Studio wanderings

 Just looking at the interactions between space, shape and colour...

Fresh-cut Alder wood/Crottle dyed yarn

Big loom/tiny looms

soft lines/hard lines

Yarn stretched tight/yarn hanging soft

Spinning Silk

Spun silk: doesn't that conjure up something luxuriously soft and lovely? It sure doesn't make me think of something likely to slice my hands as I make it, but I have come so close to doing just that as I learn how to handle this delightfully soft but fearsomely strong cloud of fibre. The finer I spin the sharper it becomes. I can only work on this in short bursts as I have to rest my hands frequently: the strength of silk taxes my hand joints and muscles and I'm risking a flare-up of RSI. But it's so beautiful, so soft, so warm.... And I want it to make a projector screen from in my studio.

Red Thread

At the beginning of the school year I traced the word 'Desire' on my studio wall in red thread and pins. It felt important at the time. But now it's time to take it off.

As I pulled out the pins the thread made these wonderful crazy lines unravelling across the surface.

I couldn't resist keeping the mass of sharp angled thread, so unlike the usual soft round curves of thread off a spool. I hung it on a pin that was holding something else on the wall and later on the sun came in and showed me it anew. I like the shadows as much or even more than the thread.