Textile artist Margaret Stanford took us on an illuminating journey through the creation of a piece of textile work from the original idea to the finished item. She wishes to create a unique handmade book for her sister, soon to retire, and who had taken up felting as a hobby. The book was to be a resource of her samples and inspirations. Margaret made up the signatures for the book to include pockets for her sister's work. The cover and binding took much longer however. Margaret started with photos of dogwood, beautiful red leaves and stems. She played with these in Photoshop, creating a variety of effects. These pictures led on to experiments with charcoal, oil pastels, coloured pencils and various papers to work out compositions and textures. She made leaf stencils, printed on fabrics, stitched and quilted to try out her ideas. She made leaves out of silk paper, and end papers with gouache and cling film. Eventually it all came together in a delightful and original book, which her sister will be bound to treasure and fill with her own ideas. It was fascinating seeing the steps from idea to completion and the pathways the creative mind takes to achieve something beautiful.
 |
| Isolating part of a photo of dogwood |
 |
| Manipulating in Photoshop |
 |
| Trying out ideas in paper and paint |
 |
| Making silk paper leaves |
 |
| A sample with stencils and quilting |
 |
| The finished cover |
 |
| The lovely end papers |
 |
| Signatures with pockets |
More of Margaret's work can be seen at her website www.clothpaperstone.com
No comments:
Post a Comment