Forest

This Was Forest Not Long Ago
I went for a small drive along the Old Beech Forest Road, which is the road I live on .About 5-6 kilometres up the road the forest used to start ( there is a lot of logging in the region). This is what i found this morning. Now when they raze a hillside like this they are supposed to leave a verge of trees along the road's edge guess that didn't happen. I was shocked by how much of this area has been denuded for woodchip. Below is a photo of how the forest should look and I had to drive another 7 kms to find it. So when loggers tell you they log in an environmentally friendly way I wonder what they mean by that?? It's put me in a good mood for more lace work-not- I am trying to think how I can incorporate tree ferns into a piece, but the treeferns along the roads edge were overrun with ragwort so that it was difficult to get a decent photo.

Forest Near my Home 

How not to Print!

Printing Poppies
I want to make some poppy lace- as one of the things I remember from my childhood in the Netherlands is Flanders poppies. They used to line the sides of the road and used to lace the wheatfields on the farm. I remember picking them as a child- I loved the colour and the black centres. So i want to make some poppy cutouts. I decided I would first print the poppies and then paint them with dye so I can get the black and red in the right areas. Well that was mistake number one!I wanted to print with black textile ink- but that ink is too runny, so I eventually had to resort to mixing it with gold so that it was thicker. Then I should have taped the silk to the table, and I didn't- anyway that is the way it is going to stay now. I am waiting for the ink to dry so I can do the dye painting. I have one piece of silk that has horrible smudgy poppy prints and the other two pieces are so so, but as it is raining I can't go outside to work- and there is not enough space inside.Oh well!

Forest Quilts

Forest IV
This is a photo of a quilt I showed at European Carrefour Patchwork which is held in Val d'Argent in France. It is essentially a whole cloth quilt, although the orange dots and circles have been appliqued on top. I do not have a better photo of this quilt as I sold it , and at that stage I was still getting used to the digital camera. What you cannot see is the heaviness of the stitching which made the quilt very textured. Yesterday i dyed some more forest fabric which is on my picturetrail site, and got some really good pieces. Unfortunately I do not have the time at the moment to make another forest quilt, though I am itching to. Have to make more lace....

Inspired by Drochel Lace

drochel lace
Finally another piece of lace finished. It is quite large about 110 cm wide and nearly 300 cms long. The straight stitching took forever- or that is the way it seemed. I am cutting out the motifs for another piece, and my thumb is getting numb from holding the scissors, but I have only a few motifs to go so can start the sewing on that today- more straight lines-or maybe I will make them whirl around- free hand. And another piece is well into the planning. Have to make the gocco print for it, and do the drawing, and I will also use some polyester film I have and transfer dye it as well- so that I can create a juxtaposition of positive and negative in the whole piece. I am still trying to work out how I can incorporate a piece of my grandmothers writing into a lace piece, not so much for the content but for the beauty of the writing which is very much like copperplate writing, and of itself very lacy.

Castello a Casatico

Castello Casatico Julio Romano

The photographs contained in todays post are of the Castello designed by Julio Romano for Baldassare Castiglione

Castiglione was the emissary for the Gonzaga Court in Mantua to Spain and many other places. He wrote a book entitled The Book of The Courtier which stated the qualities of the complete and perfect courtier in Renaissance times. My favourite portrait is contained in the link above. Rafeal painted Baldassare Castiglione obviously embodying the qualities that Castiglione had written about- to portrait is both beautiful and enigmatic. We have been lucky to find out much more about Castiglione because old family friends, the Melegari family live in a little village called Casatico where he was born and lived.His castello is on the perimeter of the village where, though it is used occasionally for festa's, it is not restored or even that well cared for and yet it is a marvellous piece of renaissance architecture custom built for Castiglione by Julio Romano. The etching below is an original etching by my friend and artist , Ada Melegari, of the Castello made on the occasion of her nephews wedding Fabio Melegari to Sara. Last time I visited she gave me one of the prints, and I feel lucky indeed.

Ada Melegari's Castello Casatico

Ada Melegari's Castello Casatico

Castello Casatico 

Forest fabric

Forest Fabric
I have been dyeing quite a lot of fabric recently. This is one forest piece. I am selling them through my picturetrail site. I am going to do some more dyeing in the next few days.
And this afternoon is destined for more lace making. I still have a lot of work to do, though I did print some more panels yesterday.

Medicins sans Frontieres

Tree for Life
I am shocked by the devastation of the eartquake in Sumatra and the tsunami that followed and destroyed so much in countries bordering the Bay of Bengal. I have been thinking as to how best I can contribute something to help- and have decided to sell all of my small quilts for US $25 each including postage, with funds thus raised to be donated to Medicins san Frontieres http://www.msf.org- which is an organisation I have supported in the past.They are an organisation who follow the Hippocratic oath without policital doctrine and really do go into the very diffcult places. They will need all the help they can get as most fresh water sources have been destroyed and dengue fever, cholera and typhoid will no doubt rage. I have posted a photo of the tree I drew with my sewing machine ,for trees for me are often a symbol of the human tenacity to survive- often against terrible odds- but sometimes help is needed. My small quilts can be seen at http://www.picturetrail.com/dcevaal in an album entitled Small Quilts for MSF.

Wow- all the small quilts are gone in less than 3 hours! It will allow me to make a donation to MSF of approximately $330US. My heartfelt thanks to everyone for purchasing !

Artichoke and Honeycomb

Artichoke
This morning I photographed some more things in my garden. I just love the picture of this artichoke flower- yes I know another artichoke!. It is huge, about two hands across and the colours are just beautiful. This one I am letting go to seed as the flower was so sculptural that i wanted to see how it would develop. The picture below is of honeycomb that the hive of bees left behind when we tried to move them into a real hive. The patterns are just gorgeous. I have been leafing through Phillip Ball's The Self-Made Tapestry- Pattern Formation in Nature by Oxford University Press in order to better understand pattern and repeats, and am fascinated that so much pattern/decoration is really just repeating what nature has already mapped for us, so that in a sense when we are creating patterns we are mapping, and that the marks we make on the surface are like footsteps through the maps. Oh and I found Maggie Relph's website ( for African fabric- she gets them in Ghana from local makers, so this is an instance of where the artisan does get paid - she also traveled through Africa with Guerba on a similar journey we did, but she did it several times) http://www.africanfabric.co.uk and whilst I was at it I also found this very good website about adire fabric http://adireafricantextiles.com, which is well worth a look in a spare moment. There is even a glossary of adinkra symbols and their meaning.

Honeycomb 

Making Lace

Making Lace
Yesterday I pinned together this piece of lace- it is just over a metre wide and about 3 metres long, now I am sewing in the lines of stitches to keep the motifs in place. The motifs are the drochel inspired prints done on silk in gold printing ink. Now I just have to keep sewing to secure it all and then it will be finished and I can think about the next piece. I am reading a book by James Trilling , called Ornament- A Modern Perspective.Of course much of textile design up to the twentieth century could be classified as ornament, and I must admit to being drawn to things that are ornamented- not especially the over the top roccoco stuff, but for example some of the detail in the Lady and The Unicorn tapestries, or the rich, rich textile designs of the renaissance.

Kangaroos!

Kangaroos
My kids went out this evening into the bush with our friends Audrey and Daniel ,and this is what they saw. I think it beats a shopping centre maybe? Now I have to admit when I have had visitors come from overseas we have gone to the same place to show them kangaroos, and of course they have not been there. These are grey kangaroos which are not as big as red kangaroos which can be as big as a grown man when upright. Still grey kangaroos can be as tall as shoulder height of an average person, and the grass is huge this year after all the rain we have had, so these kangaroos are a pretty decent size.

Creative Fire

Last night's Fire

I live in a region that experience extreme fire conditions in summer. Fortunately that has not happened so far this summer, and because it has been so wet we have been able to have a small fire outside to sit around at night. Last night we played music and enjoyed Christmas drinks sitting around the fire. For me fire is also a metaphor for creativity. Sometimes I wake in the middle of the night just burning with ideas. Sometimes a "fire" quilt falls out of the sky and demands to be made. I have made about 17 hellfire quilts so far. They are also often a metaphor for the tenacity of humans to survive in conditions that are far from ideal.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

I hope everyone I know has a happy and safe new year, that somehow humans will find a way to be peaceful, and grant every child born the right to a dignified and peaceful life!

More Gaudi

Arches at Parc Guell
Gaudi built the Parc Guell for his benefactor Guell and gaudi actually lived in the parc in his later life. There are many whimsical things and constructions in the parc, and the mosaics are brilliant- however the thing I liked best was the kind of arched grottoes he created out of stone. I also visited the Textile Museum in Barcelona ( a wonderful 15th century building in the Gothic Quarter), which has a pretty good collection reflecting some of the textile hsitory of this region. The piece I liked best was the inner cope of Sant Valeri. The cope is basically in pieces - but the pieces that remain have been pinned to a background and restored as much as possible- so not only is there the woven material but the human hand is present by tiny stitches of the restorer. Next to the cope is a map of where all the missing pieces are held- in musuems in Madrid , New York, Chicago,Lyon, Paris,Boston,Berlin and more- a map of appropriation.

Barcelona and Gaudi

One of Gaudi's Drawings
If one city is defined by the artist who lived there then surely that city must be Barcelona. I went there for a few days earlier this year- a couple of perfect, sunny, but cool days in Catalonia. Barcelona is basically a big whirring city where the Olympics were held not so long ago with a gothic inner city and some magic buildings by Antoni Gaudi. I fell in love with his buildings the most famous of which, Sagrada Familia , is the icon for Barcelona- and yet this is somehow the least of Gaudi's buildings, though the scale is grand. La Pedrera, and apartment building near the centre is a most amazing construction with flowing lines that create spaces such as rooms, and the most amazing structures on the roof line. I took this photo and through the arch you can see Sagrada Famila in the distance. The drawing , which was in the Sagrada Famila Museum must surely have been the basis for the ghostly creatures that adorn the roof of La Pedrera.

La Pedrera and Sagrada Familia 

Close-up African Journey

Close-up of African Journey
Yesterday was a day I would rather forget- everything I tried somehow went wrong- and then the temeprature outside was making the printing ink too runny- so I gave it all away as just a bad bad day! I have posted a photo that is a close-up of one of my quilts.It incorporates tie dyeing, gocco/riso printing fo guinea fowl feathers and a lino-cut print of an elephant from a photo we took on our African travels. If you click on the picture you will get a bigger image and you can see the stitching.