Unit X Pinterest Board

http://gb.pinterest.com/zoeatkinson12/unit-x/

Unit X Conclusion

When I reviewed my embroidery samples, I realised that my colours appeared flat because they were pre dyed synthetic fabrics. In weave, I was keen to add even minimal shifts of shades to differentiate the way that the texture of the yarn affects the appearance of the colour throughout. I learnt that you do not need to change colours drastically to achieve depth within the sample and imagery.

Although I worked individually, it was very useful to have group critics on my work because it enabled me to look and explore various processes and takes on the same brief. I found my group tutorials had a big affect on the progress of my work. From my first tutorial I was advised to broaden my colour palette and to do a more extensive range of drawings for my visual research.

Some examples of my samples before I broadened my colour palette.

My contextual research was vital to my understanding of the uses of and variety in passimentrie. I looked across the art platforms to inform my visual research. Piet Mondrian's style of drawing the structure of trees informed my mark making, and transformed my drawings from being solid blocks of colour to now having contrasting marks and colours, which I found particularly useful for my woven passimentrie. My new visual research had movements of vivid colour being revealed from a darker shade. I found that darker yarns with small sections of vibrant ones lift the whole sample. I placed these vibrant colours in occasionally to prevent the pattern from looking to regimented, because my drawings are loose with sudden moments of colour.

Acrylic painted Sketch book page with a woven sample inspired by this page.

I experimented with dyes and colour transfer processes, which were not always successful due to the synthetic materials I had used in my samples on. The dye would lift from the synthetic ribbon but the threads stayed to the original colour. The threads dyed in the dye baths, however the ribbons colour didn't really take, the colours went moody. This did give some depth to my flatter samples, but was still disappointing, in reflection I should have used natural materials.

 This then affected my fabric choices to using mainly natural fabric like wool and linen in my embroidery samples so that I would have the option of reprocessing them if I wanted to.   I decided that my process of practice works more efficiently when I construct a pattern instead of embellishing readily patterned fabrics. It was easier to create embroidery samples after I had a body of weave pattern designs to influence my work. I chose chenille yarn to use in my weave because it empathised the linking structure of the pattern more prominently due to it being a thicker yarn. To relate my embroidery samples to my weave samples I enlarged key moments in the patterns formed in the weave, with flocked ribbon and mock suede because they resembled the chenille well. 

Woven samples. In the middle; chenille yarn with larger proportions. On the right; chenille yarn with ribbon weft.

 

Embroidery samples on linen, with flocked ribbon and cord. Inspired by my Woven samples.

During this project, I have learnt a new technique, which with additional time I would have chosen to develop. This was a combination of a weave and embroidery technique, where you create a warp that is bound together with a dissolvable fabric and stitch. With this process, I would have liked to make my own ribbon that I would have embroided down on to fabric with the 21 braiding foot. This could have given me more control over colour and would have been an interesting way to combine weaves into embroidery.

Overall, I am pleased with the progress of my work through Unit X. Generally, I have stuck to the concept of roller coaster structures and linking shapes. I have learnt that my embroidery approach is stronger when I construct new patterns on the fabric. I feel that my embroidery samples improved after I had woven my weave samples. I feel that it was because of the strong pattern of linking shapes in the double cloth warp structure. My weave samples provided me with compositional ideas and colours that I then reflected in my embroidery samples. 

I am pleased I progressed from my original colour pallet, because my newer varied colours allowed my compositions to have moments of contrasting colour to show that the pattern isn't too regimented. I feel that my colour palette has been the biggest challenge to overcome through unit X. In the beginning I trapped myself in a limited palette, which affected my visual research that was feeding my ideas for embroidery processing. I think that I managed to overcome this problem by introducing complementary and contrasting colours to the red hues.

The use of blue contrasts with my original palette of orange and red.

I am also aware that synthetic fabric will not dye very well so I decided to use natural linens and wool fabrics to allow me to experiment with dying and heat transfer processes. 

Unit X Development

During the project I was introduced to the princess-pleating machine; It is a machine that requires patience and more hands. Because of this, I got a team together to collaborate to create our own samples on the princess pleater, but using the same thread that we set up together. This was more time efficient because we quickly learnt which fabrics worked best in the pleater and the effects it created on different fabrics. This enabled us to create more advanced samples than what we would have achieved individually.
My personal discovery from this princess pleating process was that silk slub fabric creates a less regimented pleat that makes the fabric become springy when it's gently pressed with the steam iron. I then pulled the threads away. To improve this method on the silk further, I would repeat the process a few times to see a different quality in the fabric.

On the left: princess pleated sample before being dip dyed. The right is the dyed sample.

I find the 121 Cornelly machine is low maintenance to draw with. I enjoy using the steering handle allows you to create looping smooth imagery. This makes me regret choosing a such a structure orientated theme. However, I do like the prominent stitch that this machine creates. Online, I found 'Motif pillow' (http://www.motifpillow.com/) that has some structural and composition motifs and I think similar designs would translate well through use of the 121 Cornelly.

Blue and Gold collection on Motif pillow.

From looking at 'Motif Pillow', I decided to deconstruct a small section of one of my paintings into three parts. I then created a new narrow composition from the shapes and created a sample with ribbon using the Bernina and the braiding foot. When I jumped from section to section drawing the new structure of the drawing, I allowed to ribbon to be free and connected to give the sample a fluid 3D quality. This could be seen as a metaphoric link to the movement of the roller coaster. I think that the fluid lines of uncontrolled ribbon combined with the bound down ribbon gives a variety of tone in a mono colour of orange piece, through the way light reflects off of the different fabric qualities and surfaces.

Ribbon sample with the section of the painting that I deconstructed into three parts.

I block threaded my loom into a deflected double cloth warp after being inspired by some Margo Selby patterns from her ‘Contemporary Weaving Patterns’ book. The patterns I can make on this warp are limited, which has enabled me to focus on developing the patterns with different proportions to link them to my drawings. The patterns I have been using gives a linking affect which I feel I should built on the idea of structures being bound. I would like to translate the weave pattern into embroidery by using the cording foot. I have found that my embroidery samples are stronger when I construct a pattern onto them instead of embellishing an area.