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Whether you feel that your soul
is pleased by the conception or contemplation
of harmonies or that your mind is stimulated by
the aspect of magnificent problems or whether
you are content to have fun in trying to observe
and depict the jolly things you see, the vistas
of possibility are limited only by the shortness
of life. Every day you may make progress; every
day you may be fruitful, yet there will stretch
out before you an ever-lengthening, ever-ascending,
ever-improving path. You know you will never get
to the end of the journey. But this, so far from
discouraging, only adds to the joy and glory of
the climb."- Winston
Churchill, Painting as a Pastime
Couldn’t have said it better!
Working in my studio relaxes me completely (blood
pressure goes down 20 points) and new ideas flood
into my consciousness. My dream is to be in my
studio full time, honing my skills, teaching and
exploring methods and techniques.
My frustration has been to confine
the huge surreal landscapes to a framing size.
Working in 2 mediums helps!
The Process:
- Contemplate idea combination
– sometimes the background comes first
and sometimes the image for the glass
- Obtain idea or picture of landscape
or background – usually my own photos
- Find image for sandbrushing
- Pick colours of fabrics from
the stash
- Decide size and draw landscape
to scale
- Fine tune colours with sandbrushed
glass
- Experiment with placement of
sandbrushing via positive cut out
Appliqué fabrics
- Embellish with embroidery,
appliqué, fabric paint, foiling and/or
beads Fabric scape is completed as a stand alone
art piece
- Reverse image for sandbrushing
and transfer to resist material
- Position resist on glass &
cut out with a variety of exacto knives; deciding
as I work which parts will be sharp lines and
which ghosted
- Sand brush image, placing on
fabric several times to check.
- Clean glass, polish & frame
fabricscape with sandbrushed glass
- Result is 2 standalone pieces
- combined.
- Time? Depends on complexity
of piece. A recent 28” x 40” piece
took about 225 hours.
For tools, I use a sewing machine and an embroidery
machine, a computer, photo resist developer,
pressure washer, and a small sand etcher and
compressor
- I back the finished work with
acid free foam core and recommend that originals
be kept away from direct light.
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