Just because …

it was a lovely sunny day, and it seemed ages since we’d been out together, we decided it was time for a trip.

And on lovely sunny days, our thoughts turn to the seaside. Even in January.

So, after taking one look at these on Romsey Rd and deciding to take a different route - we went to Bournemouth, to the Russell-Cotes Art Gallery. After a very pleasant and reasonably priced lunch in their cafe, we meandered round the gallery.

They have an exhibition on at the moment called ‘Food for Thought’, which combines items from their collections with some connection to food, and the work of 4 contemporary artists on similar themes. To be honest, some of the connections are a bit tenuous, but that made it more interesting – the last thing I wanted to look at was a room full of Victorian paintings of food. There were plenty of those, but also some interesting ethnographic artefacts connected with agriculture, hunting and cannibalism. Just what someone with a new found interest in ethnography wanted.

The art works I liked best were by Paul Amey - this and one a bit like this, but with crockery under the net rather than crabs.

For those who don’t know, the Russell-Cotes Collection was started by a Victorian hotelier, Merton Russell-Cotes, and his wife Annie, and is displayed, in part, in their house. I think it is fair to say that they had more money than taste, but there are some gems amongst the oversized nudes, and you can explore a high Victorian house which combines ‘Renaissance with Italian and old Scottish baronial … Moorish, Japanese and French decorative styles alongside contemporary Victorian design’. Yes, it is every bit as OTT as it sounds.

If you visit and you are the right sex, don’t miss the ladies’ loo in the house, [not the one in the modern extension].

Going round in circles.

 

I realised after my last post that I hadn’t mentioned our trip out on Friday – so the first circle is posting about Saturday and then going back to Friday …

Our trip was very enjoyable, although it might not have been. We set out to visit this, armed with a grid reference and a printout, dated June, that said it would be in place for about two months. We had an enjoyable drive down to that bit of Wiltshire and drove round in circles trying to find it – without success. [A further Google – which I should have done before we set out, revealed that it has been dismantled :(]

However, in our unsuccessful attempts to find something which no longer exists, we noticed signposts to somewhere which I have been saying we ought to visit for years – ever since I first realised it wasn’t that far away.

 

This is Stourhead, which is every bit as magical as I thought it would be. We managed a circular tour of the lake, but missed out the house, as as we didn’t have the legs for that as well, I took a few photographs of views, trees, flowers, stones and shadows.                

And us. My hips aren’t really that big, I like to believe.

 

So disaster was turned into triumph and we had a great day out, topped off by NT tea and cake, and a visit to the Stourhead Farm Shop – well, we couldn’t resist a sign which promised 31 varieties of cheese. [We only bought 3 – the Partridge Blue is great but we haven’t tried the other two – Smoke Acre and Wyfe of Bath - yet.]

And when I got home I had enough energy left to play around with a few images. The top one is a photo I took at Highcliffe last month. I printed it on newspaper painted with Inkaid [middle image], then scanned it as a black and white image and printed it again on black paper painted with Inkaid. The bottom two will be added to the tally.

I suppose that’s more of a progression than a circle – but the next one I worked with is definitely circular.

 

I don’t think I showed you the top image – an almost proper drawing, starting from a magazine photo, which I made  a few days ago. As usual I scanned it as a negative [second image], and then, as I was in the mood, printed it on black paper and Inkaid [third image]. That one is going into the homework book too – but just to see what happened, I scanned it as a negative again – and it’s almost back to the beginning.

I really like printing on the Inkaid – on the newspaper it makes it stiff enough to go through the printer and partly obliterates what’s underneath, which is good, and on any paper it adds texture to the print. Ever the cheapskate, I’m thinking of trying paper painted or sponged with emulsion paint, to see how that works.

I think that brings the total number of ‘drawings’ up to 55 …

We’ve got all the time in the world [maybe] …

so how come we end up with all out appointments – optician, hairdresser, dentist – crammed into the same few days?

Sheer bad management, obviously. And of course the timing of each was inconvenient – not enough time to go home and come out again – although I hate doing that – but more time than we  needed to get from one to the other.

We did manage to fill one overlong gap with a slightly belated celebratory lunch for our 39th wedding anniversary. Nothing too ambitious, we’re saving that for next year.

And I took more photos of the fencing across the road from the gym. I find the distortions formed by the corrugations quite fascinating. Wish I could find my ribbler…

 

 

We filled another gap by visiting the Wildlife Photographer of the Year exhibition at the Discovery Centre, although it’s not really our sort of thing. [Nothing against wildlife or photography, just not inclined to go and look at them. I like cake but I wouldn’t go to a cake decorating exhibition, either.]

But we enjoyed it nevertheless – some beautiful and thought-provoking images and a whiff of scandal - what more could you ask?

Yes – scandal – the winning image [top of this page] has been disqualified.

We still haven’t finished with appointments, as Wensleydale has an operation on Saturday, to repair the damage to his knee, as far as it can be repaired . We know it isn’t going to work wonders, but it may make his walking a bit easier. He also got his disabled parking badge today – despite having been lame for half a century he’s never applied for one. [Typical bloody-minded independent Yorkshireman.] After his injury last autumn and a lot of nagging encouragement from his family, he applied for a blue badge, and to his surprise, though no-one else’s, got one – which will widen our horizons a bit. If I can persuade him to actually use it.

With all our coming and going, not much in the way of drawing, bookmaking or needlework has been achieved, although I have finished these pages, and made a start on the cover.

I am very pleased with these, and have come to like the colours – although I don’t think I’d necessarily use them again! I’m going to count these as 4 drawings, so that's no's. 43–46. I'm almost half way to 100 and a month and a half to go. As you can see, the pages curl, which is a result of pulling the whipped edges too tight. Actually, i don’t dislike that – although I think I will experiment with the soldering iron for the next one.

I have also been thinking about the definition of drawing I found on this site:

‘…  drawing is seen to be any form of marking a surface with a view to creating a two-dimensional image.’

It’s that bit about ‘2 dimensional’ I’m pondering upon.

You may have come across Cheeming Boey’s drawings on disposable cups – 3D surface, but 2D drawings.

And I can see that ‘drawing’ 3D shapes with wire, say, is probably sculpture.

But what about this?  One of my pieces of sun printing, free machined to felt and then washed, so the unsewn areas of felt shrank and the fabric puffed up. Marks on the surface? Yes – but the image isn’t 2D. I think. Possibly 2.5D?

 

My original intention was to make this into a one sheet book with added hand embroidery – and I still might – but can I also count it as a drawing? Oh, decisions, decisions…

Still, we are intending to go for a long outing tomorrow, while we can, before W’s hospital appointment and recuperation, so I shall have to defer such decisions for a while.

Bobs and bits

I haven't been posting much because I haven't had a lot to post about, I'm afraid - but a few things came together today, so here I am.

First - we had a Friday trip this week. [We had a Tuesday one as well but that was a routine trip to Bournemouth so doesn't really count.]

The Discovery Centre [that place again - if the cakes were as good as the coffee I'd probably move in] has an exhibition of Hockney etchings. They are illustrations to Grimms' fairy stories, which Hockney made in the 60s. It is a touring exhibition from the Hayward and seems to have been on the road for several years so you may have seen it elsewhere. [I picture someone at the Hayward saying 'Didn't we have some Hockney etchings? Whatever happened to them?']

But I digress. As usual. The etchings are well worth seeing. There is one of a rose which I would dearly love to own if I was rich enough - and I don't like pictures of flowers. If you want to learn from a master how to use line and make marks - get yourself to the Discovery Centre.

On a more mundane level, I have finished my 'Stellar' quiltet for the 'Round the World in 20 Quilts' group. Sort of. I cannot reveal it all until the end of the month but here is a rather bad photo of a corner of it. This is one of the Inkaid pieces which I thought would be too stiff to hand embroider, although as you can see I managed to do some. It is sort of finished because I think it needs more fly stitches.

i am also working on these from Maggie Grey's on-line class for owners of her book 'Textile Translations'. These will eventually become a book, although they look like witches hats' to me. They are made of Vilene, believe it or not. I don't want to give away Maggie's techniques - if you want to know you'll have to buy the book - but there is a lot of stuff on there. Not much stitch, but a lot of crud - er - artistically applied mixed media.

You may notice, although the photo isn't clear, that the pieces are edged with zig zag. I wanted to edge them with blanket stitch but for some reason my sewing machine did not want to do blanket stitch on the Vilene. I tried everything I could think of - I even cleaned it and changed the needle - but no go. It would do FME. It would do zig zag. It would do blanket stitch on other fabrics. but on the Vilene? No.

Books are also being made for the Contemporary Textiles Workshop. Yes, in the plural. To make a cover, I stuck some monoprinted brown paper on Vilene, foiled it, added some monoprinted Lutradur, stitched it, zapped it with a heat gun, hated it. Threw it in the bin - then fished it out because I thought I could make some more samples from it - samples of what not to do.

So I made another piece on felt - except I'd run out of foil. I called in at our local craft shop, 'Creative Crafts' today to get some more but they had every colour except gold. So they persuaded me to try a new line of paint they had just got in - 'Precious Metal Colour'. This is the result - and the photo doesn't do it justice. The paint ain't cheap. but it just glides on - and the manufacturer claims you can use it on all sorts of surfaces including glass and plastic.

This afternoon I sat down to work on the witches' hats - looked at the first monoprint piece - and thought - it's not so bad after all. That's why I am now making two books.