wild things - the story in words and images of juxtapositions #3
Thank you for joining me here for this quiet little conversation, taking a moment to be with these thoughts, words and images.
detail: ‘wild things (juxtapositions #3)’
Once upon a time I magically created a few pieces of cloth in beautiful combinations of turquoises and blacks. I happily used most of those pieces of cloth up before realizing I didn't know how to recreate similar pieces of cloth.
It took several years and many failed attempts before I was finally able to work out a process last summer that results in cloth with the combining these two beautiful hues. It's still somewhat tricky and i can't recreate it reliably so the few pieces of cloth that are successful are quite precious.
Over the years, many people have asked me why i don't leave the long thread ends on my paintings, seeing these as a 'mark of the hand' of the artist. For technical reasons i could never come to grips with leaving the thread ends because it left the integrity of the stitches at risk.
For this painting i followed my usual process of guiding all the thread ends to the back of the work, the whole time the painting registering it's objections to me. I thought maybe the painting would resolve itself to no thread ends, but after a few months, it was just as adamant about wanting the long threads.
I worked out a way to create the effect of loose thread ends while maintaining the structural soundness of the painting and eventually added back all the long threads you see.
One of the most lovely and subtle effects is always from the way the thread stitched by machine shifts colour so beautifully as it travels over the surface of the painting. You can see this too in the long thread ends, the elegant subtle variation in the colour of each strand
side detail view of ‘wild things (juxtapositions #3)'
Leaving you with the image of ‘wild things’ in an open airy setting
And as always, I want to express my gratitude to be living and working on the ancestral & unceded territories of the hən̓̓qəmin̓əm̓ and Sḵwx̱wú7mesh speaking peoples.I honour the incredible depths of grace, courage and perseverance of Indigenous Peoples, and look to them as an example as they find their voices amidst the noise and obfuscation of colonization.
until next time,
Mardell