The Plight of the Bumblebee - my entry in 'Living Colour! international travelling exhibition

I've had a really productive year this year so far, at least for me :) I've produced two major works, one as posted below for the AQC 'Ten' challenge and the other is this piece, 'The Plight of the Bumblebee' for the 'Living Colour!' juried exhibition.

All works had to address the theme 'Living Colour!' and were to be 100x40cm in size - a quite long and narrow format which really pushed me to design something that would be best suited to this rather unique layout.

The flower petals were painted with Lumiere acrylic paints, the yellow centre is needle felted silk velvet surrounded a machine embroidered hand dye. The bee is painted and wings are made out of Angelina fibres that have been fused, backed on a water soluble stabiliser and then free machine stitched. The dew drops were created with plexi glue and opal transfer foil. Thread painting and quilting were used to further enhance the surface.

My artist statement for 'Plight of the Bumblebee' is:

 The amount of variance of colour and design on the Earth is so breathtakingly amazing and yet so often taken for granted. I wanted to show the beauty of a unique flower and how nature has allowed for so much contrast and detail, right down to the smallest dew drop or insect. The artwork's name reflects on the current significant population decline of bees worldwide, an issue for us all given they pollinate so much of the food we eat.
Techniques & Materials: White cotton was painted with metallic and iridescent acrylic paint and fused onto the backing fabric. Extra depth was added with translucent fabric paints. The middle of the flower incorporated machine embroidery, machine needle punched silk velvet and a fringe created with a tailor tack foot on the sewing machine. The dewdrops have been glued and foiled. Bee wings are made from moulded Angelina fibres. I have also used a double wadding trapunto technique on the flower petals to give extra depth.

The exhibition premiers this week in Ausralia from Thursday April 10 at the AQC in Melbourne at the Royal Exhibition buildings. To see other venues and dates please view:

http://livingcolourtextiles.com

Tutorial - Foiling Fabric

I needed to create a moon for an art quilt I'm currently working on. I wanted something that really glimmered and shone but still had some texture. After toying a few different ideas (lumiere paint, tyvek, lutrador, angelina layers, textiva, glass organza, rainbow shimmer chiffon etc etc) I decided to use some silver glitter white cotton layered with some jones tones foil.

The foil is washable and can be put down in a few ways. I used heat and bond fusible web to get a flat even coverage.

Here's how:

1. You will need: Non stick baking paper, backing fabric, jones tones foil (from spotlight or speciality art / craft / textile stores), fusible web, scissors and an iron.

2. Layer your backing fabric (right side up), and fusible web (paper side up) between baking paper. Iron to fuse the web to the fabric. Use the dry setting on your iron.

I used a heavier weight fusible web as I didn't want any areas without foil. A lighter weight like misty fuse or vliesofix will only have the foil adhere to the lines of web. This can give a nice effect but wasn't what I wanted for this.

 

3. When cool peel off the backing paper. This will have given the fabric a very shiny laminated type effect that can be useful in itself. However we're going to use this to adhere the foil to.

4. Place the foil, shiny side up on top of the web covered fabric. Still work between baking paper to protect the iron and quickly press to glue to the web. Be careful not to iron for very long as you will change the foils texture and lessen its iridescence.

5. When cool peel off the shiny cellophane top layer from the foil. The foil itself should have stuck firmly to the web. If it hasn't you may need a little more heat from the iron.

6. Trace the design you wish to cut from your newly foiled cloth onto it's back. I used a water soluble marker in case it showed through on the edges, but a light line with a grey lead should work fine too.

7. Ta Dah! One moon. I attached mine to the quilt with Vliesofix before stitching. I kept heat on for longer then i should have when ironing this directly to the foil and you can see the change in texture. Since the irridescence is still intact and I was aiming to add texture with stitching anyway I decided it actually worked well for what I wanted. You can see how it differs from the original foiling as I have placed a piece of that to the left of the moon.  I've used a holographic silver thread for the freemotion quilting.

You can also foil by layering it on top of bonding powder for a glittery effect or rubbing it over dry glue like Jones Tones Plexi glue for a 3D raised effect. Share