Colour

I am getting there - slowly. Despite the temptation to do the opposite, I am taking my time which means I probably  won't get it done by the due date.  As my grandmother would say, better to be sure than sorry. I am including a photo of images on the floor near the loom that I refer to often re. colour of the Kimberleys and the train trip.  The thing that surprised me was how much green there was.  I often put pictures up on the computer as I can see how things are progressing with the weaving.

 

I have posted 2 blogs  in 5 days; anything to avoid work.

Accents

Today I am having a day free of house issues, workshops, tapestry weaving and assignments and just  fiddling around - mainly catching up on my life; which is nice.  The last 2 days I attended a workshop at Open Drawer on Patterning - historical traditions and innovative variations given by Ruth Hadlow which I have found very demanding but very useful.  There were only six in the class and the workshop focused on experimentation and a subjective  open - ended approach and exploration of patterning; e.g. we drew with scissors which is very freeing.  At the end of the two days, I have come away with a subject matter to research which I can use in designing tapestries. However there is much research to do and in areas that I have never dreamt of.
In discussing my response to one of the exercises we had to do, Ruth questioned (she asks more questions than I do) why a particular thing worked and it was because of an, unintentional on my part, flick of colour on a white page with black writing.  Which reminded me of a suggestion made to me about the fish shape in my tapestry. 

It was suggested to me that the fish looked blocky and  lacked reference to the surrrounding area and I should add some yellow to heighten interest and enliven the shape. 

I know the 2nd picture is a little lighter, but I think it works.

Faces

The  latest assignment to keep me from weaving the large tapestry due in 6 or 7 weeks is called Interaction between people.  We had to do 4 drawings and select one to do small tapestry  sample.  The drawing I chose to do a tapestry of is one of my beautiful cousin Marj who died last year after a long battle with breast cancer.  When I was doing photography at RMIT we had to do portraits and I took  a lot of photos of her.  She had just found out she had to have a course of chemo tablets and the photos reflected her concern.  The drawing I did reflects my reaction to this news. We had been best friends since we were  8/9 and were constant companions and playmates for 60 years.

The cartoon

      

The tapestry

On third of the way - nearly.

I am about one third of the way to completing my large tapestry.  I am enjoying weaving it but it involves many bobbin changes to get the mottled look of the earth up north.  I am pleased with my "barra"; Tim and I spent lots of hours sitting beside the Ord River at Ivanhoe Crossing trying to catch a barramundi.  My job was to catch live bait which was quite a task as I am not a fisherman.  However I caught enough small fish, including a small barra about 20 cm which was thrown back. We went fishing in the afternoon to be there as the moon rose.  It is quite a spectacular and historical place and despite catching plenty of live bait, we didn't catch a barra. Each of the shapes tells a story of part of our trip and the shapes are based on escarpment shapes.  The Green shape is about the bombing of Darwin and the orange shape is about a visit to a zebra rock mine owned by friends of Tim that they are developing into a caravan and camping site. I am experimenting with the  outlining the red marks in the rocks, but this isn't working.

Changing My Mind

I know I said that I had decided not to pull out my weaving any more but I have changed my mind; a lady's prerogative. My mentor had a look at my work and thought my Darwin piece was a bit flat due to not varying the colours I used.  I took her advice and pulled it out , most of it and redid it.  As you can see in the photos, the 2nd version looks a lot better. My big tapestry is taking ages because I am taking my time. By the end of this week, I would like to be 1/3 of the way through. I have not done any weaving for 10 days due to upheavals in my life, but I should have a relatively clear run for the next little while. Despite the time I am taking, I am enjoying it.  Next time I have to design a tapestry I will employ the KISS strategy.

Spring

A large patch of clivias

Spring is here and my front garden is beginning to look lovely.  Many years ago, I uprooted the lawn so that in out dotage we wouldn't have to worry about mowing the lawn.  I instead made several garden beds  surrounded by rocks collected from my sister's property to outline the beds.  The garden design has gone from native to roses back to mostly native.  It is very easy to look after requiring half a day every 3 months or so and at this time of the year is pretty to look at.

Native hibiscus

A close up of the native hibiscus.

Orange salvia

Here you can see a touch of red in the leaves of the rose called whisky/brandy which has strong orange flowers.

I mainly designed the garden around colour - orange, purple, red.  The strelitiza, colours orange and purple is nearly in flower  and will look spectacular in the mix. I am looking forward to seeing it in flower.  I like strong colours outside the house but neutral inside the house.

I think I am a bit addicted to purple; my violets are still flowering.

ATW Blends

I have selected a few of the ends from the ATW which show how they blend colours and yarns.  Most of them are a combination of both wool and cotton.  The 2 mauve blends on the left are from the Alice Bayke tapestry.  The  next picture of one of them has 4 wool strands and 10 threads of stranded cotton, 6 white and 4 mauve; I think it was used in the lace part of her dress. I don't use as many threads when I blend.  For my large tapestry I am using 5 strands in my weft, mostly  4 strands of wool and 2 of cotton; I find the cotton lightens the effect.

Most of the wool I used for Tim's Tapestry was ends; saved myself both money and time as I already had the bag of ends  and who am I to argue with experts in blending colours.