Join me for a Textural Beading Online Workshop

I will be teaching an online version on Textural Beading and Embellishment Workshop this spring/summer at Joggles. No matter where you live, now you can take a course to learn something new or improve your technique, via the internet.

If you’ve never taken an online course, here’s how it works: You sign up and pay the class fee. A few weeks before the class starts, the folks at Joggles will send you the supply list. On the first day of the class, you get an e-mail that gives you information and passwords for signing up to participate in the class forums. Here, you can write messages to the instructor, share your thoughts, progress and photos of your work with your fellow students.

You don't have to participate in the forums, or you can just lurk and read your fellow students’s comments, so it is perfect for people who are a little introverted, too!

Each week of the class, you receive an e-mail with the lesson in PDF format. As you work through the lessons, you interact with me and the other students, share photos of your work, and of course can get individual help.

In the six weeks, you will begin with the basics of beading embellishments and create a collection of small samplers. The workshop will include all the techniques to finish the final project, the figure above, that you have seen in my previous blog posts. Please join me this summer for some beading. We should have great fun.

Introduction to Textural Beading and Embellishment, starts June 10, and costs $60 for six lessons. Visit www.joggles.com for details on the class.

Progress on Fiber & Beaded Figure

Last week - I had an unexpected trip to Arkansas, to attend to some family issues and got a chance to do some very focused beading on the figure that I have been working on - and after a good 8 hours of beading -my neck is cranky and the piece it is now finished!

Here is a detail of the head and face. I don't yet have a "name" for this figure, but she feels very peaceful. I like how my first attempt at a paper clay face turned out. The piece, took a few turns that weren't expected. The head and hair were difficult to work on the finished and stuffed piece and I moved to a curved beading needle to keep my sanity.

I am teaching a beading workshop to some friends from the Lake Norman Quilter's Guild in my studio in the next few weeks and I am happy to have a new piece to show the crowd.

-janet

One Step Forward One Step to the Side

I had a great time at the Lake Norman Quilt Guild meeting last week. They are a great and very talented group of needleworkers. I brought along a trunk-show collection and we all had fun modeling and talking about inspiration and work process. Thank you - for the great hospitality - and the chocolate on the refreshment table.

Depending on life I have more or less time to work on beading projects. As my pieces come to life they begin having their own character, as I worked on this piece; I thought that it would take the form of a standing figure. I did a bunch of research and sketching and finally drafted a pattern for an eighteen inch body, constructed a crude armature and completed the figure shape. Unfortunately, this figure and the beading would not harmonize. I now have two pieces "under construction" now. So, here is what is going on with the last piece you saw.

My plan for the next steps are - a face, beaded hair, neck embellishments and perhaps a "crown" or other
head wrap feature. As for the other figure - I need more research on myth and imagery - some large shield form and perhaps a staff... I will keep you posted.

Beadwork & Airplanes

Here is what's new in my studio. I am working on a new sculptural figure embellished with beadwork. This will be the front of the figure. As this is a work in progress, I will post again here as the figure takes on more personality.

How do I get started??

I often start new beading projects when I have to sit on a plane for a few hours. About a week ago, I went to Arizona, so with a total of 8+ hours on a plane - I started a new beaded figure. The reason I like to start projects on an airplane is that it forces me to narrow the design options to what I can carry in my re-purposed cosmetic bag that I have as a carry-on. This forces me to focus on what works really well when designing with beads - rhythm and repetition, rather than the drawers full of beads in the studio.

I usually work intuitively when I do beading. I start with fabric that has colors or a gesture in it that I like, cut a piece of it off and usually back it with a piece of acid-free paper. The paper helps keep the fabric from being too distorted from the stitching. I then go over to my beads and select a group of beads of various sizes and finishes that seem to go with the fabric. I look for colors that blend and contrast with the base fabric. I make sure I have a few different sizes and finishes and pack them up. This usually happens about 30 mins before I leave for the airport, so I don't have much time to obsess over selections. So by being captive in a plane (or a hotel room) with a small selection of beads, I have to work with what I have. When I get home, the piece has already been established and has taken on its own personality. As I work in front of the TV at home, I am less enticed by the plethora of beads available.

Cutting Paper as Inspiration

Too many years ago, I took a photography class and one of my favorite images was a still life of a pomegranate. I love pomegranates as a food and as inspiration for my work.

Last month, while visiting the Huntington Library and Gardens near Pasadena California, I found a very nice pomegranate with fruits left from the fall. The fruits were very small and bursting open showing glistening seeds.

I often work on new images by cutting solid black paper with a sharp blade to see the negative and positive space created. All the paper cuts are saved in a large sketchbook full of only black and white images. Each small piece of paper is glued down to the sketchbook, sometimes this is easier said than done. Tweezers and the tip of the cutting blade help maneuver the pieces into place. I have also been known to scan these and "fix" them up in PhotoShop.

I loved this image and worked a bit studying the form and shape. I usually don't work directly from photographs but use a set of photographs to inspire new shapes and forms. In this case, I worked from that small fruit in the photo.

Sometimes these simple pieces become stencils just as they are cut, and sometimes I re-work the shapes many times to get a more detailed image for more complicated printing tools. And sometimes they live in the sketchbook for awhile until I get inspired again with the image. Right now there are about 6 paper cuts of pomegranates waiting to be used in the creation of some project.

On to the next Journal Notebook

I have been carrying around altered composition books for a few years now, yesterday I filled up the current one. I make these using simple "composition" notebooks with either lined or graph paper - from the office supply store. The last one was embellished with some paper printed by cleaning out print screens - the paper is also great for quick collage or whatever. For me, it is a nice way to have an example of my art with me all the time.

These journals serve as a place to write down notes, make quick sketches, save phone numbers and email addresses and scribble if i get bored in meetings. I only have one book running at a time, so if I can remember either what the cover looked like or the time I wrote something down it is a simple filing system, unless like 3 years ago I lost one in a stack of books for 6 months.

So, today I am starting a new book. This one is a smaller blank book I found on a sale table at the bookstore, and I pasted scraps of paper on the cover and gilt the spine with copper leaf.

This one should keep me company for a few months, and the bright colors will make it easy to pick out from the stack of books on the coffee table.

Have a great weekend.

Pretty in Pink??

Quite a while ago I invited a group of artist friends to participate in a Sewn Art Sketchbook. Each of us created "pages" for our own book - made from whatever we liked and in the size we wanted our completed book. The pages themselves were really diverse and wonderful, we had painted canvas with sewn frames, black felted wool, painted watercolor paper, silk organza laminated with tissue patterns and tomato fencing, painted batting etc. Each artist then created a theme for the book and created the first page - or spread and then exchange in round robin fashion.

Our intention was to create a page a month until each of us had finished all the books - and then have a great celebration when we were done. Of course life got in the way and it took longer than we thought to complete the project. But last month we finally finished all the pages and each of us have a great collection of work done by great artists and friends.

As I received each page I attempted to create a piece to interpret my impression of the book's artist.

Here is one of the pages I did - for a wonderful artist and friend - I am posting it simply because it is appropriate for this weekend, because it is a Valentine.


This mixed media piece started on with a piece of fabric laminated with papers and dyed red, then over painted with different interference paints. The small Chinese coins - one for each month of the year, were stitched on with a small piece of cording I made using recycled silk and threads. Finally I stitched the collage onto the canvas page with pearle cotton.

Happy Valentine's Day.