May Meeting

Messing with Mixed Media

Joy is well-known for her love of anything that involves heat guns and paint so introduced members to a technique for creating leaves from Lutradur.  She had pre-prepared the Lutradur with a machine-stitched length of wire for a central vein, so after an introductory talk everyone was soon able to make a start on cutting out leaves then zapping them with a heat gun. A fine balancing act between too little zap and not enough! Then, it was on to the paint and summer, autumn or frosty leaves were soon drying. A very informative and productive couple of hours.  Thank you, Joy.

Those members not joining the workshop made some progress with their current stitching.

 In the afternoon, Pam made a brief presentation about the four short-listed candidates for our next Artist of the Year.  Will it be Gaudi, Kandinsky, Mackintosh or the Memphis Movement?  Can't wait to find out in June!

Making an exhibition of ourselves!

 Three of us had a 'grand day out' staffing the Megastitchers' stand at the Manchester Antique Textile Fair last Saturday.  We had a good display of the variety of work we do - group projects, individual pieces from our in-house workshops and from other outside sessions members had attended. There was a good level of interest in our activities (ie non-stop talking!) and in our displays of old threads.  We also sold some of our old magazines, so the car wasn't quite as full on the way home.

Congratulations to the seven Textile Society bursary candidates who were awarded £500 each.  There was some amazing work.

Thanks to Ro and Petra for all their help on the day. Here are some photos from before the show opened.

Things to do and see this month

If you're looking for a textile/stitch day out you may like:

'Beneath our Feet' - the Leah Higgins exhibition at Salford Art Gallery & Museum.  It's on until 5 May and is well worth a visit.  There's an excellent shop and a cafe.  See the 26 January post for more details.

The Hebden Bridge WI Rag Market on Saturday, 27 April from 10.30am to 4pm.  This bi-annual event is a mix of professional companies and people having a stash clearout.  Three venues in the town this year, the main one being the Town Hall and it's only £1 entry, with lots of places to eat and drink around the town.

https://hebdenbridgewi.com and also on the Hebden Bridge WI Rag Market Facebook page.

The Manchester Antique Textile Fair on Sunday, 28 April from 10am to 4pm at The Armitage Centre in Fallowfield, Manchester. Entry is £8 on the door or you can book in advance online through Eventbrite.

Megastitchers will be there in the Showcase Gallery upstairs. Come and say 'hello'!

As well as displays of work, we'll be selling vintage magazines, books and some kits to make small panels.  The magazines are 'Needlewoman & Needlecraft' (including the first two editions from early 1940) and 'Embroidery', the Embroiderers' Guild magazine, again including the first edition from 1932 and others from the 1930s to 1960s.  We'll also have a display of some of the vintage threads advertised in the magazines. 

https://www.textilesociety.org.uk

April meeting

Another busy day at Megastitchers with a workshop in the morning and a speaker after lunch.

Lynda started us off with a really well-prepared and enthusiastic session on using rubbing plates, transfer-dye crayons, paper and organza, with plates based on Clarice Cliff pottery shapes. Here are some of Lynda's samples, including some of her work from Bobbi Britnell's (Ben Nicholson-inspired) course made during lockdown.

A 2-hour workshop definitely isn't long enough to do justice to the technique, but everyone had a great time making a start with their exploration.

In the afternoon, we had a talk from Alison Wake, a Buxton-based artist and stitcher about 'Painting with Yarn'.  Alison is a member of SEW (The Society for Embroidered Work) and Peak District Artisans.   Her inspirations are her grandmother stitched pictures, Impressionist art and the local landscape, which she photographs/sketches from unusual viewpoints and close-ups.  The use of locally-sourced wool dyed in a variety of colours along the skein (they were lovely!) allows her to create great depth in her work.  

Alison was generous in talking us through her process, starting with a sketch or photo traced on to canvas through to the mounting and framing.

Acknowledging that such finely stitched work is time-consuming and, therefore, expensive, Alison has produced smaller work and limited edition Giclee prints. In addition, she also has a range of fine art greetings cards, three of which are pictured below.

You can see more of Alison's work at https://cognissark.co.uk and on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.

March workshop and talk

 In the morning we had a workshop led by Anne - another of her creative sessions combining mosaic and fabric and stitch, this time using Clarice Cliff as inspiration. As usual, Anne was well-prepared with lots of samples and colourful resources.

The session was only two hours long, so even with some preparatory thinking about design and concentrated effort, no-one completed their piece, but here are photos of all the works-in-progress.

Our afternoon speaker was mixed media artist Priscilla Edwards, whom many will know from her 'tea-time' pieces, one of which featured on the front cover of Stitch magazine for April/May 2012.  Priscilla took us on her textile journey from a BA at MMU in 1995 to the publication of her Search Press book Sculptural Textile Art  in 2022.

Priscilla's is an avid collector of ephemera, found materials and the 'lost and overlooked'. Her inspiration has ranged from the cotton industry, the war-time and post-war periods to pincushions from the Gawhorpe Hall collection. More recent work has been figurative with a (slightly scary!) dark, fairy-tale edge. As well as giving an inspiring talk, Priscilla also let us handle some of her work.

If you want to know more about Priscilla and her work, there's an excellent interview at https://www.textileartist.org . 

www.priscillaedwards.co.uk

More shadows!

At the March meeting, Linda brought in her pieces from the February workshop, together with some further developments she'd done.  Definitely an encouragement to look at how we can progress learning from from a simple session!

The top two are from the workshop and the lower two are from transfer printed rubbings and different organzas.

Another shadow

 Here's another photo of a (nearly) completed piece from the February shadow applique workshop. In this instance, Russell has shown that you don't have to use only running or back stitch to outline the shapes - he's included beads, as well as whipped and laced running stitch. Couching would also be good for a well-defined outline.