently because he felt that street in particular illustrated the height of British fashion at the time. Curry wanted to make it possible for all women to make their own fashionable garments quickly and easily.

For some reason my machine does not have the original carriage with it.  I am using the intarsia key plate to knit with until such a time that I find a proper carriage.

Using the keyplate makes setting up the hooks a bit tedious as they are set up by hand using cards to position them as shown in the first picture.  The yellow card for working position and green card places the stitches into the far front of the needle bed.

There are tons of youtube videos and instructional websites out there as machine knitting is still popular. This is a good website for information about the Bond machine.
 http://www.bond-america.com/help/help_usm_faq.html

Toe Challenged

Have you ever bought a pair of socks and after wearing them the first time found that the seam on the toe made the socks unbearably uncomfortable to wear?

I am always on the lookout for wool socks, that are well made, light and hopefully comfortable on the tootsies but occasionally I get suckered.  Like with the last six pack of socks I bought for my husband.  After the first wear they were pronounced unfit for duty.  That's eight whole dollars wasted.  I ask myself, should I throw them away or give them to a second hand store?  No! No way will I waste these socks instead I will attempt to re-knit the toe in a make work project that will involve hours of my time and energy.

I started in the kitchen cutting the toe off, had a nice light snack to bolster my energy and then moved to the living room. 

Comfortably ensconced in my couch I could deal with pulling the yarn back to the line of gray yarn indicating the beginning of the toe.  As I pull back the yarn individual stitches are revealed making it easier for the next part.

After a good stiff drink I began picking up the stitches all around the sock toe.  I don't remember how many there were but its important to pick up every stitch and to ensure that all strands are neatly over the needles.  I used 0 mm bamboo needles which are perfect for picking up the loops.  This process gave me plenty of time to consider factory knit socks. They can be terrific because they are made with very fine materials and very closely woven making them comfortable and sturdy.  Added value comes from not having to make them yourself.  However factory knit socks are often sewn shut along the toe leaving a bulky and uncomfortable seam leaving me, and my husband in this case, bitter and foot sore.

Once all your stiches are picked up the rest is a breeze!  Pick a lightweight, wool sock yarn for finishing the toe and knit it like you would a regular toe.  I like to decrease four stiches every row until I have around 22 stitches left then I will knit two together all around until I have around 5 stiches left which I draw up onto a loop.

Here are several finished socks.  They have been enthusiastically worn many times since I finished fixing them.  No more sore tootsies.   We just won't talk about how long it took to fix.  I can't say its rational, but making or even re-making things is good for the soul.

Boxed In Exhibition

Here is an invitation to "Boxed In" an exhibition of contemporary craft work by artists including myself along with artists from across Canada.  67 artists are included in this exhibition and the show will be on display in two exhibiton sites, the Rooms and the Gallery of the Craft Council of Newfoundland and Labrador from January 25 to April 14.

Here is a link to the art gallery where my artwork will be on display.
http://www.therooms.ca/artgallery/

Christmas in the Making

This is the most productive time of the year, from baking cookies to making Chritstmas gifts and ornaments, I love this time of year.  This year I have been busy making fingerless gloves from bits of scrap sock yarn.  As fast as I make things they usually disappear, snatched up by friends and family alike.  A few pair are shown below.

A tradition in my family at Christmas time has been to get together and have a craft day.  This year I had the pleasure of making a tree for another tradition a fundraiser in Winnipeg called the Festival of Trees and Lights.  Myself along with three compatriots hand made a collection of ornaments to decorate the tree.  We decided on a cat theme for the tree as we are all cat lovers and called it "Meowy Christmas."  Here are a couple of photos of the various decorations.

Switching Gears

For the last year I have switched gears in my art practice and instead of painting I have been concentrating on sculpture.  For many years I have worked on a series of sculpture titled "Generation" completing one sculpture every year or so.  Needless to say it may take a while to complete enough for a solo exhibition.

The image shown above is a sneak preview of my most recently completed piece titled Sleaze Entangled.   This piece will be on display at the Rooms in St Johns, Newfoundland as part of a group show called "Boxed In."   Sleaze Entangled is a component part of the series 'Generation.'  This series explores the complexity of gender and sexual identity as social constructs.  To make this piece I used a jelly mold, fabric, glass beads and vinyl tubing.  I enjoy the challenge of combining a variety of material in order to make the image in my imagination a physical reality.  Learning a new skill is an additional challenge I appreciate.

Talking about new challenges and learning new skills, the above image is from a second piece recently completed called Creative Hands.  In order to complete this sculpture I taught myself how to needle lace.  I really enjoyed the intricate and repetitive process of lace making.  With needle lace it is extremely challenging to make the stitches even and to create different textures.  I love the detail that can be achieved just using some thread and a needle. 

Creative Hands was made specifically for a group exhibition as yet to be determined.  From this project what I now look forward to is using needle lace on some future piece that will be a part of the "Generation" series.  Allowing myself to be distracted by other projects enables me to plot and scheme about future works as yet to be realized.  In the time it takes to knit a sock or sew a shirt, I have considered half a dozen options on how to execute the next sculpture, I have added or taken away from it, and considered a multitude of material options before starting the next piece.  In the end what will finally influence me the most will be the materials themselves because only they know what form they will unltimately take.