I’m finally back to working on those stitched portraits I was playing with a while ago, making up a couple of small quilts to test out some processes I’m hoping to use in some bigger work later this year. These two small studies will be part of an upcoming exhibition to accompany a jazz festival at Mackenzie Hall this summer. The larger quilt works that these are serving as practice for will be exhibited in September. I’ve got a lot of quilting to do this spring and summer!
I’m hand stitching the portraits onto a colour blocked background of various naturally dyed cottons and some of the white-on-white brocade I printed recently. These will be composed like formal portraits, and each figure will be holding a potted plant. No conceptual reason for the plant, it’s just an exercise in making stitched plant portraits, again practice for those larger works to come, for which there IS a conceptual reason for the plant. Phew.
Despite the blue hair, this isn’t a self portrait.