My reflections on Part two – Surface and stitch
To prepare my Surface and Stitch unit of work for assessment I went right back to the beginning of my blog and sketch work to remind me of what I have done.
What a journey! (and its only just begun!) I can safely say with relief and a bit of pride that I have definitely progressed.
I did not realise at the start of my journey that it would be at least as psychological as it was creative. Without the support of the various OCA student groups it would have been difficult to overcome the emotional blocks, the constant self questioning and the small demon on my shoulder that says no. It was a surprise to find that my creative journey is to be so emotionally challenging, this module has taken me way longer than I wanted it to but I feel that I now understand far more about myself and my working processes. I love that this course is awakening my creativity and pushing me forward.
At the start of ex2.2 the Paper manipulation library, I’m not sure that I fully absorbed the importance of the sentence –
By working to select, manipulate and transform paper first, you can carry out an initial translation of your drawings’ qualities into something more malleable and tactile. This will allow you to move gently from drawings on paper to working with paper as a substrate.
I was so focussed on my difficulty of choosing drawings that I started manipulating paper surfaces without a specific drawing translation in mind – so no surprises , my transition from drawing to stitch was not as smooth as it could be!! I’m terribly stubborn about doing things in order – I think in this case, I could have progressed more smoothly by manipulating paper and stitching from one drawing first, then working on other manipulations and translations using what I learnt from the first one. My final two manipulations made a sideways leap and I think that stitching on to bark, and an origami model worked really well.
I feel that I successfully achieved variety of stitch across my paper
samples, I have also filled my mind with other techniques that I’d like to try.
The nature of paper made it difficult to achieve dense stitching as the paper tore easily, particularly the tracing paper. I overcame this by laminating the tracing paper and chose stitch work that kept the structural integrity of the substrate.
I can definitely observe the Improvement of my technical and visual skills. I experimented with different media, used a good range of materials and techniques and discovered many more that I haven’t had time to use yet. I now realise how important it is to draw from life rather than relying on photographs, the camera certainly has its place in research but photos definitely don’t capture the entire essence of an object, time , place. This was really evident in the drawings of archive textiles, the drawings of the pieces I own were far more expressive than the Kachin outfit that I drew in the museum. The developments from these drawings were not as richly detailed as the work based on the Akha jacket.
My use of sketch books can certainly improve, I am still using my note book effectively to record ideas and observations but would like to develop my visual drawings.
I started little book of compositions to develop my understanding. It is tiny and I think a really accessible way of developing good sketch book habits by giving myself a focus with pages that I can create quite quickly during my terribly short work lunch breaks. Its already come in useful – I used golden ratio and rule of thirds really effectively in my stitched fabric pieces.
I feel that my fabric pieces have undoubtedly benefited from the process of researching and experimenting. I struggle with discernment! I find it very difficult to choose drawings to develop, I know that this will improve with more experience. I think that having developed textiles from drawings, this will in turn feed into how I draw and record my initial observations. A growing understanding of composition, form, texture, colour will also support the flow of work, enabling me to present work in a more coherent manner. It was interesting to work in my A3 sketch book but I probably won’t choose this method again. Apart from the paper turning out to be a bit shoddy, flipping backwards and forwards between drawings isn’t useful. Rediscovering my little handmade books has reminded me how much more joyful and personal presenting a body of work could be.
A very interesting and reflective post, full of good ideas too J
Thanks Julie