Art Spirals - fabric_art

Summertime Wall Pocket

noreply@blogspirit.com (Rachel Murphree) — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 17:25:00 -0600

I made a fabric cone for Wendy's birthday this year. My aim was to pack as much glorious summer color in it and whimsy and fun, to brighten up the (occasional) day of gloomy weather in England. I think it turned out cool.

The curly thing hanging in front of the back is the fringe edge I had to trim away to make it a fringe. It just curled up so cute, I had to put it on. I’ve been wanting to use those vintage paper flowers for the longest time too, and I think pom pom fringe is just plain old fun!

Another friend called it a "clown in a box". That's fitting.

There are more wallpockets to see too.

Background ready and a quandry

noreply@blogspirit.com (Rachel Murphree) — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 12:59:46 -0600

From Felted peaches

I strip pieced a background from a recycled silk skirt and cotton fabric. I meant to have the lines be more random but they ended up looking uniform, kind of. Now I'm working on samples to figure out how to attach them with thread painting to the background.

And now for the quandry. Here's my yoga tree.

From YogaTree

It started out as a Bead Journal Project 2" square concerning yoga. You can see the square in the middle. I decided to put it on this beautiful piece of hand dyed fabric from Anne Marie and stitched my heart out on the tree and embroidered the trunk. Then I thought I would like to make it as though you are looking through an arch and seeing it. So I added more fabric to it, don't like the seams, but that's what happens sometime, my project gets bigger than I expected. anyway... so then I've sewn on this beautiful vintage trim (from a vendor at IQF) and I've stitched it on several different ways and I'm not happy with any of them.

So I've decided to lay it out and try two ways and see what you think. What do you like, or how should I handle it? I don't want to cut it before I know I'll like it, so that's why I'm trying the trim, but I think seeing the rest of it outside the arch makes it hard to visualize. Hmmm...maybe I could stitch a stucco feeling/looking background and put it on top of it, creating an arch opening in the stucco top piece. hmmm..

anyway, here are some ideas.

From YogaTree

Here's another of the squares done for this project, this one celebrating a winter play day. Shh, don't tell anyone, but this is as far as I got on the BJP project....

From A Year in Beads

Peaches!

noreply@blogspirit.com (Rachel Murphree) — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 19:13:00 -0600

Well, today was a VERY productive day...following four days of massive art supply reorganization and assessing what I have and where I want to go! I was considering renting an artist studio, did a final reorganization to see if I really needed it, and realized with creative rearranging, I can stay right where I am, using my bedroom as a studio, but having places for baskets for each work in progress, and cleaning up after I'm done.

I think this was a suggestion in the last Studios issue of Clothpaperscissors, allow 10 minutes to clean up before your alloted studio time is up. Another trick I did was to include tools with the supply in question. For example: I tied scissors and tape near the gift wrapping section of the closet, the eyelet setting tool with eyelets in the Altered Book section, etc. I also made a spreadsheet with all my supplies and their location so that I can easily do a keyword search or scan the alphabetical list and see where something is. Hopefully this will avoid double buying of supplies (with the extra money I would have paid in rent -- Credit Wendy with that suggestion!)

From Felted peaches

So, my four works in progress are a journal quilt on Carlsbad Caverns, another on the Gila Cliffs, a larger piece on childhood memories of South Allentown, and a "happy" piece of needle felting in yellows/pinks/oranges. So I dragged out the South Allentown piece, of which I have fabric gathered and a study of porch steps finished, and pulled out shiva painted blobs I painted before, with thoughts they would become peaches, and sure enough, it WORKED!

Here's what I started with, shiva paintsticks blobs on a textured type of interfacing. Don't know what it really is, an estate sale find.

From Felted peaches

And here's the reverse side:

From Felted peaches

What I learned from this is that what I thought was the front side (i.e. the side I was working on) became the backside because the fuzziness of having the fibers protrude from being meshed into it was really what I wanted. I used images of how to paint watercolor peaches to help with the lights and curves, and when I attach these to the quilt and add some extra threadpainting to supplement them, I think they'll be smashing! And I using the 'back" as the finished piece let's me use eyelash and other fibers that look too stringy when embellished and the front is used, but if they're the right color, they look fabulous on the fuzzy back. I did the leaves from the finished side, so they don't have as fuzzy a look. one of the stems is a piece of brown/gray velvet.

I'm also pleased with scheduling studio time worked so well for me. I scheduled three hours of time, turned off the phones and the computer, and just had fun (once I got over my initial strange fear of getting back into working). how odd. I even considered puttering more on the reorganization and never starting the actual WORK/FUN of it all. Ever have that happen to you?

Fall fabric postcards and ATCs

noreply@blogspirit.com (Rachel Murphree) — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 20:27:56 -0700

From ClothPaperStudio projects

Tweed and Glitter. Fall scrap postcard.

From ClothPaperStudio projects

Fall Finery #1 scrap postcard

From ClothPaperStudio projects

Fall Finery #2 scrap postcard.

From ClothPaperStudio projects

And these are fall ATCs from the scraps from the scrap postcard project! This is for a swap in the Clothpaperstudio yahoo group

Painted embossed wallpaper

noreply@blogspirit.com (Rachel Murphree) — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 12:50:15 -0700

From Painting

These are embossed wallpapers that I've painted with golden fluid acrylics, and some sorbet paints. My plan is to stitch into them with machine and/or hand, some little seed beads, and then make them into boxes or box ornaments. My friend has an absolutely LOVELY book, highly recommend, by Janet Edmonds called Three Dimensional Embroidery, and there's this little box project in it. Google books has it has a preview page here: http://snipurl.com/565yy [books_google_com] Hopefully I can work on this project more this weekend, and be back with at least in progress boxes!

Yoga Shiva paintstick postcard

noreply@blogspirit.com (Rachel Murphree) — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 07:11:00 -0600

From Shiva

I'm calling this yoga because the colors are what I breathe in (the
cooler aquas blues ocean colors) and I breathe out the warm yellow
alive greens. This is how I visualize myself breathing when practicing.

I pulled out bits and bobs and combined them, the blue petals on a
stem are actually the freezer paper pattern I used to make the leaves
for the other shiva piece that became the bird of paradise postcards I
made earlier for this swap, shown here.

From Shiva

One drop at a time

noreply@blogspirit.com (Rachel Murphree) — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 12:45:00 -0600

Earlier in the month, I had a wild hair, or is that hare? (insert grin), that I would plan, start, complete and submit a journal quilt to be juried into the International Quilt Festival show in Houston this fall. The theme is the elements, I worked out an idea in my sketchbook, full blown, fit the theme, reasonable size (17x22 inches), the only kicker is that it's due August 1st. With my life, work, kids, etc. I finally realized that I wasn't going to make this goal...or if I did, it would be to the detriment of something ELSE in my life, and everything else is much more important. BUT I do still love the idea, and a deadline is good for me, so I considered it. in the end, I'm doing it for me, and we'll see if I want to submit it anywhere. And this way, I get to talk about it on my blog and show pictures.

The quilt is about our trip in June to Carlsbad Caverns, which is an amazing place, if you haven't been. Here are some photos I took, and I"m using them as inspiration.

I just love the texture and possibilities here. So I gathered all my fabrics that I thought would work, graded them light to dark, took black and white photos, just to double check, and started out. I cut a snippet of each, stapled it to a board, and used it to shop for varigated thread. Great idea! Found this purse at a garage sale for $1, washed it, thinking it might fall apart, which it started to, but that's ok. the bulk is great rock texture, the threads will be wonderful to couch on for embroidery.

So here's the start of the top 1/3 of the piece, the background for spires of columns/stalagmites in front, and a path down. I can see how doing this on an embellisher would be a great technique, but I'm managing to incorporate and integrate snips of other fabrics into the stitching to show variations and veins in the rock. it's a start. you can see the left section has a piece of fabric that's not stitched down yet. It'll require many layers, just as mother nature required to make it the showcase it is!

Then, the other day I was playing with Shiva paintsticks and got a lovely russet brown color and thought...this might work for the detailing of the rock. I pulled out a piece of what I think is interfacing, with neat ridges already on it, and made a iron on ripped stencil from freezer paper and I think it'll be a good start for the base to mimic the very first picture above. With FME to do the shadows and crevices on top of the paint...hmmm....might work.

And silhouettes of the kids will be in there somewhere too, my little explorers.

Silk cuff

noreply@blogspirit.com (Rachel Murphree) — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 15:30:00 -0600

Here's what I made from my first silk fusion lessonWendy gave me this spring. I stitched it onto a piece of yellow suede, covered it with water soluble fabric to not get my sewing foot trapped in the fuzzy layers, without thinking. So I tried to use a brush with water to dissolve the fabric, but I wasn't happy with it, so I dunked it. It dried, of course, the silk paper isn't as soft and wonderful as it was, but that's ok. I then cut up squares from the lime green dyed tablecloth used to make the postcard, shown yesterday, stitched it on with beads and sequins, through a copper metal lace ribbon. Then stitched it onto the blank, and glued the ultrasuede backing onto the inside. Fiddly work, but I like the outcome...although, it may be too hot to wear it here in the summer!

Porch Study

noreply@blogspirit.com (Rachel Murphree) — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 15:26:43 -0600

I"m pretty proud of these porch steps. This is a study for a quilt I'm doing, and may end up being one of the pieces of it. I'm following along the lines of Beryl Taylor's Mixed Media, making small items in the same colorways/themes and then experiencing the unknown joy of how they will go together. So, these steps are from three different values of recycled fabrics, the pale highlights are actually from the distressed creases near the pocket of a pair of stretch jeans, cut using paper template from my drawing, temporarily sprayed in place and then free motion embroidered. now on to peaches....

Salvaged Threads

noreply@blogspirit.com (Rachel Murphree) — Sun, 15 Jun 2008 11:05:00 -0600

I sent away for an envelope of cool sheer fabrics from Cynthia St. Charles. She's hosting a Salvaged Threads juried art quilt exhibition and the deadline to enter a small quilt is in January 2009. See the link for more info. She's gotten a whole BUNCH of sheer fabrics donated and for $2, you can get an envelope of random pieces and you use those in a quilt submitted to the exhibition. Here's what I received this week. Some fun stuff in it! The wheels are turning in my brain.... LOVE the lime green one!