PE Task 2

I started my project by gathering lots of visual research, not only from textile artists but also looking at gallery artists and designers. By gathering this visual research it helped me create my body of drawing work that would inspire my embroidery samples. Throughout this project I decided not to narrow my options down to one topic or theme. I continued to look at all of the visual research I had gathered and use the imagery or themes that inspired me most to influence my embroidery work. The main themes that I drew my inspirations from where graphs and charts that showed data, constellations and block lines influenced by the work of Tom Hackney and Mondrian.

One artist that I was particularly inspired by was Emma McNally. I think what first struck me most about her work was that it was all black and white. I thought that this was quite striking because I'm always more attracted to black and white work than coloured pieces. I also knew that I needed to keep a neutral colour palette for this project so I thought her work would be perfect for me to draw inspiration from.

I found this piece of artwork by her really inspiring because its based on constellations which I had already been researching before I had looked at her. What I found really interesting about this piece was how some of the white in the drawing is so crisp and clear and the other white is soft and blurry. I think the contrast between this crisp and soft white on such a dark and deep background creates so much depth within the piece that makes me want to keep looking at it further.

Whilst researching graphs and data I looked at different ways of gathering and collecting data and one person that really caught my eye was Etienne-Jules Marey. He was a scientist, physiologist and chronophotographer. He captured movement by taking and recording consecutive photographs. I found his work so interesting by the shapes he has captured through his photography showing the clear steps of movement that we over look until we see this broken down into steps.

Another theme that inspired me whilst researching data was the use and importance of straight lines to depict so many different things. I think my initial spark for this inspiration was looing at bar charts and line graphs but this led me to look at artists who used lines and blocks in their work. I first looked at the work of Tom Hackney who created his pieces based upon chessboard and moves made throughout a chess game. His work then reminded me of the Artist Mondrian who based his artwork on aerial views of the streets of New York city. I find both of these concepts very interesting and they inspired me to create embroidery samples incorporating stitches of different size, width and length lines to create patterns.

Tom Hackney

Mondrian

Sampling Week 5

This week i learned how to use the double needle and tested this on different types and weights of fabric.  I liked the way that the same stitch on a different fabric would create a totally different effect by the way it tucked in-between the 2 lines of stitch. I found the way it made the fabric warp really interesting. This week i tried t use the techniques i have learned to try and relate my samples more to my initial drawings.

Sampling Week 4

During this week i really enjoyed learning new techniques like hair pinning. I thought that hair pinning gave a really interesting effect to the fabric because i could use lots of the old and more interesting threads that i have gathered. I feel that it made my samples more textured and tactile. I also learned how to use the tailor tacking foot which i feel gave a more lose, scratchy effect to my work which i feel related more with my initial drawings. I also worked back into my samples by cutting through the stitches i had made using the hair pinning and tailor tacking techniques. This again made my work more tactile and more relative to my hand drawn work.

Sampling Week 3

This week i was introduced to the sewing machines and taught how to use the basic feet and stitches. I used a satin, straight and a zig zag stitch onto patterned fabrics to get the hang of using the machines. Through working on patterned fabric i was able to create more interesting samples using simple stitches by altering the stitch widths and lengths. I enjoyed using the sewing machines more throughout the week because i started getting the hang of how they worked and what i was able to create. I am looking forward to learning new techniques with different machine feet and stitches.