How I Work

I know I've talked about the way I work before, and in the current series I'm working on I have a really good example of that.  This first piece is in the early stages, where I've decided what I want to do, but haven't finished deciding how I want to do it.  I've dyed the fabric black, then bleached out what I want.  If I leave large black areas in the piece, such as this one, I usually go back in and overdye the black,  because it often looks dark green or navy after the first dye.  This will sit on my design wall for a few days while I think about the next step.

Sometimes I will add in color before I stitch it, sometimes I wait until it has shrunk up a bit after washing to add the color.  It depends if I want a more solid look or not.  On the piece below, I am stitching first, then I'll wash it and thick about what I want to do next.

This is a piece I'm in the middle of stitching. My design wall is over to the right and I spend a lot of time glancing at it during the day.  Mindless row stitching gives me time to think about what I want to do with the other pieces I'm working on.

The piece below is done with the machine stitching, and after washing it a few times to shrink it, I added some color with fabric paint.  Now I'm doing some hand stitching, and thinking about how I want to finish it. The top two pieces and this piece are part of a series within a series, from the body parts http://aviewwithin.wordpress.com, I'm working on a mini series about in vitro fertilization.

This last piece is done, and I'm applying the backing and sleeve.  I never used to do the back and sleeve until something was accepted into an exhibit, but I really find it boring and hate doing several at once.

So there you have it.  Five pieces in various stages of making.  I don't always have this many pieces going at one time, but I rarely have less than three.  I think I make better art when my mind can shift around from process to process.




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