Tapestry, textiles, arts & crafts and more
I spent the summer in Canada, and came back with a bunch of yummy yarns. I don’t know what I will do with these wonderfuls threads, I have to wind and sample them to get an idea. For sure, some will stay for months or years in their boxes. Doesn’t matter, yarns are like books, they patiently wait till you’re ready for them.
J’ai rapporté pas mal de différentes fibres du Canada, soie, coton, chanvre. Il va falloir que je fasse des échantillons pour voir ce qu’elles donnent.
Not exactly a loom, more a large frame, one of the millions old looms in the world. It has now a new home, I washed it, waxed it and mounted it with the help of Celina and Olivier. I was first disappointed because I was told that such a large frame without tensioning system wouldn’t do for tapestry. I then found online a wonderful artist and kind person, Louise Oppenheimer, https://www.louiseoppenheimer.com/, who has been working for years on simple large frames, and who gave me confidence. Also that night, instead of sleeping, I decided to warp my loom for a try. Here it is!
Un nouveau métier, ou plutôt un cadre, car il n’a pas de système de tension. Mais voir le travail de Louise Oppenheimer qui travaille sur de simples cadres me met en confiance, et j’ai monté la chaîne cette nuit, pour essayer.
Celina admires this artist, and she is planning to pay hommage to him in a tapestry. She did this sample to try her hand at windows. She first considered to make them with soumak ( the bottom window) but after seeing the hommage to Louise Martin woven by my friend Jon, she decided to go with slits. I can’t wait to see the whole piece but it will take some time because as me Celina has a full time job).
Célina va se lancer dans un hommage à Hunderwasser, elle a tissé ces fenêtres en échantillon , les lignes verticales sont en soumak pour celle du bas, et indiquées par des fentes dans celle du haut ( comme dans une tapisserie de Jon), ce sera son choix final. J’ai hâte de voir la tapisserie terminée, mais ce n’est pas pour tout de suite!
You may know, if you follow that blog, that I spent this summer weaving Link, who is the a character of the LoZ. My daughter made this fanart piece, that I fell in love with, and I decided to weave it. ( You can find the original digital art here)
I first made my cartoon, choose my wools, and begun to weave in June, I finished this summer in the parks of Toronto.
When I showed it to my daughter, ske liked it, but made some remarks that made me want to do it again. I will detail them below the picture.
1- The weaving doesn’t follow the line of the drawing
2- This part is not the skin, but the hair, souldn’t be different from the sides.
3- You can’t recognize that it is a little woman
4- You don’t see that the background is a castle
5-the value of the top of the hair is too light
6- This part is too complicated, it’s only the hair, should be one color
7-It was not necessary to line the eyebrows. ( But it should have been great to line the eyes on the top too)
8-There was a shrinkage at the end.
So I tried to take all her remarks in consideration ( but I must admit I forgot some of them, and that sometimes I didn’t follow her prescription because it didn’t seem right to me: for example, she thought the purple was unnecessary, I found it fundamental). Even if it doesn’t show on the photos, all the colors are the same except the deep green of the Hoarin Link 2 (they may sometimes be arranged differently). Here is the result.
I am sure that the weaving of Link 2 is much better. But some parts of each are better than the other’s. I had fun doing that, and if I didn’t have a full time job, I would do a third one.
Which one do you prefer? You will find below pictures of the process, and some details.
Mes chers amis français, c’est trop long de tout traduire donc en bref: deux versions d’un Fanart de ma fille à partir du personnage de Link du jeuLegend of Zelda.
I found this as usual in a flea market, in Paris, about 6 years ago, sweet memories of this moment shared with my mother and my niece Aina.
This piece of textile is beautifully and neatly framed (7×10 cm) with exotic wood and silver. The design has a forties ( or sixties?) look to me. But I don’t know what is this textile so carefully sealed. Antic Peruvian? If one of my readers have a clew, I would be glad to hear it.
J’ai trouvé ce textile très soigneusement encadré de bois et d’argent au marché d’Aligre, il y a environ 6 ans. Si quelqu’un a une idée de l’origine de ce tissage, merci de la partager
My daughter loves to draw Fanart of the video games she loves, like The legend of Zelda. I love my daughter’s art. So I decided to make a tapestry from one of her production, and to give it to her for her birthday.
It’s now off the loom, and not so bad, and I think she likes it. Then, discussing with her about my choices in terms of color or details, she said that though she likes most of my choices, they wouldn’t have been hers. So today we will work on collaboration, to elaborate an new cartoon, I will weave it and she will choose the one she prefers.
My daughter’s website is here.
J’ai fini la tapisserie à partir du Fan art de ma fille. En discutant, elle m’a dit que ses choix n’auraient pas été les mêmes que les miens, même si elle les appréciait. Alors après une session de travail, on va élaborer un autre carton, et quand j’aurai fini cette deuxième tapisserie, elle choisira celle qu’elle préfèrera.
My Airbnb in Toronto is a cave, so I spend some time weaving in a park. It’s a real pleasure to weave outside, feeling the wind, hearing people talking and laughing. The hardest part is to find each day the convenient table, shady and not to close to the street. Sometimes people approach me and ask questions. A young Asian man was in wonder, he told me that when he was young, he saw his mother weaving, not tapestry but fabric. And, looking at the Mirrix loom he added that she wove on a huge wooden loom, not like this cute little thing.
As for the weaving, my gift is going well, and should be finished on time.
MonAirbnb est un trou à rat, alors je passe mes journées à tisser dans le parc, et c’est un vrai plaisir. Le plus dur, c’est de trouver la bonne table.
Quand à la tapisserie, elle avance bien, et devrait être terminée dans les temps.
I love the red color of this kilim. Turkisk I bet, powerful with only four colors. Yellow and white or rose have faded, not the brown. The warp is cotton, the weft seems hand spun wool, thick and shiny. The kilim shows some repairs, and at some places the warp is visible. In their book, Ahmet Diler and Marc-Antoine Gallice decribe the design as scorpio, they say that people appropriate the strength of this animal they fear. I often think of the work of women I don’t know, dyeing, spinning, weaving, repairing.
J’adore le rouge de ce kilim à motif de scorpion. La laine a été filée à la main.
When I came back from my first workshop from Aubusson, I hadn’t heard of Mirrix yet. So I thought I would lately buy a low warp loom, and I begun to find equipment meeting this goal. I first bought (second hand and very cheap) these tools whose name I don’t know in English. The cycle is made to wind big bobbins, like the ones in the picture. The two little ones are made to wind Aubusson “flûtes “. The tiny one is 100 years old, and was probably intend to wind lace bobbins. I also bought the lazy John, and the 60’s plastic bobbin winder, to be able to wind without bobbins ( they are hard to find).
For the Mirrix, I don’t need fûtes anymore, but I still use them from time to time. And I may still buy a low warp loom, although I would like now to have a proper training on high warp loom. We’ll see.
Pensant que je m’achèterai un métier de basse lice, je me suis équipée à Aubusson d’une roue à bobiner, et d’une bobinette pour les flûtes. J’ai aussi acheté le cantre, puis le bobinoir en plastique années 60, pour faire des pelotes, car les bobines en bois sont rares et chères. Avec le Mirrix, plus besoin de bobines, mais peut-être que j’achèterai le métier de basse lice plus tard, on verra.
Tissagerie 