October is nearly over and this week also saw the end of our first year, living here on the East Coast of Scotland. It’s been a busy month, with Matt getting back to work, our grown up kid’s lives getting busier, so that there are constantly people in and out of the house; our 15yr old getting ready to start college next year, which means a very full schedule with home education and of course a delightful seven year old, with more energy than the rest of us put together!
In amongst it all, I have been striving to find the right balance to show off the beauty of jute twine.
I spent an enormous amount of time on a piece based on autumn leaves (photos below), but had to admit that it was confused at best, and that I needed to step back and reconsider how to move forward.
Help came unexpectedly from having to complete an application, for a small arts grant. The process of putting my intentions into words and boiling down my thoughts and passions to the essence of what I wanted to achieve, really helped me to focus and to pick out the elements of previous work, that I wanted to develop and refine.
Finally setting up a dedicated workspace has been helpful too, much more so than I expected.
It’s strange the things that we put off sometimes, letting them slip further and further down the priority list. But sometimes a small change can act as a big catalyst and claiming a wall in our living room, where I could put a £40 secondhand table and a couple of trolleys for my materials, has turned out to be one of those small changes.
Being able to leave work out and take a minute here or there to contemplate it, during a busy day; being able to spread out a few images of old work and a few pieces that have stayed with me; having a place to put other objects and images that inspire me – it all helps to see the connections in my work, of the past few years and even right back to childhood.
There are actually only a small handful of ideas/themes running through my work, which I keep building on and returning to, with more skills, or new materials, or a different approach (which I was actually quite delighted to realise), because sometimes, when looking at it through my social media, or even here on my blog, I feel like I’m flitting around, from one thing to another, without direction.
It’s comforting and grounding, to realise that the direction has been there all along, I just needed to give myself a small amount of space to see it.
And so with these helpful little changes in place, I have been happily making and exploring, how best to combine jute with other materials, to elevate it beyond garden twine, without taking anything away from the simple beauty, that I find in a perfectly wound ball of twine.
So I returned to my old muse – the coast!
I have been fascinated by beach pebbles like the one in the photo below, for a long time. To me they look like they have been carved by an ancient hand and my eyes will pick them out from all the other pebbles on the beach. I have found them in Orkney and here in Angus and Aberdeenshire, and I really wanted to make something that was inspired by them.
I began by printing a small piece of blue canvas, using the side of an emery board and some paint, and using those pebble markings as a starting point.
I turned the fabric into a sort of button, by covering a circle of thick card with some wool wadding and stretching the canvas over it – sewing it in place.
Then I cocooned it, just as I would with one of my sea treasures, but carried on working to create a wide frame in linen embroidery thread.
This made the pearl, for the mussel that I was going to make in jute twine.
I really love how the pearl turned out and I think I will return to this idea of framing textile pieces, to make some small wall mounted pieces. I think they will be really striking and using coil to frame other objects and works is, I have realised, one of the main themes of my creative practice.
I chose a mussel shell as the main form for the piece, because I know it so well, and that familiarity gave me the freedom to concentrate on getting the balance right, between the different materials.
First time round I felt that I had made the mussel too thin. Not only did that mean that the pearl didn’t have that feeling of being nestled in the shell, but also, it meant that it wasn’t as structurally strong as I would have liked.
So I started over.
Sometimes, even though you have invested hours and hours into something, it’s important to stand back and say
“I need to try this again”
Over the years, I have told my kids many, many times that you can’t always get something right first time and that’s ok. And I think that it’s just as important for us to remember that as adults.
Second time around I was much happier. I imagined that I was starting further into the shell and the result was a piece that worked better together and was super strong, which makes it perfect for wall mounting.
It is always important to me that I make work that it is fit for purpose, as well as achieving the look that I want.
I had further reworking to do, when I got to the surface decoration on the mussel. I originally worked it in the colours of the canvas printed centre. Looking at it, I realised that although it linked the pearl to the mussel, the strength of the colours was taking too much away from the jute, making it seem like a prop, to the fine linen details. I wanted to jute to stand proudly on its own merits, so I reworked it using some fine 1 ply jute.
I love the juxtaposition of that humble garden twine, so strong and richly textured, against the fine linen thread and Japanese canvas.
This piece has given me a lot to consider about my work going forward. I can both see and feel the foundations of a strong body of work starting to emerge and I’m really looking forward to the months ahead.
I want to say an enormous THANK YOU! to everyone who signed up to my new Introduction to Creative Coil Basketry course this month. Your enthusiasm to get started on your own journeys with coil basketry, has funded this month of development work for my own practice and will help me to move forward and hopefully create more courses for you all in the future.
