Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Moving along on small tapestry for Land...

But first, last steps on the just completed piece...



I spent most of today with finishing details of the large tapestry just completed--stitching on velcro, attaching hook velcro side to wood bar, inserting eye screws, final pressing (oh, yeah...the big red stitches are basting thread holding on the velcro covered twill tape while I stitch it down). By late afternoon I'd completed that so I was able to weave a short while on the small piece for the Land exhibit in Australia.

Meredith should be by tomorrow or early Thursday to begin weaving a bit on the Land tapestry. I'll labeled it as a collaborative weaving when I send it off. I've never had anyone work on a tapestry of mine before and I'm excited to have it happen. Meredith is proving to be a very good weaver so I hope she enjoys the experience as much as I think I will. She'll be working on it while I deliver my pieces to the Piedmont Craftsmen new members exhibit to be on display March 7-31 at the gallery in Winston-Salem.


I'm using a portion of an earlier design, manipulated by enlarging and cropping, rearranging the parts. The design concept was about herbicide use; the image was from photographs I'd taken of living and of dead leaves that I cut into strips and wove, then drew on with prismacolor pencils. The paper weaving was photocopied, enlarged, cut apart and rewoven. This design uses further enlargements of selected portions from the earlier version.

The piece is about 4" h x 33" w. There's a small hem area at bottom and top (the solid light green woven above the white cotton header). Three sections are at the 4" level now and I'll probably finish this side before I leave on Thursday. That way Meredith can work on areas to the right on Friday. We should be able to finish the piece and cut it off by Monday night. Since I understand the tapestries will be pinned in place at the exhibit I won't worry about attaching velcro to the back--will turn back the hems and whip stitch in place.


I'd mentioned I'm using a strand of some orange with all the bobbins...and the orange isn't always the same. I have an 8 epi cotton seine twine sett for warp and am using four fold of wool as the weft.

I'm working mostly with slits, sewing as I go. A tiny bit of eccentric weft is being used, as well as small amounts of hatching...for the horizontal lines it gives, and some single interlock. All colors are blends.

2 comments:

  1. Hi Tommye! Nice to see the collaborative work in progress. The Trees work is still that gorgeous. When I look at it, I can almost feel the light falling on me too.

    Love, AK

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  2. I love this one. The concept and the colors. Just beautiful.

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