Owl Moon

Owl Moon, 2018
Hand and machine embroidery on metallic fabric and naturally dyed silk and linen

Sometimes I have an idea for a piece of work and I get started and make it right away. More often though it takes a long time (years sometimes) for an idea to become a reality. On our first night in Islay on holiday three years ago we were lucky enough to get very close to a Tawny Owl. It swooped down and landed on a fence post right in front of us as we gingerly drove down a track to what we hoped was our accommodation for the week. It wasn't terribly impressed with us stopping to admire it but the experience stayed with me and since that moment I've been wanting to make a piece about that owl.

Tawny Owl, Islay 2015

Layering up fabrics

Layering up fabrics

As much as I love owls, I've resisted making any pieces with owls for a couple of reasons. Firstly, I only really make work about birds I've seen and been able to observe properly as I want my work to capture a bit of their spirit and to do that I have to get to know them. It's hard to observe owls in the wild as they mostly come out at night and they're very stealthy! Secondly, owls are very popular (I own many owl embellished items myself) and I didn't want to fall into the trap of making a 'cute' owl.

Building up the owl, using my drawing as a template and photograph as reference

Rust dyed silk for owl wings

Starting to add machine embroidery

For our exhibition 'Wingspan' at RSPB Geltsdale Visitor Centre, Mr. Stitches has written a poem about an owl hunting, called Owl Moon. This poem captures the wildness and skill of the owl and inspired me to finally get around to making my owl piece. As I mentioned, the idea for the piece had been in my head for some time so Nick's poem was just what I needed to kick start the process.

Detail: Owl Moon, 2018
Hand and machine embroidery on metallic fabric and naturally dyed silk and linen

Detail: Owl Moon, 2018
Hand and machine embroidery on metallic fabric and naturally dyed silk and linen

Detail: Owl Moon, 2018
Hand and machine embroidery on metallic fabric and naturally dyed silk and linen

I'd found some interesting metallic fabric on a trip to Bombay Stores in Bradford and I knew that's what I wanted to use for the moon. I also knew that I didn't want it to be too shiny so I experimented with layering up pieces of silk organza that I'd dyed with logwood, giving a beautiful deep purple colour. I also used some indigo dyed organza and used some indigo dyed linen as a base as I felt the piece needed a more solid ground than the organza. For the owl I used pieces of organza that I'd dyed with rusty pins as it had just the right texture and patterning for an owls wing.

Detail: Owl Moon, 2018
Hand and machine embroidery on metallic fabric and naturally dyed silk and linen

Like a lot of my work this piece was built up in layers. As always, I started by drawing and sketching my ideas before I started to play around with layering up fabrics. Sometimes the pieces of fabric come together really quickly and other times I spend a long time arranging and re-arranging until I'm happy. I used running stitch and star stitch to secure the background layers and chose to leave a lot of raw edges as I think this emphasises the wildness of the subject.

Detail: Owl Moon, 2018
Hand and machine embroidery on metallic fabric and naturally dyed silk and linen

Detail: Owl Moon, 2018
Hand and machine embroidery on metallic fabric and naturally dyed silk and linen

I then moved on to making the owl. Again working in layers I built up pieces of rust dyed organza, using my drawings as a template to cut out specific areas such as the wing feathers. I then worked several layers of machine embroidery in various shades of thread to build up the pattern and texture of the feathers.

Detail: Owl Moon, 2018
Hand and machine embroidery on metallic fabric and naturally dyed silk and linen

Detail: Owl Moon, 2018
Hand and machine embroidery on metallic fabric and naturally dyed silk and linen

I'm really pleased with how this piece has worked out, I think that it is starting to marry together different parts of my practice;  the work I've been doing on my feather banners, my bird portraits and drawings and my increasing interest in and experiments with natural dyeing. For me this piece feels like the start of something, as well as the resolution of an idea that I've had in my mind for a long time.

Shadow Work Workshop

Samples and materials ready for the workshop

In February I delivered a Shadow Work workshop for the Cumberland Branch of the Embroiderers Guild. I was really nervous about this workshop as some of the embroiderers have been stitching longer than I've been alive! I wanted to create a workshop that focused not so much on traditional ways of doing things (as I knew many of the participants would be far better at it than me anyway) but on ways of taking the traditional techniques and using them in a more personal way.

Selecting and transferring designs

Selecting and transferring designs

Selecting and transferring designs

This workshop also inspired a piece of work, called In the Shadows, which I really enjoyed making. It was also good to have a big piece of work to show the participants as traditionally shadow work is worked on quite a small scale. I had also combined several techniques to show that we don't need to be limited to working with just one method at a time.

Tacking fabrics ready to stitch

Tacking fabrics ready to stitch

Stitching

One of the things that I often find when running workshops is that people are very nervous about implementing their own ideas and have little confidence in their own creativity. They are often worried about getting it 'wrong' and making sure they do things the 'right' way. Personally I find this an odd approach as for me it is a natural thing to want to experiment and try new things but I do understand why people feel that way. I hope in my workshops that I can give people the confidence and freedom to try something different and not worry too much about getting it 'right.'

Experimenting with fabrics

Pin Stitch

Stitch and tea...

To help limit people's worry about design and creating something I did provide several designs for people and encouraged participants to use these as a starting point to try out their own ideas. Because they were my designs they did of course largely feature birds so a lot of bird samples were produced during the workshop!

Pieces from the workshop

Pieces from the workshop

Pieces from the workshop

I really enjoyed the workshop, it was great seeing people playing around with fabrics and trying things out especially things that they might not normally have tried. For most the session everyone was very quiet, deep in concentration working on their stitching. This kind of silence in a workshop is very satisfying, knowing that you've shown people something they want to spend time learning. I always find I learn something new too when I run a workshop, whether it's a new artist to look at, a technique to try out or using something in a different way.

Pieces from the workshop

Pieces from the workshop

Pieces from the workshop

In the Shadows

In the Shadows, Shadow work, 2016

One of my favourite pieces of my own work is a large magpie piece from 2014, called Hail to the Thief. Inspired by this piece and a shadow work workshop I'd been booked to run  I decided to make another magpie piece, making use of the particular qualities of the silk organza I prefer to work with.

Layers pinned together

Layers tacked together

Working shadow stitch by hand

I wanted to continue to explore our odd relationship with magpies, it is something of a love hate relationship and there aren't many birds as loaded with stories and superstitions as the magpie. We admire their beautiful plumage yet berate them as bullies and thieves, we salute them and see a pair as a symbol of happiness and fidelity yet still call them pests. Personally I love to see them, from their swooping flight to the sun on their purple green feathers to the stark contrast of black and white on a grey day I find them endlessly beautiful and charming.

Shadow work detail

Shadow work detail

Shadow work detail

In many ways this has been an experimental piece for me. I have used a lot of machine embroidery in my work, partly to allow me to work at a reasonable speed and produce larger scale works. However, I also have a great love of hand embroidery and have wanted to bring this into my work more and more but I have still wanted to work on a large scale. I wanted to see how I could combine these two aims and thought that using some shadow work techniques could allow me to do this.

Edge detail

Hem detail

Hanging in the studio

I used a 'sandwich' technique to create this piece, trapping pieces of coloured organza and lace between two pieces of white silk organza. Once I was happy with the composition I tacked all the layers together and  I then used machine embroidery to draw the magpie and hold the layers in place. I then worked into the piece with some hand embroidery, adding more layers of sheer fabric in certain areas as I felt necessary. I finished off the hems and edges with pin stitch and a decorative variation of blanket stitch.

Leg detail

Head detail

Hanging in the window

I am unsure how I feel about this piece. It definitely works best as a shadow piece (i.e. lit from the back) and I think I like it but there's something not quite right. However, I think this about most my work at the moment, there are elements that I like and that are working really well but somehow it's not quite coming together as I think it should. I feel like I need some time to really focus on where I want my work to go but as that's not likely to happen in the near future I shall keep persevering and making and see what happens...

Shadowy Swallows

Shadow work Swallows

I'm going to be doing some embroidery and applique workshops at Carlisle Library over the next couple of months as part of the No Borders programme which is running alongside the Outside In exhibition at Tullie House. You can find out more about these and the other workshops on offer over on Prism Arts website.

Detail of small swallow

So, I have been busy stitching up some samples and generally enjoying having a play! On Wednesday I made a piece using shadow applique and shadow embroidery. I can't believe I have never properly explored these techniques before. I love working with transparent and sheer fabrics and layering up work and I almost always use stitch so it is a mystery to me how I have avoided some of the things I tried on Wednesday for so long. However, there is no time like the present so I think it's fairly certain I will be using these techniques a lot more in my work.

Detail of large and small swallow

For the applique I bonded fabrics using adhesive web to the back of a piece of very see through material (some sort of man-made fibre, I bought it from a seconds box ages ago!) I used a navy blue satin for the large swallow and then navy chiffon and net for the smaller ones because the chiffon on its own was too sheer and did not show through enough. I then added the red and white stitch details using herringbone stitch and laced holbein stitch. I worked the embroidery on the back of the work for a more subtle effect on the front. I then outlined the birds on the front of the work with back stitch, blanket stitch and running stitch.

Detail showing bonded fabric and embroidery but not yet outlined

Detail of work from the back (in progress)

Detail of work from the back (complete)

I'm really pleased with how this experiment turned out, I like the delicacy and lightness of the work and the different layers. It is definitely a way of working that I think suits me and my work and I am excited about exploring these techniques further.

Detail

Detail

Detail