Goldfish

I must say I am missing my old studio with all its funny smells and below zero temperatures. Working at home has its advantages of course (like being able to feel your fingertips) - but one big disadvantage. I. Don't. Work. Or at least when I do, I have the attention span of a goldfish with ADHD.

Ten minutes at my desk, (which, by the way, is far too small) and I wander off and fret about my ironing pile. Ten minutes ironing and I think about the weeds that must have grown over the ground I recently dug in my garden, so I venture out try and dig, all the while thinking I should be at my desk. Ten minutes back at my desk and I notice it's time to start making the kitchen marginally less unhygenic in preparation for dinner. Even the dog looks at me with a pitying gaze.

I need a deadline and some self discipline. Ah well.

Here's a papier mache doll I made for our upcoming Open House.

Irrelevant

Today I only did some scrappy (and indeed crappy) drawings - no time to go out and do anything major. I had to go and pay my studio rent, and while I was up there I finished making this pincushion, which I started last week...
And here it is on my bookcase so you can see the scale of it.


I know it's irrelevant to everything I should be working on but sometimes I just feel like making things just for the hell of it.


This evening I was supposed to go and see Woodrow Phoenix talking about his book, but for various reasons I just couldn't make it to Brighton in time. Too scared to go in once it had started, I just went Christmas shopping, marvelling at the notion that we are all broke, yet once a year we suddenly have to spend loads of money buying things for people. Strange, isn't it?

Illustration Friday - "Unfold"

Pull back a leaf, crack open a nut, and see what story unfolds...

I came across this in my garden today. (OK, OK...I came across it after I'd made it from cloth and mounted it in the nut shell!)

Another Doll

It has been absolutely lovely Spring weather...I hope it stays like this for the weekend when the Brighton Festival begins. I'm going to be in an Open House in the Newhaven Art Trail. (I'm in the Badgers Hill Workshop.)

I've made a couple of new dolls to show at the Open House...here's the Earth one from the elements series I've been doing...

You can see some of my prints on my studio wall in the background - and my offer letter from uni!

Here are the pictures I took while I was making the doll. Unfortunately my camera battery ran out around the time I made the dress, but here are the early stages. Making a pattern...

Sewing the pieces together on my trusty Bernina (born the same year as me!) ...

Stuffing the head and covering with stocking material.

This part was done a couple of weeks ago - note that I'm wearing gloves because it's so cold in my studio!

I'm so-o-o tired...I have got far too much to do. I'm just going to staple a few peg doll packs together and then I will be collapsing in front of the tv.

Elements Doll

Just a couple of quick snaps of a doll I have been working on. There's an Earth one as well, which I haven't photographed yet.

Went to BIP yesterday to do some printing, and prepared a couple of plates to work on next week. That's all really!

And another thing...

Here is a doll I didn't manage to photograph until it was on the gallery wall!



It's Boudica, who changed ner name from Bodicea around the same time Marathons became Snickers and Opal Fruits became Starburst (and haven't been as nice since). She is going to the home of a lovely friend, Jo.

Today we held children's workshops at the gallery. You can see pictures on our group blog, here. If you do visit, click on the last photo and check out Iron Man peeping worriedly over a woman's shoulder...

Pre-Exhibition Stress

It's amazing how just trying to take a few simple photos can make it look as though your house has been ransacked by burglars (who then decided to go somewhere cleaner and with things worth stealing).

Anyway, thanks to Brad's brother Tony (to whom I am truly, truly grateful) I now have some photos of my work so far, some of which I hope may end up as postcards to be sold at the exhibition. (Which is at the Crypt Gallery in Seaford, 6th - 20th December, by the way!). Above is Mossycoat & Mother again. Here's Rosalind, made in homage to Rosalind Franklin, scientist and discoverer of the DNA double helix (as embroidered on her skirt!)

And here's Mossycoat who you've probably seen before...

And here are a couple of Superheroes I made the other day when sick of failing at everything else. Hope you like 'em.

Tony, Val and their gorgeous baby daughter Rebecca have been here in Newhaven for the week. Singing the "Iggle Piggle" song with someone so bloomin' lovely, squidgy and cuddly is enough to cheer anyone up, even me. I highly recommend it!

Once again the pictures won't enlarge when I click on them. Why? Why do computers hate me?

New Doll

This is my latest creation - it sprang from the Mossycoat story. I thought I would try and make Mossycoat as a baby with her mother. I had in mind a textile competition when I made it - the theme is "magic", and I thought it fitted in nicely. I might still enter; the closing date is tomorrow. I have had terrible trouble with the photographs though. To be more precise, I've had terrible trouble with the photographer. (Me). Click to "enbiggen"!

I went to look at some studios last week and I was very nonchalant about it, until I found out there is still a waiting list for one...and now I really want one! We haven't eaten at a table at home for almost a year because of my art and textile antics.

I think I miss going out to work every day. I mean, I could work naked if I wanted and no-one would know. (I don't, by the way). (Well, I suppose when an exhibition is close and I am really pushed for time...) But I think having a studio might make me a bit more professional, and less inclined to watch Jeremy Kyle and eat an entire packet of Hobnobs before I even start on my artwork.

Oh, the doll is all cloth, with painted silk and machine embroidery.

Illustration Friday - "Sour"

Here's a little drawing I did for Illustration Friday - my first go at submitting something, although I always look at it! As the theme was "Sour", I drew the Old Woman Who Lived In a Vinegar Bottle. I like this story - I can identify with the miserable old moo, as I always tend to look forward to moving to my next place! I've done some work on this story before, when I exhibited with the Inky Crows group at Thebes Gallery in Lewes last year -our theme was English Folktales. I made a doll of the character - here's a rather bad pic.




She has decided to stay put and improve her current vinegar bottle, what with the credit crunch, and now she resides in my dining room and keeps me company while I work.

I might start a new series of pics here next week, so watch this space. (Well not this one, but, you know, future ones!)

Have a great rest of week everyone. And Happy Birthday to my dad!

Weekend & Mossycoat

Hello everyone. It's been an eventful few days for me...here are a couple of highlights!

Saturday - a day at Seaford beach. Here are my lovely boys braving the icy sea...

Followed by a family bbq...

...relaxing in what I laughingly call my garden. (No pics of me I'm afraid. I don't want to scare people).

Sunday was spent gardening, and today was just pretty stressful. Not much work got done, except I finally mounted a doll I have been working on...

The doll is all fabric; the face needlesculpted. It's a character from the story "Mossycoat", an English Folktale. The girl's mother makes her a coat from moss and gold thread, which lets her move around and to change to other forms by wishing. I used the idea of the mother making the coat as a theme for the mounting, and collaged some treasures from women's sewing boxes I have into an old drawer. I love sewing boxes and button boxes, and I've been lucky enough to have some of these passed on to me by friends recently. The next theme for our touring Inky Crows exhibition is "English Heroes and Villains" and I think I would like to develop the women's work box idea further for this - I think they have a quiet power and are quite magical. I love the way they are passed down, too. Especially if it's to me!

(By the way, I don't mean to be sexist and suggest that only women have sewing boxes. It's just I have never seen one belonging to a man!)

Now off to my dancing class...don't laugh - it's my only form of exercise other than housework or gardening!