Something new

     I belong to a smaller group of fabric artists .. sort of "bee" that originated from several of us who belong to SAQA Atlantic Canada and who lived within a reasonable distance from each other. At the moment not everyone is a SAQA artist, but we all work in fabric and share ideas & techniques and of course, social time. We meet once a month.
     Each month someone "presents" a new idea, technique, topic ... something we might incorporate in future work (or not). My difficulty is in trying to think of something that might interest this wonderful group of talented women.
     So ... NSCCD (Nova Scotia Centre for Crafts & Design) offers a variety of short classes on evenings and/or weekends. Last weekend I tried one of the classes: "Mixed Media".  I have discovered that I am a 'structured artist' ... I can't create a piece without having some idea of the outcome (I can do this when I am writing fiction but not when I am working on a visual arts piece). Telling me to 'draw something' doesn't work so well.
     The first bit we did was called "sgrafitto" ... an Italian word that basically means 'scratching' .. as in scratching off the top level of paint do create a picture or design.

      I've been working on a fabric piece of the Clock on Citadel Hill so this sketch was already in my head ... Difficulties (or It would have been nice if): 1. We should have been instructed on how much gel medium was needed to keep the top layer of paint moist so we could work with it more before it dried. 2. We should have had a greater variety of thin / small pointed tools to work with ... the stick I used was blunt edged and I couldn't work the lines that I wanted.
     The 2nd day was about collage ... although several people 'pasted' down a variety of paper pieces to create an abstract form and then painted over parts of it, I stuck with creating a 'picture'. I really tried to be a little more free-flowing, ... it is difficult to go out of one's comfort zone!! ha ha

     I worked the gel medium in smaller areas / amounts so the whole thing wouldn't dry out too fast. I used bits of sandpaper, twigs, paper, and wool bits.  In hindsight, the wool bits should have been placed one by one instead of groupings since they didn't stick down very well. I think I should have left off the batting for the clouds, although it looks better in picture form than in real life.
     Oh well, it is something new and not likely something I will incorporate in my current work nor something I think is worthwhile to try out with our fibre arts group.

     Back to something I enjoy.
     I saw a picture in the news in January that would work well in my Transitions series. I immediately went to the site where the picture was taken (well, not immediately since it was January cold, but within a few days). I managed to get a similar picture but the crane was not in the position that I wanted. I contacted the original photographer and got permission to use his picture for my art piece.
     Here is my work in progress: Clock on Citadel Hill in Halifax NS

And the original photo:

    Yes ... this is a winter photo. We had some snow and then it melted. It was darn cold out in spite of the lovely appearance of the photo. And then it snowed again.