Empress Wu Designs with Wilma

For the current challenge "The Sea"  at Tag Tuesday, I made a couple of  painted/ hand drawn tags . These were created from a piece of watercolour paper which had been sprayed with acrylic paint - blue, yellow and quinacridone gold. I then sketched over the top  , trying to follow some pattern created by the splatter and then add some felt tip pen lines  watercolour pencil to highlight the shapes. The tags represent the fantasies of the hidden city of Atlantis and a mermaid.  With this theme in mind, I also add a free motion stitched  tag I made  earlier this year for 29 Faces - 

Wondering if I have the time,  I tentatively registered for the TextileArtist.org   Stitch Club. I started late but I have come to terms with being behind and will do the exercises when I feel in the mood ... my new formula  is:  (collection of ideas + good mood + time opportunity)  - (hesitation + self doubts) = happy project   So this weekend, it was time to tackle the first workshop by artist, Debbie Lyddon. No problem with "ideas" This is what Debbie says.....  " I walk, look and listen, I pick up an object and put it in my pocket. I make a container for it and place it ... in a place where I gather interesting objects together. I make connections and I tell stories....  This workshop is drawn from my love of walking, collecting, being curious , telling stories and making....  The challenge is to make three hand-stitched containers for a collection of three objects, natural or man made..."  from Stitch Club work...

Fish Brooches Fish, mermaids,  fishermen, water goddesses, ocean creatures and a couple of majestic frogs were all there. The doll making group I belong to, Hello Dollies, was a featured artist at the Dobell Art and Crafts festival  last weekend. The little colourful fish which were made at one Saturday meeting were the most popular amongst the crowd, with most of them  being sold  on the first day of the festival.  Here are a few images of the dolls on display... no wonder there were lots of oohs and aahs.... Fishermen and  Siren of the Sea   Water maiden, mermaid and frog prince  Chubby mermaids  Water doll, mermaid and sea urchin  Mermaid  Sea Goddess  Frog Prince  Water Maiden Mermaid, Venetian fisherman and "compass" doll  "Taking a friend for a walk " - hard to see but the friend is a fish!  Ocean maiden and beaded face mermaid  Part of the...

Original fabric for textile art ... an article   'Surfaces for Stitch " by Pauline Verrinder in the February/March edition of Quilting Arts Magazine caught my eye. It reads " Scrim or cheesecloth - is an inexpensive woven cotton that is both open and loose. It has many uses around the house : cleaning windows, straining cooking ingredients, and as a bandage. But for textile artists, it is the perfect material for creating richly decorated art cloth...."  So, with some cotton fabric,  gesso, paint, pastels, pencils, newspaper headlines and cheesecloth ... this is what I got :  I also applied the same technique to a cloth doll body - inspired by the ocean and shipwrecks.  (The100th anniversary of te Titanic sinking is next month )  So enough of playing around with paint... back to some naked bodies desperately waiting to be embellished into some message stick  art dolls. I wonder what the person who ordered these would think if he saw the...