How to inhabit an idea?

It's Friday, it's wet again and my hip hurts. So how do you try to get some ideas developing?
For me, at the moment, it's darning and patching. Initially inspired by two books 'Darning, Repair, Make, Mend' by Hikaru Noguchi and 'Mend and Patch' by Kerstin Neumuller I have gathered together a basket of beautiful crewel wool and begun to stitch.
There is a profound pleasure in the simple act of hand stitch but for me the excitement of developing colour combinations, of harmonies and discords is paramount.

Seeking for ideas with a needle and thread, joining, amalgamating, mending are words in my head. I am thinking of colour and stitch that might inhabit a cloth surface.

So, for the moment I shall obsessively stitch, observe and enjoy!

Liz Harding

Spring Bloom

With a second showing in Ilminster this autumn of our work under the title Bloom very much in mind, Linda has a cheering photo of purple crocuses taken in her garden.

This week, here in the south west following a very mild winter, spring flowers and green shoots of growth on hedges are appearing early - a real and encouraging pleasure in the rare sunshine!

Linda Babb

Girl sewing

I am amazed at how many artists have portrayed ladies/girls sewing. This is by William Adolph Bougerea painted in 1898 and is called The Seamstress.

Others include Renoir, Van Gogh, Gwen John, Dali, Morisot, and Mary Cassatt.

Carla Mines

Stitch Challenge

This is a small piece I did for a monthly stitch challenge.

I was allowed 3 pieces of fabric, cut & arranged for background & then 20 minutes to stitch down using 3 different stitches. Some stencilling & dimensional paint were added along the way.

Corinne Renow-Clarke

Agnes Richter

I love words and they feature strongly in my work, mostly in the form of handwriting from old letters, recent lectures and quotations. The words are hand stitched or machined. A slow thoughtful process that leaves a permanent mark that may have been insignificant or almost forgotten. There is something so personal about leaving your mark with needle and thread.

Here, I was looking at Agnes Richter, a German seamstress (1844-1918), a patient at Heidelberg Psychiatric Clinic. She wrote on her day jacket, mostly in black and white with the odd piece of coloured thread, red, blue and yellow.

Words and sentences were stitched intensely all over, many indecipherable. There are visible perspiration stains that map the contours of the body.

Agnes rejected language, predominantly a male prerogative, and returned to the feminine and utilised needle and thread as a means of communication. I wanted to make a small piece to mark her life.

I used a piece of found embroidery to commemorate her life. I stitched her name, her occupation and the dates that she lived. 

Carla Mines

Towards Inhabit

The next exhibition of new work by Brunel Broderers is in the spring of 2021 at The Lansdown Gallery in Stroud, Gloucestershire, under the title Inhabit. 

This has set me off on an exploration of modern high rise buildings with their towering height, their reflections and their sense of eternal activity - and the dramatic change their sudden presence makes in the urban landscape.

Right now, I'm looking in detail at a building I photographed in Sydney, Australia, on a visit a few years ago. At the time I saw it, I was fascinated by its construction, its colours and the vertical shapes within it. A closer look has revealed much more. I have explored the image via cutting and enlarging to focus on areas of interest, and then drawing and stitching shapes and marks that catch my eye. These photos give a small sample of this early work.

This is just the beginning of exploration. Like so many beginnings, the images above may lead forward into work or may lead nowhere at all. Only time will tell. 

Margaret Robbie