Empress Wu Designs with Wilma

  Connecting and Interpreting : Story #2 from the ATASDA Collaborative Golden Cape The  Golden Cape  is a new collaborative project for ATASDA members. 50 present day members will each receive an image of one of 50 yesteryear members artworks, to use as a muse, to create new artwork based on the past. Inspiration can come from textures, colours, style, design, subject, culture or history of the original artwork.  (from   https://atasda.org.au/50-years-of-atasda)  The second story in this series highlighting the narratives behind the creative stitching on the contributions to the ATASDA  Collaborative Golden  Cape is a topical and poignant social commentary.  As I contemplate what happens after the disappointing defeat of "The Voice " referendum, I think of the word   ‘Makarrata’, a multi-layered Yolŋu word understood as the coming together after a struggle. It involves truth telling. A beautiful response by Karen Rivers, ...

Solitary Tea #07 - Wilma Simmons 2023   A single tea cup is often the subject of my textile art work. Yes, I do like tea, especially teas like White Jasmine and Buddha's Tears, and I am interested in the history and all that surrounds the subject of tea.  I particularly love this poem by a classical Chinese poet, Wang Wei:  Softly closing the chamber door Alone I await you in the empty room.  You never came .  Disappointed I drink solitary tea.  Solitary Tea #06 - Wilma Simmons 2023  Combining the techniques of photo transfer onto fabric and collage, I created these vignettes in the last week. They are interpretations of the poem and I hope they convey the simple economy of expression of the poem.  Solitary Tea #05 - Wilma Simmons 2023  Previously, I have interpreted the poem, using actual tea bags in the works and featuring my great grandmother as the narrator of the poem.   Tea Cup :Solitary Tea #03 - Wilma Simmons 2021 Blue ...

  It's Spring here in our garden. Although the weather has been warm on a few days , it has been often wet and cold and yet the garden is blooming beautifully. Every September, for the last couple of years, I have participated in #SeptTextileLove  - a daily response to prompts by the Seam Collective to share a love of textile art.... here are my September  days 11-20 ...  Day 11- Reverse  Reverse side of an upcycled jacket  Upcycling an old denim jacket with boro type stitching/mending  Day 12 : Sloppy Craft  What about the name of the movement – “sloppy craft”? “Sloppy” is really a sound bite kind of name, irresistible once spoken out loud. The reference was used extensively with textile and fabric art, but examples can be found in all the crafts. “Sloppy” indicates intentionality, which might not be the case with the art. “Sloppy Craft” is an unfortunate phrase — perhaps other names like “informal” “casual” or “raw” would be less jarring than “s...

    Recently, I've created a few portraits and it is always interesting to try different techniques. For a  "travelled" theme exhibition, the Wednesday Makers Group at Timeless Textiles   was invited to create some postcard portraits.    It was a great opportunity to use  "random cross stitch" , a technique I learnt in the textileartist.org workshop by Sharon Peoples.  The cross stitch helps to create a textured skin with subtle changes in tone.  My husband, Jim, is the subject -  here depicted on a trip in Finland ( Finnish forest in the background)  This postcard is  all handstitched and as Jim always travels with a paper map , I added a much loved map in miniature.  The whole collection of postcards by the group captures travel memories of places visited and enjoyed - places like Hawaii, Uzbekistan, Turkey,  Vietnam, Bali, India, Fiji , Latvia, Lord Howe Island, Disneyland, China , Germany, Finland, Ukraine, B...

 Chatting with Anne Kempton , Timeless Textiles Gallery,  about my textile art portrait of artist friend , Margaret Adams  - exhibition re- opening on  4 November  .  ‘Ain’t the Archies ‘ Exhibition      https://youtu.be/rZKbzvjjsWA Timeless Textiles Gallery 90 Hunter Street , Newcastle NSW 

#100gardenthreads / 26 & 27 ... the beginning of Book #6 - Sunflower Materials : cotton batik, hand dyed cotton, sewing threads, fusible webbing , coloured pencils.  Techniques - raw edge applique, hand dyeing, hand colouring, free motion machine stitching, fabric collage   

  This year , I have spent a lot of time practising free motion stitching on my sewing machine, a Bernina 550.   Earlier in the year, I had one of my machine stitched artworks, "Take Time" chosen for the exhibition, "Stole the Show, curated by Rod Pattenden.  This was created using the machine's set stitch patterns on collaged fabric.  The  newer work, "Finding Gold"  doesn't use any set designs. It is free motion stitching, which is really like free hand drawing, with the needle in the sewing machine like a pencil. The only difference is that the fabric is moved rather than the needle - just like moving the paper rather than the pencil. Sometimes, I think free motion machine stitching  is like rubbing your tummy and patting your head simultaneously, but with practice, the action of moving the fabric under the needle and keeping the machine whirring in a rhythm becomes comfortable.   "Finding Gold"  started as one of my practic...

 Background: Seam  are a contemporary textile collective based in Bath, England. We are emerging and established embroiderers, printers, knitters, weavers, dyers, fashion designers, eco-designers, makers, artists… …who want to make textiles that are irresistible, and find their way onto your body, into your house and onto your walls. We share a commitment to pushing the boundaries of our craft and making high quality objects realised in the hands and thoughts of the maker. We hope to make a sustainable living from textiles, work locally and bring textiles into contemporary focus This month, all textile artists are enouraged to share their love of textiles and respond to  30 different textile prompts for on  Instagram  during September. You can respond to as many of the prompts as you wish, this could be only a few or it may be all of them - with the hashtag #SeptTextileLove   Here is my first week of #SeptTextileLove  Days 1 & 2 - Introd...

Stitching a 'garden' background - Wilma Simmons  Using gardens as inspiration for art is long established practice in the fine arts, including textile arts. Monet's painting are amongst my favourite artworks and there is no shortage of  treatises about the gardens in art.    https://www.booktopia.com.au/monet-s-garden-in-art-debra-n-mancoff/book/ Some of my favourite textile artists ( like Anne Kelly) turn to gardens as a source of unending inspiration.  https://www.textileartist.org/small-worlds-recycled-textile-art-by-anne-kelly In a considerably more humble way, I have recently been featuring plants from our garden in my small wearable art pin series for #the100dayproject. Although we are in the winter phase of the garden where the colour palette is a more subdued, there are still some beautifully bright flowers, like the purple black eyed African daisies, late summer marigolds, tiny native violets and their potted cousins, violas. Even the p...

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...