Stealing from Tudor Artisans – Part II

Last week I posted about my discovery of a beautiful example of Tudor woodwork, the Parham fire surround.  I found the detailed carving inspirational and have developed a motif from one of the pheasants lurking in the carved vegetation.

Here is more of the process shown in a few photos as the design is first outlined and then painted with dye, pink, old gold and moss green, on a handkerchief-sized piece of silk.

I was not convinced about the old gold so it was dropped when I expanded and transferred the design to a larger, 90 x 90 cm square silk twill scarf.

As I recently mentioned June is the month of roses and I do love a classic pink rose – I think that’s why I have been working with pink all this month.

And, the pieces are now ready to be rolled in paper and steamed for a couple of hours to fix the dyes.

A favourite bird motif morphs into a ???

I have been having a serious clear out of cloth. I am trying to be disciplined about this. I am attempting to organise all my work materials so there is studio space that is conducive to work and not one that is so chaotic it drains me of all my creativity.

During this protracted endeavour I came across some of my old silk work. In the photo above there is a bird hidden within all the colours. The original idea came from a medieval bas-relief bird I photographed on a visit to a cathedral (possibly in Germany, but it could’ve been in France) a couple of decades ago. In my memory it was always Speyer Cathedral on the Rhine. However, I have just Googled Speyer and though the magnificent 11th century Romanesque church is the building I have in mind’s eye, I can’t imagine where I thought this bird was ‘perched’. Strange how our memory plays tricks with us, isn’t it?

Anyway, I can now see that my ‘stork’ and ‘heron’ phases had a long forgotten forerunner lurking somewhere in Europe.

Of course, a freehand one-off motif once designed doesn’t remain fixed for very long.

Over time my bird motifs have lost most of their definition and morphed into little more than blobs with spikes!

 

Might be time to track down my old photos and revisit the original ideas and try working up a new motif or two from the primary source material. I haven’t unpacked either box marked ‘photos’ yet, but I am hoping that I didn’t bin them all the last time I had one of my ‘once every 10 years’ clear outs.

 

Returning to a bird theme

Just added to my online shop another flat silk crepe silk square working with a stork motif placed within a stained glass window frame.

Since I last worked with a stork motif it has greatly changed. Somehow it’s reduced in size and morphed into various stylised shapes of beaks and feathers!

However, I think the stained glass influence is still obvious.

It is surprising how effective the final addition of green over the various soft golds has lifted the design.