Layers of Meaning
commentary on design, fiber art, & modern embroidery from Serena Fenton
Glow-in-the-dark yarn seems to have made a big impression on the fly fishing and the Emergency Rescue communities, and is slowly creeping into use by the arts community.
There appear to be at least two main varieties of light reactive yarn. Retroglo is a reflective yarn. "Retroglo® has 50,000 minute glass beads to the square inch, reflecting light back to a light source, such as a car's headlights. The driver sitting behind the headlights, immediately sees the reflected light and is alerted to the wearer ahead."
Uni-Glo is a phosphorescent yarn. Exposure to a bright light for 10 minutes causes the phosphorescent yarn to glow for hours. The yarn creates a work that changes with exposure to light, to the current lighting conditions and over time, as the light-emitting charge in the yarn slowly discharges. The possibilities for expression and exploration using this medium seem quite broad and not fully explored by fiber artists (needle-felters take note!). Antoinette Carrier and Christine Keller are two artists who created works using the light emitting yarn.
From a 1999 review by Jennifer Dudley of Antoinette Carrier's contemporary tapestry works: "Like ghosts, the works exhibited are semi-transparent, having a luminosity and glow achieved by the weaving materials used - shiny polypropylene twine, clear cling-wrap, silk, shredded silver-gelatine on paper, phosphorescent yarn, light - everything which encourages our perceptions of the insubstantial, of a shifting reflexivity, the ever elusive quality of memory, of things which are, and then are not. Where we stand determines what we see. Notations appear as text panels for a story-cloth, suspended slightly in front of the woven cloth surface, whose structure is also its dominant texture and contains in its weave the marks of its images."
For a presentation at Australia's 2004 Space Between conference, Christine Keller writes: "...these pieces respond to light in unexpected and unknown ways. The viewer will experience a space where images appear and disappear on the structures through illuminations of various kinds. Due to the properties of Retroglo yarns two layers of visual appearance are integrated in one fabric, alternately visible.
The phosphorescent pigment will store the projection in a ‘magic’ way and let go of it slowly. Layering of images is possible. This constructed textile surface has the potential to memorize the traces of light it is exposed to. A fabric is created which can carry various motifs. New high tech materials are being placed in the realm of contemporary art. The potential exists to expand these applications to performance, theatre and dance etc."
Image above by Christine Keller. Keller will be teaching a workshop at the 2005 Surface Design Conference, Uncovering the Surface.
Shrunken (felted) old wool sweaters plus some stitching on an old Singer sewing machine = cozy blankets. Crispina Ffrench has taken this concept and made it into a business. Her web site describes the process: "Our Basic Blankets are made from softened recycled wool sweaters. We cut 7" squares from carefully brushed and felted garments and incorporate fresh details in each finished piece. Basic Blankets are edged with colorful decorative scalloping."
The blog Treehugger, shows the power of this kind of recycling, "Over 150,000 lbs (68,000kg) of discarded clothing has been salvaged to make Crispina blankets. Using mostly wool products, they wash garments and sort them into particular themes before combing the elements into a new whole. Quirky elements of the original apparel are retained to fashion unique goods."
Katie at Jejune's blog d.i. your own damn self gives directions as well as insight as to her experience of making a blanket from scraps of old, felted woolen sweaters. Lots of tips on what to look for and little glitches to dodge. Great photos of satin stitching the seams and all those other details that most magazine articles gloss over.
The blanket on the left is by Crispina. Katie at Jejune created the blanket on the right. And luck is with me! Our local thrift shop is having a 'bag day' sale starting in 20 minutes!
Additional links on the process:
For those of you who are also magazine-packrats, the Dec 2002-Jan 2003 Threads Magazine featured an article on making felted slippers (with any leftover felt!)
Paula Scaffidi is the woman who introduced many of us in the South to the Babylock embellisher and machine needle felting. Fiberella.com is Paula's new web presence. There is a wealth of resources on the site, making it the perfect place for novice and more experienced user (these machines are pretty new - how experienced is anyone?) There will soon be a forum to discuss needle felting and embellishing issues.
A good starting place is the FAQ page (Frequently Asked Questions) Paula was an art instructor for over 20 years and it shows in the clarity of her information. Some of the opening questions discuss the differences between the Babylock, Bernina and Brother machines and component parts: "How machine needle felting works is mostly about the needles. The needles on BabyLock's Embellisher, Bernina's Punching attachment and the Brother attachment are all designed to basically do the same thing. The have little barbs or hooks with soft shoulders above the hooks (I think of the tiny hooks on a crab's leg). As these needles travel down through layers of fiber, fabric, yarn, etc., they pull fiber from the top layer(s) and move some of this material down through, underneath the bottom layer."
Best of all, there is a complete tutorial on site, presented in a variety of ways. The completed object is a felted leaf that can be added to scarves, landscapes or other fiber pieces. The Techniques page, shows a variety of leaves; a link to Resources has full directions for the leaf (.pdf format). For visual learners, there are four short videos that show Paula creating a leaf on the Embellisher.
Image above is Old Stream , a purse featured in Paula's gallery.
The embellisher by any other name would look the same: Needle Punch Machine by Mitz 8 Needles Raku-Raku and the industrial strength needle punch machine. They also have some examples of the machine used on knit fabrics, including felting done from the back (a crisper edged design) or the front (a fluffy flower). It would seem that the market they are aiming for is ornamenting sweaters by a commercial clothes manufacturer.
In Australia, Pierrot has introduced a 5 needle felting machine. "Pierrot does exactly the same as Babylock's Embellisher . But for half the price" (an aside: 5 needles are not 7 needles, and even with currency conversion, $750.00 sounds close to list price in the US for an Embellisher)
I also came across a fascinating "needle punch machine" which appears to be used to join layers of fabric. There is a brief reference to creating patterning on velour. I think typically, these are used to produce items such as needle punch batting or needle punch felt, blankets and carpet. What struck me as most interesting was the needles. Babylock charges $3.00 each. If these are the same needles, it would seem that there should be a cheap outlet for them somewhere.
A previous LoM article about the embellisher featured some images from the Babylock site's Flash movie, which were made by Margo Duke. Duke's creations are now online at Her Majesty Margo.
Duke's site offers a gallery of her work (though the pictures are a bit fuzzy), and best of all, an online catalog of materials and kits for machine felters. Scroll past the kits to see some lively hand-painted mohair roving and hand-dyed silk ribbons and fibers. If you are not lucky enough to live by a weaver/spinner's supply house, this catalog is a nice source for varied colors of roving. There is also a short explanation of both wet and dry felting.
Embellisher part II. We don't have a lot of resources for the embellisher in the US; nor seemingly in any of the English-speaking countries. However Babylock (I believe) is a Japanese company and they seem to have had the machine over there for more years and in Eastern Europe as well. There is a group in Russia going by the name Yaga who appears to be turning Embellisher-crafted items into art fabric available in commercial quantities. It is amazing to sift through their website and revel in the imagination, beauty and productivity.
Their explanation of what they are doing (note the parallels to the embellisher):
"Yaga-fabric is a joining into one whole cloth of various fabrics, yarns, threads, fibers in any combination without seams, stitches, glue, and other auxiliary means. By analogy with metallurgy it is a fusion of textile materials.
Yaga-fabric is distinguished by its great patterns, plasticity, depth and texture effects which can not be achieved in other technologies.
Yaga-fabric is not only primary cloth for further work but they can be also referred to a handmade art-object unique due to its origin. The figurative row of Yaga-fabrics is endless"
Some of the links are in Russian and some in English. You choose a language at the front door. There appear to be different images, possibly catering to the differing markets.
handbags
palatins (sarongs?)
shawls
brightly colored shawls
shawls - wallhangings
dresses
and more dresses
sweaters
window covering
more window coverings
placemats
sofa throw
and more sofa throws
Debbie Lucas creates dreamy impressionist landscapes using layers of wool. She descrbes the process: "Felt has a hidden magic by taking fleece wetting it and rolling it a new and interesting fabric is made often with surprising results.
All my pieces are hand rolled using mainly merino wool. I hand dye the fleece this gives me a rich pallet of colour to work with.
The inspiration for my work comes from the ever changing Cumbrian landscape. My pictures are made by building up layers of fleece which I card well to create a variety of colours and shades. I often cut back through the layers of felt to reveal hidden colours beneath, giving my work a 3 dimensional effect".
The Courtyard Gallery offers more views of Lucas'landscapes; landscapes created directly with fiber - no stitching added.
Picture, narrative images, abstract images created entirely of fiber with no stitching - this is both challenging and intriguing. America seems to lag way behind the rest of the world as far as felting goes. Here we seem to mostly make dolls, hats, or booties -and some of these are gorgeous, but there are so many more possibilities! Other parts of the world are going wild with the sculptural, painterly possibilities opened by creating directly with the fibers.
The International Feltmakers Association is a great introduction to a media that is inspiring the rest of the world. They produce Echoes, a journal on felting, and a list of international felt exhibitions. And of course, lots of links to members sites, such as Felt Hungary, which has a Symposium of Traditional and Contemporary Felt Art.
