Birding with Abigail Brown

Close up of fabric owl - Wilma Simmons, Empress Wu Designs 2015.

Abigail Brown is described as a creature textile designer extraordinaire, and having met Abigaill recently, I would add a very talented, generous, spirited and beautiful artist. Her vibrant work rejoices in the amazing beauty of nature ... here is what Abigail says about her stunning soft sculptures ....

I am excited by the opportunity to create life from these flat pieces of cloth, working with their weave to mould shapes, fraying their edges to form feathered breasts, creating stiffened tail feathers from something that was limp. That final placing of the eye and a new life is born...The Animal Kingdom is the inspiration behind all my work. I am fascinated by its rituals and language, a world of mystery and secrets on which we can but speculate. My fabric bird sculptures are a celebration of textures, patterns, colours and forms that delight me in nature.

Abigail Brown with workshop participants' birds

I thoroughly enjoyed the workshop with Abigail at Timeless Textiles, Newcastle ( NSW Australia) and created a simple bird on the first day under Abigail's guidance.

Green bird - Wilma Simmons, Empress Wu Designs, 2015

Basic bird in progress - Wilma Simmons, Empress Wu Designs. 2015

Basic Bird in progress - Wilma Simmons, Empress Wu Designs 2015

When it was time to create our own pattern, I chose a woodland owl, because my owl collector sister's birthday was imminent, and I had recently dyed some wool with eucalypt leaves which I though would look good as an owl body. So with other hand dyed fabrics and a batik shirt abandoned by my husband, an owl is born.....

Early stages of owl in progress - Wilma Simmons, Empress Wu Designs, 2015

Sample of feathers, and various fabric feathers - Wilma Simmons, Empress Wu Designs, 2015.

Some close ups - Owl by Wilma Simmons, Empress Wu Designs, 2015

'Owl in garden' by Wilma Simmons, Empress Wu Designs, 2015

Happy Birthday Owl - Wilma Simmons, Empress Wu Designs, 2015

Owl in new home with a previously created owl woman (circa 2009) Wilma Simmons, Empress Wu Designs, 2015

And as a post script.... many thanks to Anne Kempton from Timeless Textiles who organises fabulous artists like Abigail Brown to visit Newcastle to inspire many like myself to create....

Anne Kempton, Timeless Textiles with her little owl created in the Abigail Brown workshop, March 2015.

Fish and Sticks : Art Dolls

This week I've been working on fish and sticks .... The sticks are the message stick art dolls which were very popular, attracting some attention and a few orders at the Wise Women exhibition. Each of the message stick dolls are from the Wise Women series, each with her own personality and message of wisdom, handwritten on a handmade timber tag. I gather the sticks during my walks around my neighbourhood and the tags are made from special bits of timber, some collected by me or my husband or from off cuts gifted to us from another doll making friend whose husband makes bagpipes. These dolls start off very simply with a wrap around a stick, in the general shape of a body. 'Naked" message stick dolls - strips of wadding wrapped around found sticks. Then I usually wrap other layers of fabric, wool, and/or fibres, over which I do some simple embroidery. I sculpt or mould small face masks for these dolls. I really like using "sari ribbon" as w...

In the Pink

At Tag Tuesday . Pinky O' Hagan is hosting a tag challenge which asks for 'a bit of pink".... not so difficult if you like pink. I don't use a lot of pink in my work, so it was quite a bit of a challenge when I thought only of pink - my thoughts went to pink roses, pink hearts, pink confectionery !!! Then I referred to this week's colour prompts, #coloricombo by artists Este MacLeod.... pink with sap green, dark tea, and sea green. I'm not sure I got the colours in this palette exactly, but here is my tag, a stylised landscape - The collaged background of the tag has torn pieces of watercolour art rejects, painted magazine pages and a little bit of gift paper. The tree silhouette is decorated with paper dots, cut with a hole puncher.

Covid Man and Book Print

This is my tag for the current theme at Tag Tuesday - Book Print. I like using text as a background for tags and today, I reduced one of my recent line drawings and printed it on a small book page .... as you can see, the book's chapter is entitled "Of Holy Living and Dying ( from The Book of Books) . I thought this was appropriate as this 'Covid man' drawing depicts Nature happily thriving while man appears to be "unravelling " at the edges of body and mind... Original drawing - Wilma Simmons Silk screen print on fabric : Wilma Simmons Silk screen print on paper : Wilma Simmons And here are some other tags on book print backgrounds - these are free motion stitched "Nature" portraits done earlier in the year.

Empress Wu Designs with Wilma

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