30 January 2013

a mum of wool is a shorn sheep

   There are few photos of my knitted samples which I've done in the last week. 
I didn't expect that I would do such a lot of handwork together with the knitting machine before getting into the knit group. Because of it, I felt it's weird when my friend said that she was knitting 'by hand' although she's actually using a knitting 'machine'. Now I got what she meant, and I also agree with her in that way. 
   Those knitted fabric below are showing lacy patterns, but it is still in progress—they  need to be washed. The main purpose of washing fabric is removing oil inside of yarn, and making the stitches tighter as the woolen yarns shrink well. 
   A funny thing is, my tutor also told me that the fabric would smell and feel better by washing them with laundry powder.

Tutor: well, now your samples smell of a sheep yeah? (he sniff one of my samples)
Me: yes. (I sniff another)
Tutor: They'll smell and feel nicer after you wash them! (he sniff&crumple it with a smile on his face)

I doubt somebody who looked at us by chance might wonder what was going on between our conversation :)






23 January 2013

what do you see on the cutting edge of knit?


   As the workshop started yesterday, I've started looking for interesting knit design. At the begginig of this project, I found some inspiring design, although I rather needed to find art which is related to the theme of the project, bloom. At this time, I need to find designers, and I found more interesting knit designs that I've found before.
   The photos below are knit design by 2 designers; the first two are by Mark Fast, and the others are by Craig Lawrence. Few colours and 3 dimentional design particularly interests me at the moment, and the ideas could be apllied for my own project.
  My tutor explained that more than 60% of clothes in the modern world are knitted. The thing I would imagine with the word 'knit' was a bland knitted jumper, but the latest knit design is actually stunning!

Mark Fast 

S 2010 rtw

F 2011 rtw

Craig Lawrence  




20 January 2013

colouring books

My drawings are getting simpler, and harder to identify the original photo. After doing texture drawing, I've been concentrated to symbolisation of the shapes. It is difficult to break down the botanical shapes and to leave only necessary elements. I don't really like these drawings below to be honest, but believe it is good to try variety of drawing styles.





I've been to Edinburgh this yesterday, and visited Dovecot studios. As there's no current exhibitions at the moment, I thought I wouldn't go, but now I can say it was well worth visiting. I found a book called Pretty Deadly at the museum shop, and knew an artist Michael Brennand-Wood. His work is very different to the others, and it is literally exploding. I'm sorry for having been not able to see the original (the exhibition has already finished only few days ago), but it was good to know a new artist.







17 January 2013

dinosaur skin

   Today's work was as slow as usual, but a bit different. I focused on texture and simple lines. I don't know how much I can translate them into design of knit, analyse of texture is very fun anyway. One of my friends showed me his technical samples of the past project, and it was helpful to know what I could do in advance.
   I haven't thought that I would use acrylics after getting into uni, but actually I do. I'm very happy with it, and guess they are happy too. 






15 January 2013

simple

   I had a tutorial this morning. The main thing I should do over the week is, draw in simple/abstract style, so that the drawing becomes suitable for design of knit. It isn't very far from the thing that I was doing in the last few days,  so I could carry on the studio work without much stress.
   My 3D drawings are simple, in comparison with painted ones, but some of them are still too complicated to translate into knit patterns, so I need to make them more simple, and this is challenging.
   I did colour work and line drawing in this afternoon, because there're more 3D&monotone drawings and less others. 










13 January 2013

for her

I made a birthday present for my lovely classmate :)

a lacy pattern with lazy daisy stitch




11 January 2013

make it

I've got a few more drawings now. Although I am still afraid of doing something wrong, any problems will be solved at the tutorial, so I kept trying to make stuff with enough quality as much as possible.

After the christmas holiday was over, I've done more paper craft than pure drawing/painting. When I draw from a photo, I always try to translate it very accurately, so there's no development between them. However, if I make—instead of drawing—, I feel it's far easier to simplify the shape. 






10 January 2013

B&W

It wasn't a productive day today. Although I believe I spent plenty of time in the studio, there are only few that have potential to be developed at the next stage. 
This is because there is a problem on my selected photos. As I merely chose shapes which excite me, I've got a collection of random photos. Firstly I thought it's good, in terms of observing a variety of shapes, but actually the randomness confused me very much. I couldn't find a link between each photo nor even couldn't explain why I chose them. 
At a tutorial before Christmas, I was suggested to sort them by colour, and I did, but there were still few photos that were not able to be in any groups. Those photos have bothered me, because I don't like their colours but shapes; I can't be happy with drawings of them in colour. I struggled enough until today, so I finally decided to ignore the colour of them and to concentrate on the structure. This might not be a good idea, but at least it helped me to take a step forward. I am quite happy with results of the paper manipulation below, and going to make(or draw) another from them.








8 January 2013

inspiration spot: the library

   Today was the first day of uni, so we have been briefed about DP project in the morning and the afternoon was free. Therefore I went to the library after lunch, and searched for interesting designers and artists. Once I am on journey of searching inspiration, it takes much longer time than I would firstly be expected.

   One of my bad habits is jumping the subject from one to another. This time was the same, although I had to look for designer/artists who I have researched before, I was excited to others as I realised. Usually, I hardly look at magazine racks on upstairs in the library and go to the PC room straightaway, but today, I did. The one I took a look was Embroidery magazine, and an article caught my eyes. It was about a freelance embroidery designer who studied embroidery at Ecole Lesage in Paris. I was kind of familiar with the name—maybe I saw the book about the school before—, but I searched it later as I wasn't sure. Actually, the world of haute couture must be like heaven, and Maison Lesage is the one who lives in there, and Ecole Lesage is a school founded by him in 1992 when I was born! The studio of Maison Lesage gets job from world's the most famous fashion designers such as Chanel and Dior, and dresses embellished with embroidery in many techniques are absolutely amazing.


   After a while, I was looking for fashion designers who made dresses inspired by tulips for some reason, then happened to know a Japanese designer Tadashi Shoji. It is embarrassing thing to know too few fashion designers although I am studying textile design, and so the discovery of new designers often happens to me. His design is elegant, no 'too much' nor 'too less' and different to other famous Japanese fashion designers. His career is interesting as well, he was originally studying contemporary art until going to NY in 1973 when he was 25. 

Tadashi Shoji Fall 2012 RTW






   Lastly I need to write about an artist, Orly Cogan. She is an unique artist who use embroidery for the major part of art work. It wasn't first time that I've seen her work online as her work is definitely found when you google images 'embroidery artist'. Although I don't really like the obvious way of showing sexualism, I think her work is beautiful. Pictorial embroidery on vintage fabric gives you impression of both new and nostalgia.