New work

Still using black fabric. This time I wanted to merge my older, compact, solidly filled up, stitch-upon-stitch style with the new, black fabric, more texture oriented, looser collage style. No 3D stars or stitched-over objects in this one but I did collage in a few small pieces of fabric and it is stretched onto a frame. As usual a variety of embroidery techniques are used, but I took some of them further than I usually do: the pointillism, most of which is made with metallic thread, is a mix of colored dots - some areas with a total multi-color mix, and others made up of different hues yet still keeping a single tone. There are a few small sections where the pointillism is on plain, un-colored fabric. The three-dimensionally rendered parts are rendered, I hope, with more realism than I have yet achieved. I make much use of the smokey monofilament thread which is becoming one of my favorite flosses. I'm finding that French knots are a good solution to fill in areas when I have a loss of ideas.

This took longer than expected and I had to leave out some images that I wanted, otherwise I would be working on it indefinitely.

New Work - "Mask / face / head"

I was working on the piece in the last post and decided there needed to be some kind of mask / face / head somewhere. I started creating one on a separate, smaller hoop and about a month later I was finished and ready to add it. However the face / head that I ended up with was just too big. So, I decided to use it as the 'center point' of an entirely different work. I stitched it to some larger fabric pieces but it looked a bit naked all by itself, so I added some collage elements around it. I started with a few small scraps of black fabric and eventually added pieces of velvet, lace, trimmings, and other odds and ends including stitched over shapes, not unlike the star shapes I have been doing in previous work. My inspiration was African and Indian clothing and fabric I have seen adorned with various different items. I wanted to keep everything black on black as I have been doing, and of course a photograph does not capture this well.

The face / mask / head was made with metallic floss - both 'pointillized' and also stitched over with smoky monofilament floss, and white cotton floss. 

New Work

The latest in the black fabric or 'star' series (I guess I could call them that as the star shapes inhabit 3 works so far). I cut the stars out of matte board and stitch through and on top of them, the idea being like gluing an object onto a canvas and painting over it for textural effect, in this case black on black (which is continually difficult to photograph).

In a previous post I talked about hand making multi-colored floss which I use a lot of here.

I also seem to have gotten temporarily possessed with pointillism.

I am expanding the use of collage and I think it will increase.

The human type figure took on a life of its own. It looks like an alien to me (unintentional). The face made from monofilament thread hovering above the figure looks to me like it is being 'beamed' from the alien straight into my brain (also unintentional). I nick-named this piece "The Alien Within".

Making multicolored floss

 I love multicolored floss (sometimes called painters floss), but I could never find any that had the extreme color variation that I really wanted. What I really wanted was to have a single piece of thread that gave a different color for every single stitch. Eventually I realized I just had to make my own.

I bought some white cotton floss and a set of fabric colors and started to experiment.




 I found the best method was to simply paint the colors right on the floss with a thin brush. I also found that it really helped to hold the floss taut and in place. I used tape for this.


I painted one side then flipped it over and did the other side and also filled in any little remaining blank spaces that needed it. This took several days since drying time for each color was needed.

                                                                                                                                                                              

After it was done I un-taped it all, put it in a 

small pouch and tossed it in a dryer for about 

20 minutes or so to set the colors.

I was happy with the result. I get a different color for almost every stitch, and as a bonus many of the stitches have multiple colors in them - some with different colors on each end or sometimes split horizontally down the middle.

I used this 'homemade painters floss' with this piece and this one.

Hopefully this is just the beginning.....

New work

Still continuing to work on black fabric. The center image was taken from an old anatomy diagram, but I changed parts of it to resemble an African mask and I did some more improvisational changing. In the end it turned out looking like some kind of 'un-dead' monster or something.
I used multi-colored metallic thread with transparent monofilament thread layered on top in an attempt to create the look and feel of skin tissue. I also used some cotton multicolored thread that I hand-dyed. I will post about that sometime soon.

The line images surrounding the 'head' I made by laying down a bright red/pink/orangey thread and then stitching over it completely with black (though bits of slight fuzz from the laid thread is visible). This technique is similar to 'couching' but I covered the entire laid thread….. I think it's called a 'trailing stitch', I'm not sure. The black thread on top of black fabric makes an interesting texture.

I stitched the black fabric to black velvet and stretched the velvet onto stretcher bars.

Of course, the monofilament thread over the multicolor metallic as well as the black on black make a fun photography challenge. Seems I'm always making things that are hard to photograph, why stop now?

New work

After taking a considerable amount of time on the last one, I decided to do a series of smaller pieces. Then I decided to specifically do a series of head/face/mask related images. I had seen a beautiful and strong tattoo on the back of someone and I wanted to reproduce my memory of it. I'm sure the tattoo that I saw looks very different from this however.
I experimented with the background by stitching 'smokey' monofilament thread over multicolored metallic thread. Of course the effect isn't shown very faithfully in this flash-photograph reproduction.

New

This is the largest piece I have yet completed in embroidery, 6 1/2" x 6 1/2". Actually I think there is another one with the same size, but not as dense. This one is completely filled solid with stitches.
It started out with the central figure based on an image from an old 50's French cheesecake magazine. Then I had a flash of late 60's comic book sci-fi influence. Then a PBS show about chickens happened. Then all hell broke loose, literally. The human figure plummeting through the demonized depths on the left side is myself.

What I have been trying to avoid is too much use of a black outline on things to define them, to pull them out of the background. I want to make everything look 'painterly'. Adding a black outline looks too 'cartoonish'. I have nothing against cartoon imagery but I just want things to look more painterly. But I couldn't avoid using black outlines in this one.

This piece took too long. I think my stitching may be slowing. Maybe I have reached 'stitching Nirvana' and I no longer am aware or care of the passing time. Nah. Next one is going to be smaller.

Stitching in the Park

This is basically what I do on weekends in the warmer months - take my current hoop, needle and threads and venture out. This is Prospect Park Brooklyn.

New embroidery

I decided to make a plan and do small embroideries (2.5 x 3.5 inches), one a month for this entire year. This took me about a month and a half. Oh well. I'll try some more.
This photo is thoroughly inadequate.

New Hoop video blogging still going

New Hoop, yes more video

…….more of the attempted metallic thread 'tutorial' and continuing on with this work.

New Hoop more video

Continuing on with the new hoop, last seen here. In this 'episode' I attempt a little tutorial about using metallic thread (which will continue in the next post).

Video Explanation - Final

Continuing from here and here about this.
Just wanted to show more super-close-ups. The color is much better in this one!

Video Explanation (continued)

Continuation from this video describing this work.

Pseudo Surreal

This is probably the most difficult thing to 'see' I have made. It must be viewed in person and close. It must be examined and not looked at as a whole. I mean, it CAN be, but......double-click if you can.
I will post a video explanation soon.

Video - even closer close-ups

I was able to get even closer.

Current Hoop - still even more continuing video - close-ups

Finally got a super macro lens for some nice extreme close-up shots.

Current Hoop - even more continuing video

Current Hoop more continuing video

Current Hoop continuing video