Seashore Pillows Finished

Here is the final pillow in this project, the crab. And the stripe fabric is for the rope piping. It will be cut into 4 narrower strips for that.


I also did some more work on the turtle and the seahorse today, depening the shadows, especially on the seahorse, which was looking a bit flat.




And here is the crab. He is a fine fellow. Or lady.

Seashore Pillows

This is what I am working on now. Four pillows depicting sea shore animals, some on land some from the water, and some that go back and forth! The fourth one, not finished
yet, and not shown here, is a crab.
The backs are stripped fabric, and there will be a fat, fabric covered piping around each one.































The pillows are commissioned based on a group of pillows I did some years ago. Its sort of hard, and then sort of easier to match previous work...in some ways, the new ones are much better. I like to think my skills improve...but the originals were very good too. Not requested this time around are the gull, the hogfish (wrass) and the view of the birds' feet on the sand. Have you ever seen how seabirds often stand on their own feet, and have trouble getting going walking from that pose? Pretty funny.

Another Big Catch Up for This Blog...

This project was completed in August 2010, and I simply never got around to posting about it, I had so many deadlines, I never found the time...but it seems worthwhile putting it here now. It turned out very nicely, and makes an interesting change from so many posts about ceramics. In fact, you won't be seeing much about ceramics for a while, now...that season is past...for a while anyhow. This is a mural painted on canvas, in my studio, and stapled directly to the wall. It is painted to match the floorcloth, also painted by me several years ago, which its looking pretty good, too.

I painted wooden framing pieces that are applied with finishing nails, and these cover the edge and the staples. It took forever to hang. I couldn't believe it.

But then I was done, and it looks great.

I had a wonderful time painting the water. The theme and style were the result of the client and I coming up with these ideas- a very simple tropical water scene, serenity, but with movement in the water... big, big clouds, etc etc.

Here is the canvas on the work table. You can see the stretched edge, and the extra area painted in case it needed to be bigger for some reason. In the end that was cropped off.

I also painted this little mirror, to match the mural floorcloth duo, and it's cool to them reflected in it.

There is silver in the floorcloth and in the framing that picks up reflected light. The ceiling is fun too, with the star lights ...they scintillate and flicker on and off...magical.

Fish,Fish Fish!

I am still busy painting this fabric yardage with the fish theme, 11 yards total, I think I am almost done!

I have the cat fooled....

This is Bomba, he is always such a helpful presence, ceramics being his usual specialty....

You might ask if painting so many fish, on so many yards becomes tedious?

Well, I try to avoid that feeling, by working fast and keeping up the energy. It never helps to drag it out, and feel as though it will never end... however, when I see the faces develop on these little guys, I get quite caught up in the whole thing, and want to do MORE.

Must be a Pisces thing....

Lots Of Fabric To Paint

So here is how the fabric project starts....I will be painting many yards of each of the sample designs shown here. Here is my lovely bolt of new fabric. I use 200 thread count muslin, usually unbleached, for better application of the paint and a very soft silky feel to the finished fabric.

I like to be bold and have a lot of fun with the colour wash that underlies the detailed painting. Contrast and movement make for much more depth later. A lot of this simply disappears under later motifs, and gets blended into the overall, but its always worth it to see some lovely shape or texture peek out between the later additions to the painting. Something always shows.

It is wonderful to watch the colours blend and separate. I have learned to let this happen, and not smooth it away, from painting and firing the ceramics, and seeing the cool things that happen when colour blends and melts and shifts into its neighbour.

Time for a tea break! One of my painted mugs with fish all over it too...I couldn't resist the photo op.I was in a great hurry last night to finish this piece, and get a new piece on the table, and do the colour wash so it was ready to paint on today. Otherwise much of the morning would have been wasted waiting for this next section to dry, if I had done the wash then. I didnt take any pictures of the finished first piece on the table last night, but here you can see where I have advanced the fabric, and begun the process all over again for another 2 1/2 yrds....Over the edge of the table its too dark for proper pictures, but its a nice effect!