Sunday, July 26, 2015

Birth of a Royal Guardian - Peacock Art (continuation)

I find myself incredulous that my post of yesterday was cut off.  When I looked at it today, the final part was gone.  Drats!  Let's see if I can't re-create it now.  Yesterday's post seems to have ended with sewing the peacock's crown.  Here we go with a continuation...

After the crown was sewn onto the backing, the body and tail of the peacock were pinned to the backing and then machine appliqued to the backing, starting with the head and stopping where the tail hangs off the canvas.


Machine Appliqueing the Body to the Backing.
After the machine appliqueing was complete, I randomly added claw shapes made from glass beads across the background and finished the work by adding heat sensitive rhinestones, also in a random manner.
Beaded Claw Shapes and Heat Set Rhinestones
Once the work was complete, I wrapped the quilt around the stretched canvas, stapled it to the wooden stretcher bars, glued black mat board to the back and finished it with D-rings and wire for hanging.

Waalaa, the work was complete and ready to hang on a wall.
Ruminations on Why I Chose to Use a Peacock to Express the "Boundless" Theme

The occurrence of multicolored iridescence in nature has always captivated my interest and stimulated my imagination.  To me, the male peacock is the king of radiant iridescence. After studying this bird extensively, I clearly understand why in Japanese culture the peacock was historically considered a guard to the royal palace.  To me, it is, indeed a “Royal Guardian”.

Exhibit Information
"Royal Guardian" will be on exhibit at the Cerritos Library for the months of August and September, 2015, along with other quilted and mounted art works by members of Beyond the Edge Fiber Artists.  If you happen to be in the area, I hope you will stop by the library to visit the exhibit.  The address of the library is: 
18025 Bloomfield Ave
Cerritos, CA 90703
Thanks for visiting and...
Always remember, never fear to experiment.  
Sometimes wonderful things happen.
© Linda Friedman 2015.  All rights reserved
 

Saturday, July 25, 2015

Birth of a "Royal Guardian"-- Peacock Art

It was quite thrilling to learn that, "Royal Guardian"  my 18" x 36" quilted art that was mounted on a stretched canvas is featured in the July 24, 2015 Studio Art Quilt Associates news.
"Royal Guardian"
I belong to the group, Beyond the Edge Fiber Artists.  We chose to expand the theme, "Boundless," for which each of our group of 10 would create a quilted art work with an individual interpretation of the theme.  In "Royal Guardian" I chose to not be bound by the 18" x 36" stretched canvas but, instead, extend beyond it to enter the land of "Boundless".

This work began with a drawing of a peacock that I enlarged to fit within the 18" width of the canvas and extend beyond the 36" length of the canvas. 
Cartoon
Notes at the side indicate colors that I wanted to use for the bird.
Projected Materials to be Used
 At first I thought about achieving an iridescence by using green glitter over a fabric painted surface.  I auditioned how this might look through three different applications that used acrylic gloss varnis as the agent to secure glitter.
Free Moltion Stitching over Paint and Glitter
 Actually, this was quite successful, but to me the effect appeared to be garish, so that idea was scrapped.

Next I set up a "MacGyvered" a light box setup and copied the drawing of the peacock to 100% white cotton fabric.  I chose various shades of blues, greens and violet Setacolor fabric paints that I ordered from Dharma Trading Co. and set about painting the bird shape that had been traced onto white fabric.  Unfortunately, because I was on a good roll, I became so involved in the painting process that I failed to take pictures of this stage.  Drats!  So sorry about that.

For the field upon which I would ultimately applique the bird, I hand dyed 100% white cotton fabric with a mottled orange, yellow and green colors, made a quilt sandwich for the background field.

Once again, I traced an outline of the peacock onto the orange fabric so that I would know where to quilt in a fashion that would highlight the bird.  I started with a modified feather pattern around the outline of the bird and then carried the shapes of the feathers on to the remainder of the background.


Modified Feather Quilting Design


After the bird painting was completed, I traced the bird shape onto heavy weight Pellon interfacing that I purchased at a local yardage store and then cut out the shape.  I placed the Pellon shape under the painted peacock to act as batting, pinned  it to the painting so that it wouldn't slip. I then backed  the bird shape with a hand dyed fabric down to where the tail extends beyond the edge of the canvas to make a quilt sandwich on which I would start quilting and thread painting.  Blue painter's tape marked where the edge of the canvas would fall.
Determination of Peacock Placement
All edges were turned in to the center and hand stitched so that no turned over edges would be visible on the tail section that extended beyond the canvas.
Peacock Ready to be Quilted and Thread Painted
Here is how the backing for the tail looked.
Reverse of Tail

Initial Threads Used to Thread Paint the Peacock
I first thread painted and quilted the peacock with non-metallic threads to define the shapes further.
First Quilting and Thread Painting of the Peacock
After the entire bird shape was quilted and thread painted, I turned to using metallic threads for the head, breast and back edge feathers.
Thread Painting with Metallic Threads
When all the thread painting was completed, I added the peacock's crown to the background with metallic thread painted small cuttings of dark fabric

Peacock's Crown