Friday, July 01, 2005

Blue fabric


Rhythm and blues
Some fabric I dyed today whilst thinking of the theme Rhythm and Blues for the Val d'Argent quilt competition- I know I am running completely out of time as the deadline is 9 July, but something is tantalisingly hanging in the shadows of my mind and it won't quite emerge. I can't quite pin the imagery, for rhythm and blues took blues and jazz into another realm, without it music would not be what it is today. I wanted the background fabric to be rhythmic and to represent the blues from whence rhythm and blues emerged. In its early days it was largely the music of African Americans and so the blue colour is also a reference to indigo- the traditional dyeing of much of western Africa and from where many African slaves were abducted and transported. I did not want to notate music in the traditional western way because traditional African music is on a pentatonic scale. Rhythm and blues is also about dancing and song titles like Walking the Dog have floated into thought space, but but somehow....... I am not there yet. What would you do?

And on an up note- the roof is on my studio/shed, one wall and the back wall is almost done!!! I can't believe it is actually happening.Posted by Picasa

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

The Beloved wandered past and said "cool, is that by Geiger?" (you know, the guy who does the scary aliens in Alien, etc?)

I can see teeth and skulls in there - eeks!

And I'm sure you're watching the Martin Scorcese directed doco on the Birth of the Blues tomorrow night on ABC tv?

Elle said...

I was going to enter Tish Groove into Val d'Argent. As you're running late too, how will you be able to get your entry in on time? I'm almost panicky about it because it's so close and I have to get it to France from here in the States.

Elle said...

Well, the slides that is--and THAT's the hard part since I only use a digital camera.