Starting the C&G Certificate Course

The City & Guilds courses have finally started.  Over the past four days, there have been six very enthusiastic and occasionally bewildered students in my studio starting on their C&G Patchwork and Quilting Certificate.

Chrystine's cake, which was followed by an equally delicious one made by Isobel.  What great students!

The first day started well when Chrystine arrived with freshly baked cake.  Always a good start!  Everyone seemed remarkably relaxed and keen, even when faced with poster paints and hand printing to practice colour mixing.  I would like to report that our activities then became more grown-up, but really, the beauty of this course is having permission to play and experiment and try new things.  Perhaps at a more adult level too, it gives you the structure to make you do things you should do, but never quite get round to, such as trying out different stitches on your sewing machine.  Even reading your sewing machine manual to see how it should work.  I know I am very guilty of this myself – you get a new toy/sewing machine/ camera so you dive straight in, not wanting to waste time.  However I know that both my sewing machine and camera have so much more potential that I still haven’t bothered to find out about.  Even with our new car which has wonderful new gadgets integrated into it, I still haven’t read how to use them beyond the music system.  Perhaps understanding the parallel parking function would have been more useful?

Concentration whilst trying free machine quilting

Anyway, back to the C&G.  The students are lovely and I was really impressed with their attitude and their first results, especially since some of them have little patchwork experience.  After playing with poster paint and colour wheels, we did some basic quilting and piecing and tried out different ways of adding colour to fabric.

Some of the colour onto fabric samples

Our next meeting isn’t until September and I can’t wait to see what they come up with from their homework challenges.

Trying out different ways of adding colour

My next challenge is the C&G Diploma class which starts this Thursday.  I’ve got lots of interesting activities planned out and I’m really excited to get all the students together and to see how their research into their different topics is developing.

Some of my notes, which were embellished by oldest son

In the meantime, less than 24 hours since the students finished, I’ve already managed to turn my studio back into a Gillian bombsite, with tables and fabric all over the place.  Better start tidying again! 

The now not-so-tidy studio - back to normal!

Design Day workshop in the Studio

Susan's piece from kitchen utensils

Last Friday I finally remembered to take photos of the class – hurrah!  It was ‘Design Day’.  It was a great day, painting and dancing at the same time; experimenting with different media and seeing which ones people preferred (not always the ones I expected); making completely random pictures and finding interesting patterns from unpromising material (kitchen utensils!).

Creating random pictures

Many of my friends think I’m a bit nuts, but for me it was a great way to spend a Friday helping to take away the fear of designing and I was really impressed by some of the pieces created.  Fantastic designs for new textile pieces. 

Scaling up and changing media

Tomorrow is ‘Stitch Day’, the last of this session as I need to then get the studio ready for Open Studios, which starts on Saturday 6 June.  I’m going to be demonstrating my working processes as well as having work displayed for sale, especially as I have a couple of pieces I want to get made.  As I write, I’ve got fabric sitting on the radiator drying so it can then be taken to the next stage.  Can’t quite believe that at the end of May it is cold enough to justify having the radiators on!  Still it does make drying my fabric quicker.  Photos of these pieces coming soon.

Louise's drawing from utensils

One of the random pictures

In my studio: admin and spot the errors

New York Beauty

This week I’ve been having a bit of a sort-out and catch-up week.  Photos of accounts, admin and business meetings are not very exciting, so instead, here are some images of ‘humility’ quilts I designed for an article in Popular Patchwork a number of years ago. 

54 or Fight!

Quilting is full of lovely myths and one of these is that Amish quilters believe that as only God is perfect, it would be a sin for their quilts to be faultless so they add an imperfection.  To my mind, this is the ultimate sin of pride, to believe you have to add an error because otherwise it would be flawless.  I can’t believe that this attitude would sit well with what I know of Amish communities and indeed it seems unlikely and most quilt historians have decided it isn’t true.  However, it is a nice idea and perhaps it came about as an excuse by quilters who had made an obvious error in a quilt, rather than admit their mistake, put it down to a humility block.

Irish Chain

So for a bit of fun, here are some ‘humility’ quilts I designed – each one has a mistake in the pattern – can you spot them all? I designed them in EQ7.  And looking at them now, I'm not sure I can spot all the errors.  Hope you can!

Mariner's Compass

Flower Basket

Bear's Paw

In my studio: lots of daily drawing

Greek Goddess sketch by Gillian Cooper in Conte Crayon

A few months ago I told you I was trying to do a daily drawing and shared some of the early pictures.  This felt like a bit of a luxury, taking time out from making the things I needed to do, but at the same time, I know it is important for my artistic practice.  So I’ve carried on with my (almost) daily luxury and each day I start with the treat of a large mug of tea and a blank piece of paper.  Almost all my drawings are related to my continuing Ancient Greek Goddess obsession, although occasionally it may be another ancient object such as a pattern from a vase or a little horse sculpture instead.  I started out in 4B pencil, moved into 8B as I love the smudge effect.

Inspired by a Greek Octopus pattern on a vase by Gillian Cooper.  Sketch in pastels

Currently, I’m playing around with the media more and more.  Yesterday was soft pastels, which I love, today was NeoColor, which I love a lot less!  Inktense and Conté crayons and fine tipped pens have also been hits.

Detail of Greek figure in pen by Gillian Cooper

Now my biggest problem is stopping and getting on with other work as I get very absorbed in the drawing and don’t want to stop, so I am devoting more and more time to it.  However, it is very good thinking time and hopefully I will be able to develop some of these ideas further.

Same detail as above but in Inktense by Gillian Cooper

Do you have a favourite medium to draw in?

My daughter getting in on the act - with more pastel on her than the paper!

Terracotta figure in pen by Gillian Cooper

Side view of Greek figure in Conte Crayon by Gillian Cooper

In my studio: creating a collection of small works

Work-in-progress by Gillian Cooper

Over the past month or so, I have been working concurrently on lots of small pieces.  Some have worked; others will remain samples (a polite term for failures!).  What is really exciting is that they are all coming together now and will be ready to take to Holmwood House for the Meet Your Maker event next Sunday (23^rd November 11-4).

Work-in-progress by Gillian Cooper

The completed pieces will be hand-dyed then mono-printed using acrylic paint, followed by more colour added using Inktense pencils.  I’ve made stencils and used them with Shiva Paintstiks over the top.  Parts are then padded before they are machine quilted.

Work-in-progress by Gillian Cooper

I met my dear friend Marjory Mackinven for lunch today and showed her some of them, saying I was worried that these are too simple.  However, having listed out all the techniques involved, I think I am now agreeing with her that they are more complicated that I had realised!  It was lovely to see Marjory and catch up and we had a fabulous lunch at the new Three Sisters Bake Cafe in Killearn Village Hall.  Highly recommended if you are in the area.

Work-in-progress by Gillian Cooper

Finding the balance between strong design and suitable levels of detail is an interesting challenge.  I often find that as I add more and more detail, the composition becomes less clear and so the overall design is not as good.  The good news is, though, any overworked pieces can always be cut up and used in another piece.  Do you know when to stop?

Work-in-progress by Gillian Cooper

The back of one of the pieces, showing the padding

Work-in-progress by Gillian Cooper

In my studio: 3 new mixed media paintings

Untitled so far by Gillian Cooper

Amongst other things this week, I have been mono-printing onto paper.  It seems to work better than printing onto fabric – I need more paint for the fabric, so it is thicker and less defined, whereas the paper seems to pick up the subtleties better.  Or maybe it could just be the type of paint I’m using. 

Untitled so far II by Gillian Cooper

To complete the pictures, I painted the backgrounds today.   Painting totally transformed them and as I had used acrylic paint for printing with, it meant I could add more paint without the print running.   I’m satisfied with these three and they have been deemed completed.  As I am enjoying working on paper for a change, there are a number of other ones in progress, in progress being a euphemism for I don’t like them yet, so I’ll keep going!

Untitled so far III by Gillian Cooper

In my studio: my most important piece of kit

What is the most important piece of kit in your studio?  I was pondering this question as I tidied up my space. 

My sewing machines are very important, but then there are always needles and threads to stitch by hand.  I love all the different types of fabric I use, but if I was truly desperate, I could cut up some old clothes to use as a base fabric.  I have many different pens, pastels, inks, paints, etc, all of which have different uses, so it would be hard to stick to just one.  Same goes for all my threads.

So somewhat bizarrely, I think the most useful piece of kit in my studio is ... my Ikea stool! I kidnapped it out of the kitchen a few years ago, thus I need to climb on chairs in the kitchen to reach some things in cupboards.  But in my studio it is great.  I can reach everything on the top shelves and the ceiling to hang work (we have low ceilings!).  It is easy to climb up and down to put and adjust work on the design wall and takes up much less space than a ladder.  I use it as a seat when I need one to paint or print as that table is set just a little bit too low (any ideas for raising it?) and it makes a great footstool whilst I am reading or hand-sewing.   What more could I want?!

What is the most important thing in your studio?

In my studio: Fabby Fridays gelli-plate printing

My kids at the local primary school have ‘Fabby Friday’.  On Friday afternoons they get to choose from a number of fun activities including craft or watching a video or whatever it is that other people’s kids like to do.  I like this idea, so I’ve been having Fabby Friday too, giving myself permission to just play at whatever art I want to do.  The last three weeks I’ve been using my new gelli plate.  The results don’t matter, but perhaps because they don’t matter I like some of them! 

Do you give yourself time to play at art?

In my studio: spot the difference - the big tidy up

After

Before

The studio was beginning to get on top of me – literally.  I’m not tidy but nature and there is always something more interesting to do, but ... even I need to tidy up every three years or so.

So began my studio reorganisation.  I moved my desk to a better location and started to slowly work through the mounds of stuff.  Then I got bored and started working again.  The big clean up hadn’t stopped entirely; it just went slower, especially with my trip to France.

Before

After

And then this week I had an email from Sheena Kitchin of Craft Scotland wondering if she could bring round Kathy Brassill of Handcrafted Holidays.  I had to move up a tidying gear.  I think the studio is a lot better now.  I can see enough of the floor to work on larger pieces.  Hurrah!  The desk and sewing machine are now in a place where I can get the cupboards open and I have the threads right besides me.  I think both Kathy and Sheena liked the studio.

Now for the confession... I ran out of time.  The studio may be tidy, but this is settee in the kitchen and then there is the stuff under the stairs too!  

Oh dear

As the photos are complete, I’ll have to move the stuff back and have a think about where it can be stored.  And the answer isn’t the bin!

In my studio: fabric printing and painting

screen print onto hand dyed fabric

After a summer out of the studio, having fun as well as seeing lots of fantastic artwork, I’m struggling to settle back into making.  There are so many things I want to make, but I just don’t seem to be getting started right away.  I thought I knew exactly what I was going to do, but I’ve discovered out I didn’t!  What had seemed the key things during the holidays have turned out to be less fully fleshed out ideas than I had thought.

Hanging out to dry

Rather than panic – I have some exciting deadlines which I’ll tell you about later – I have decided to take things easy and just paint and print and see where that leads to.  So here are some of the things I’ve been ‘playing’ at this week. I don't know where any of them will lead, but maybe the panic will start subsiding in a week or two...

Reverse of the breakdown printing

Painting with thickened dyes

Mono-print from bubblewrap

Printing with bubble wrap

Painting with Inktense pencils

Print plate ready to make mono-print

Lightly dyed fabric, with circles stamped on top