At our April and May meetings there was quite a bit of Show and Tell from the members. It is great to get inspiration from other members in this way and also to get positive feedback on our pieces.
In April Jacqui had done some wonderful cloth dyeing based on the February swing tag technique with dyes and salt. Here is her description of her technique:
The cards and the light parts of the calico I gessoed, the dark parts of the fabric are ungessoed. After the gesso was dry I flooded the card/fabric with blue quink ink, then sprinkled on rock salt, when I was happy with the look of the piece I dried
them with a hair dryer to stop the process. Bits of inky rock salt tend to be blown around so make sure you do this
where damp blue rock salt won’t mark anything you don’t want blued.
The card with the yellow lines on were made by drawing with crayon onto the dried gesso before adding the ink.
Gillian did a fantastic piece combining some earlier techniques:
Yesterday Gillian and I showed the results of the weekend workshop at the Melbourne branch of the Embroiderer’s Guild of Victoria. The Guild had invited Jan Beaney and Jean Littlejohn over for their 50th Anniversary celebrations and they held two two day workshops in Malvern. Jan and Jean were inspiring, funny and generous. I will do a post on my blog and I’m sure Gillian will also so pop over to have a look in more detail.
Jill showed us her fantastic bag made of ties from the Op Shop:


Shirley showed us her amazing family quilt dedicated to memories of wartime:
And some close ups; Shirley also used regimental ties in her quilt.


Jill brought her Book in progress, an ongoing project for us all to showcase the techniques investigated in 2009:
Front Cover:





And the Back cover:
Inspired by our wacky wild women last month, Pauleen has made another which was perfectly matched to her purple jumper:

Our Geelong branch of the Guild have a couple of exhibitions this month in conjunction with the Embroiderer’s Guild of Victoria 50th Anniversary celebrations. At the end of May selected items from our Christmas exhibition at the Johnston Collection will be on display at the National Wool Museum here in Geelong (the Johnston Collection is holding some great talks on embroidery for the Guild celebrations also). Also beginning this month, our members have contributed to an exhibition of Oriental Embroidery at the Geelong Art Gallery. This is sure to be a visual feast, not to be missed.
Finally, here is a link to the Reflections Scarf Festival 2010. This is a fantastic festival for all ages. It caters for local, Melbourne, state wide and interstate entries, including students and younger children. The workshops are great and also continue throughout the mid year school holidays, with many catering to students and children as well as adults. A membership to the Museum is good value, giving free entry throughout the year.
Happy arting and I’ll be back next month with a rundown of June’s workshop on silk paper.
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