Printing

I've become quite fed-up with the price I have to pay for clothes (another downside to being overweight) so I 've been making some tops lately (with the help from my friend Annette ) using fabric bought at the market. Last week I decided to print my own fabric. The first example is a beautiful quality linnen which I dyed in Procion before printing with a lovely leaf stamp using Trapsuutjies fabric paint. I love the depth which can be created by playing with the colours.

This second piece was screenprinted on grey jersey. Now to get down to sewing, but first I'm on a huge mission to organise our personal lives : weeding through paperwork and throwing out the irrelevant stuff, keeping chaos firmly outside the door of this house. Hateful job, but someone has to do it, and we both tend to turn a blind eye. So I'm really getting my head down today to try and get as much done as I can. The reward is going to be able to direct all my energy towards working in the studio by the end of the week (hopefully).

Doing it again

Remember I told you about the aches and pains caused by emroidering those ladies? Well, I've been in pain since about October, sometimes barely able to lift my right arm. Eventually, two days ago, I stopped being stubborn and went to my GP. She diagnosed tendonitis and gave me anti-imflammation pills. After only one pill, my arm started feeling better and now, 4 pills later, I'm almost as good as new and able to sleep through the night again! Well, enough said about being pig-headed about visiting the doctor! What is more astonishing is that I'm doing it again!

I started playing around with another of my monoprints a while ago, just doodling with the sewing machine. Then I decided to try and make something (i.e. a complete quilt) and pieced together some fabric.
And now I've ended up with a large piece that just needs to be embroidered by hand! The minute I started I could feel the same points in my shoulder and neck playing up. Then I realised that the table and bar stool combination in my studio was the culprit. All to do with incompatible heights, causing terrible posture and tension. Not doing the embroidery and putting aside the quilt is obviously not an option. So after trying out different places, I've opted for the dining room. It seems to be working. Have to finish this before I'm back to square one!

By the way, I'm part of a new textile art group called Voyageart. There are 13 of us from all around the world : http://voyagearttextiles.blogspot.com/. Very exciting.

Shwe-shwe: " seeking wisdom "

It's been almost a year since I last blogged and I won't be surprised if everybody's forgotten about me. But, I'm just going to start again and carry on as before. The blog will be more about my personal creative journey.
This is my first quilt inspired by shwe-shwe fabric from South Africa. When I turned 21, my mother made me a pinafore with very traditional blue shwe-shwe, a fabric mainly used to make uniforms for black women who worked in white households during the apartheid years. Won't get into politics except to say we never had a "maid". But I loved the fabric. Last year, it so happened that I was helping my friend Magie Relph (from the African Fabric Shop) to fold some shwe-shwe fat quarters during the show in Ste. Marie-aux-Mines and I got all carried away, wanting to get home and print on it. She generously gave me a few fat quarters and here is some of what I have done with it so far. I printed the shield and then started piecing with procion-dyed brown and green fabric. I then printed the images in black, but they were too much in the background. So, I started embroidering, spending so much time on its that I started developing all sorts of aches and pains! But I'm pleased with the result.

I call this quilt " Seeking wisdom" because the young Xhosa girls seem to be listening to what the older women are telling them.

Daisies screen printed and machine embroidered, and, below, just some printing done with Adinkra stamps. These fabrics will eventually find their way into quilts.