'She Dreamt of Growing Antique Lace'

 

This is a very personal piece based on a poem written by my very talented cousin the writer Geraldine Moorkens Byrne.
It is a poem she wrote about my crazy love for antique lace, the woman knows me !

It is part of the international exhibition called Texnet2. I am delighted to be part of this wonderful project which is a collaboration of 21 international textile artists. We are artists from Europe, United States, Canada and Australia and have interacted, discussed, planned and inspired each other via a facebook group since 2018 under the guidance of Juliette Eckel.

The result of our project Texnet2, a collection of 377 textiles works.

It was a joy to work on as well as so wonderful to get to know fellow textile artists who I have never actually met ! The pandemic canceled our chance to exhibit in EPM (Carrefour Européen du Patchwork) in 2020, but going ahead September 2021.

My first challenge was how to draw myself . . . fun. I used light flat felt as base and drew guide markings, then it was hand stitching in many shades of thread.

I wanted to depict the dream of growing the lace.

I stitched layers to form a bulb shape and then painted extra detail of colour with watercolours.

The hands were tricky !!

The background was silk noil I had dyed with flowers and leaves.

I tried various ideas for hair but because it was a dreaming figure I ended up going very detailed.

I mixed thick knitting yarn with thread and ribbon and of course lots and lots of antique lace.

Finally I wanted to include the poem that started it all, printed on cotton.