Project 7 Theme book Citrus and circles

Citrus and circles

I've been looking for interesting images of fruit, particularly those that might offer me ideas to develop.  I found this lovely one and it's certainly good enough to eat:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ACitrus_fruits.jpg

It suggests all sorts of things; printing, applique, stitch and some of the lovely manipulations in Wolff (1996).

I've taken a series of photos of some dried fruit slices I had as decoration at Christmas.

A funny thing to put into a hurricane lamp maybe but they look pretty

With the wikimedia image in mind I  chose to look particularly at the citrus fruit:

Then I did them separately

There are oranges, lemons, limes and blood oranges here. I suppose we don't often consider how fruit actually looks and I was surprised that these pieces all looked so different.  There's the size issue and the skin colour, with or without pips, the thickness and colour of the pith and on and on. The pith on the second to bottom photo has a real softness.  Some of the fruit has dried to look oily but one or two look quite dessicated. 

Very dry fruit looking feather like

I spent a few minutes doing a pencil and crayon sketch.  This still doesn't feel like my natural territory but I think it looks like a very bitter but juicy piece of fruit.

I have also been playing with the idea of fabric manipulation and trying to find a way to make something circular that emulates the segments of an orange.  I've done a mock up in newspaper to see if it would work.

I'm happy enough with this to take it a bit further. It needs a lot more layers to make it look "juicy".  There's very little room between the stitches as they meet in the middle so I  might try some slashes that go just half way down.

I painted up several layers of newspaper, and found some orange organza, yellow lining and an orange net.  I took my sketch as a pattern t guide my stitching and with vilene as a base I stitched my lines.

The back

Remembering not to slash all the way through (almost) I found it hard to cut into the middle. I ruffled it up a bit.

This looks very effective for something with such humble origins.  The more fabric you can squeeze in the better but the centre really did become very congested and hard to work with.  In my sketchbook it faces the first image of this section and the colours are gratifyingly similar.  It is very powerful.  Only very vaguely does this resemble an orange.

I've used this piece to explore image transfer with Bondaweb.  I approached this with some scepticism.  I found the Bondaweb got a bit snarled up in the printer and left a black mark on the print but by and large I'm delighted.  It gives a diffused, hazy result that will be wonderful to use as the basis for some stitching.  I'm not at all sure what I'll do and I'm in no hurry. I'm so enjoying playing.

Image transfer using Bondaweb

I've been inspired to try my machine now that it's sewing well.  I used this image with some wadding, backing and organza and made this:

I started with yellow because that was the palest colour and infilled some spaces.  I did the same with the darkest colour. The organza was a lovely dusky pink that seemed not to lend any colour but when I tried orange thread it was awful and I had to use a pink.  I'm pleased with this.  I like being able to trace back to see where it came from, see similarities but huge, huge development of an idea.

I seem to have become interested in all things circular and I remembered the Yo yo's in Wolff's book.  I had a go.

They are easy to do

Wolff suggests that these could be joined together and used as edging.  I think with some good fabric choices or skillful dyeing they could be pieces of citrus fruit.


I thought I'd see if I could print using my slices of dried fruit but it didn't work because the shapes didn't reach the paper.  Instead I did some rubbings:

On my sketchbook paper

This one shows a lovely metallic looking relief but I had to be persistent.  It confirmed the difficulty I had when I tried to print.

On printer paper

The printer paper was much easier to get an impression on.  The image was crisper but I didn't get the relief.

I'm going to take this image and practise my free machine stitches on water soluble fabric.

I printed the rubbing on A5 paper and drew the shape on the fabric which I mounted in a hoop.

Orange

or grapefruit?

This gave me lots of practise making textures. I was conscious of mark making whilst I was stitching. It actually felt like drawing at times.  I used different colours in the bobbin so the back looks more like a grapefruit than an orange.  In the centre the plastic gave way so I just put in a patch and it seemed to work.  There is a bit of instability on the rind at the edge where my stitches don't quite connect.  I am feeling much more confident as I practise - albeit with a temperamental machine.  I enjoyed doing this and am pleased with the result.

Image from my sketchbook

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Citrus_fruits.jpg
Wolff, C. 1996, The Art of Manipulating Fabric. Krause Publications, Iola, Wisconsin