Fibre 15's exhibition, Conversation, ends Sunday. It's been a very busy month with lots of learning. Here's a peak at some of it.
Getting ready
I've been to openings of exhibitions before, but it's a lot more exciting when you're part of a smaller group of artists. The vernissage was very well attended with roughly 100 people showing up. It was also the opening of a new shop as well as the first event of the year for the Stone School Gallery.
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| Journey of many paths at the exhibition |
The vernissage was on the Friday but all of the art had to be delivered to the team that was hanging the exhibition on Wednesday. Since my pieces are not fragile, there was minimal packing but I did have to put labels on all of them as well as wires and dowels for hanging.
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| Adding the wire on the back of the canvas |
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| Soaking in the stiffener |
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| Letting it dry |
For the concertina book, I needed to stiffen the first and last pages so that it would stand properly for display. I used Golden's GAC400 stiffener. It worked quite well.
I also had to add labels. Since creating labels is not something I enjoy doing, I did it as easily as possible. I backed a piece of pale batik with iron-on adhesive and then used a permanent fine marker to write. I also remembered to add in my small fabric label.😊
You'll notice that I wrote a lot more on the Let Them Flourish label in case it was sold (so far, it looks like I get to take it home...I'm very happy about that!)
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| Label for Let Them Flourish |
I kept the label very short on the Please let me play because I knew that it would come home with me. I just added the link to the post since the post explains everything much better than a few words on a label.
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| The Please let me play label only has my name and ULR to the post. |
At the Gallery
The gallery really looked wonderful with all of our art there. Here are some of the photos that I took, which represents a small part of the show.
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| A lovely corner with art |
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| Let Them Flourish on a pedestal |
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| The concertina book standing more or less straight 😊 |
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| Some of my favourite pieces by Elaine Quehl |
Teaching a Meditation Stitching class
Although I have a lot of experience teaching, this was the first time that I taught any kind of art or stitching course. I'm really glad that I chose Meditation Stitching since there is really very little to bring, and no sewing machine to lug around!
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Bilingual poster at the Stone School Gallery
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Since the gallery is run by volunteers, as exhibitors, we had to volunteer some time to sit at the gallery during visiting hours. I chose to be there last Saturday and Sunday since I was teaching on the Monday. This gave me lots of time to work on my meditative stitching samples for the class.
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| Sample made of extra flying geese blocks |
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Sample made with the first English Paper Piecing
that I ever did (a total dud that worked out well for this) |
This sampler was created to remember the weekend. It includes a shell and a washer that I found on the beach at my brother's trailer. I haven't finished it since I didn't have all of my thread with me.
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| Sampler to remember the weekend. |
During the class
It's not usually a good sign when a class is very quiet, but in this case, it was excellent! After an introduction, everyone was hard at work stitching. They found that the time flew by very quickly! Here are some of the results of the class.
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| A lovely blue block from an experience stitcher |
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| Great blocks from a student who had never embroidered! |
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| Lovely blocks on denim by an experienced stitcher |
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| A fun block with lots of stitching by another experience stitcher |
During the class I also did some meditation stitching. Instead of the usual 4" block, I made a bookmark. I hope to make more of these.
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| Lots of stitching on the bookmark |
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| Making a fun bookmark |
What I learned
- It took a lot of effort on everyone's part to get this show done and it looked great!
- Creating the art work takes time but getting ready to show it is also very time consuming, and includes many of my not-so-favourite tasks!
- I was so impressed with how the show looked - I really felt like an artist 😊
- Volunteering for 2 days and then teaching a class the next day was a lot! It took me days to recuperate and that's with everything going well.
- While I was volunteering at the show, I'm so glad that I brought a variety of work to keep me busy. I love embroidery but I can't do it for 6 hours at a time. Thank goodness I had some English paper piecing (EPP) - hexies - to play with!
- I'm looking forward to having some fun playtime for the next while. I really need it!
Related links
Linking parties
It took me a while to get the hang of what call for entries and preparing fiber art for exhibition require. I'm not a big fan of making and attaching labels either. However, once I figured out that I could print them onto fabric designed for this purpose using my computer and printer, the task is much less arduous. Yes, you are an artist. The gallery presentation looks great.
ReplyDeleteThanks so much Gwyned. I am looking forward to experimenting with printing on fabric. That will make the labelling task much easier - and I'm sure it will look much more professional. Take care.
DeleteWhat a wonderful exhibition! I don't like doing labels, but do them on an as needed basis. I can't even imagine 2 days of work; its been so long since I have done anything like that (mostly due to covid and now my broken ankle). Thanks for linking up to Tips and Tutorials!
ReplyDeleteThanks Kathleen. I tried to leave a message on your post but it didn't work...both times, so here it is... I love your ironing board and I sure wish that I had space for something like that in my studio!
DeleteYou are indeed an artist, Andree, and a very accomplished one. How wonderful to see your exquisite pieces on display with all the others. How fun to teach other like-minded people meditative stitching and encourage them to create their own works of art. Just a little aside, your photo is lovely and I do love the dress you are wearing.
ReplyDeleteThank you so much Kim for your lovely, kind words :-) It was really great to teach these students who are open to learning. I don't usually post pictures of myself but this one just had to be there. Thank you!
DeleteHello Andrée, My goodness you have been busy! The exhibition looks wonderful, and such a lovely photo of you with Journey of Many Paths.
ReplyDeleteI quite like the idea of attending a quiet class - it sounds as though everyone there just relaxed into the idea of meditative stitching. It nice to see you gave new life to a dud piece of piecing.
Thanks so much Muv, it really has been an incredibly busy summer so far. I'm still recovering and also playing in the garden instead of the V2.0 quilt! Take care.
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