Techniques
"All of the works start life as an idea. This can be inspired by something Ive seen, heard or even felt.
From this point, reference material is found to begin planning and produce the sketches required for the finished piece.
Silk Painting
As the name suggests, this is painting onto silk. The silk is first stretched onto a suitable sized wooden frame. This must be stretched taut, like a drum.
From there, I trace the image from my sketch onto the silk using a fabric pencil - which will later be washed out.
Free painting is applying the dye/silk paint straight onto the silk without any barrier. This allows the colour to flow, and minimises the amount of control you have. This is great for a free, loose work and can produce some great results.
Tighter, more formal colouring can be achieved by using a clear gutta. This is applied from a bottle with a small nib. Gutta is applied to the edges of the drawing were colour is to change, and no bleeding is desired.
Free Machine Embroidery
Although this is produced using a sewing machine, there is no magic button that produces the stitched shapes automatically. Basically, the teeth of the machine are dropped to prevent them from gripping the fabric, as would be required for standard sewing. The work is stretched onto a frame to stabalise, and the patterns and line work are stitched in by moving the frame - using the needle as a drawing tool.
Quilting
This effect I achieve by sandwiching interlining between the image and a piece of backing fabric - usually cotton lining. Negative spaces (background) are stitched back with a free machine embroidery pattern, which give the image relief and a slight 3 dimensional quality."
