Things to do and see this month

If you're looking for a textile/stitch day out you may like:

'Beneath our Feet' - the Leah Higgins exhibition at Salford Art Gallery & Museum.  It's on until 5 May and is well worth a visit.  There's an excellent shop and a cafe.  See the 26 January post for more details.

The Hebden Bridge WI Rag Market on Saturday, 27 April from 10.30am to 4pm.  This bi-annual event is a mix of professional companies and people having a stash clearout.  Three venues in the town this year, the main one being the Town Hall and it's only £1 entry, with lots of places to eat and drink around the town.

https://hebdenbridgewi.com and also on the Hebden Bridge WI Rag Market Facebook page.

The Manchester Antique Textile Fair on Sunday, 28 April from 10am to 4pm at The Armitage Centre in Fallowfield, Manchester. Entry is £8 on the door or you can book in advance online through Eventbrite.

Megastitchers will be there in the Showcase Gallery upstairs. Come and say 'hello'!

As well as displays of work, we'll be selling vintage magazines, books and some kits to make small panels.  The magazines are 'Needlewoman & Needlecraft' (including the first two editions from early 1940) and 'Embroidery', the Embroiderers' Guild magazine, again including the first edition from 1932 and others from the 1930s to 1960s.  We'll also have a display of some of the vintage threads advertised in the magazines. 

https://www.textilesociety.org.uk

April meeting

Another busy day at Megastitchers with a workshop in the morning and a speaker after lunch.

Lynda started us off with a really well-prepared and enthusiastic session on using rubbing plates, transfer-dye crayons, paper and organza, with plates based on Clarice Cliff pottery shapes. Here are some of Lynda's samples, including some of her work from Bobbi Britnell's (Ben Nicholson-inspired) course made during lockdown.

A 2-hour workshop definitely isn't long enough to do justice to the technique, but everyone had a great time making a start with their exploration.

In the afternoon, we had a talk from Alison Wake, a Buxton-based artist and stitcher about 'Painting with Yarn'.  Alison is a member of SEW (The Society for Embroidered Work) and Peak District Artisans.   Her inspirations are her grandmother stitched pictures, Impressionist art and the local landscape, which she photographs/sketches from unusual viewpoints and close-ups.  The use of locally-sourced wool dyed in a variety of colours along the skein (they were lovely!) allows her to create great depth in her work.  

Alison was generous in talking us through her process, starting with a sketch or photo traced on to canvas through to the mounting and framing.

Acknowledging that such finely stitched work is time-consuming and, therefore, expensive, Alison has produced smaller work and limited edition Giclee prints. In addition, she also has a range of fine art greetings cards, three of which are pictured below.

You can see more of Alison's work at https://cognissark.co.uk and on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.

March workshop and talk

 In the morning we had a workshop led by Anne - another of her creative sessions combining mosaic and fabric and stitch, this time using Clarice Cliff as inspiration. As usual, Anne was well-prepared with lots of samples and colourful resources.

The session was only two hours long, so even with some preparatory thinking about design and concentrated effort, no-one completed their piece, but here are photos of all the works-in-progress.

Our afternoon speaker was mixed media artist Priscilla Edwards, whom many will know from her 'tea-time' pieces, one of which featured on the front cover of Stitch magazine for April/May 2012.  Priscilla took us on her textile journey from a BA at MMU in 1995 to the publication of her Search Press book Sculptural Textile Art  in 2022.

Priscilla's is an avid collector of ephemera, found materials and the 'lost and overlooked'. Her inspiration has ranged from the cotton industry, the war-time and post-war periods to pincushions from the Gawhorpe Hall collection. More recent work has been figurative with a (slightly scary!) dark, fairy-tale edge. As well as giving an inspiring talk, Priscilla also let us handle some of her work.

If you want to know more about Priscilla and her work, there's an excellent interview at https://www.textileartist.org . 

www.priscillaedwards.co.uk

More shadows!

At the March meeting, Linda brought in her pieces from the February workshop, together with some further developments she'd done.  Definitely an encouragement to look at how we can progress learning from from a simple session!

The top two are from the workshop and the lower two are from transfer printed rubbings and different organzas.

Another shadow

 Here's another photo of a (nearly) completed piece from the February shadow applique workshop. In this instance, Russell has shown that you don't have to use only running or back stitch to outline the shapes - he's included beads, as well as whipped and laced running stitch. Couching would also be good for a well-defined outline.

February workshop - In Clarice's Shadow

2C + 2H = U ≠ 2C !

Not a real mathematical equation....... but it simply means that if you use Clarice Cliffe's work (2C) as inspiration and add in your hand and your head (2H) you end up with your own design (U) and not a copy of Clarice Cliff.

As the theme for the day was Shadow Applique we started the session with a small exercise using triangles of fabric, scraps of organza and threads to explore the interaction between different colours and stitches (running or backstitch).

After an hour or so of fabric, we then moved on to using some shape templates taken from Clarice Cliff's work to create our own designs. Using paper and card, we flipped, repeated, enlarged and distorted and cut.

We relaxed over lunch and returned to then look at transferring our designs into fabric and stitch.

Lots of brilliant, bold colour from a really hard-working and fun group.

Covered in colour!

 All prepared for the workshop on Saturday.