Chapter 12...resolved?

All change!  Clarity of thought, aided by Sian, has led me away from getting to involved in creating a functional piece and am going for an interpretation of strata in a landscape/portrait style pieces using a combination of sections. I ventured down the route of exploring ideas with Gimp, the computer programme, which I enjoy and set off on an interesting adventure to complete this piece.

Ref 5.12.3b

Ref 5.12.3a

With these pictures beginning to help me concentrate on the methods to use it was good to muse on the different levels and sampling that could be used for each section.
With three key words kept coming to mind; texture, layer and contrast the selection began amongst my papers, fabrics and threads.
Concerned not to over process the piece kept in mind the words in the manual ' to limit selection to a maximum of four methods'. Texture could be produced, by stitches and fabric finish. Levels could be achieved by padding and cutting through, allowing sections  to show their layers with possibly the highest point being seen outlined in pink with slope being shown in orange. Contrast by colour selection and the thickness of fabric or thread.

Ref 5.12.3c

Ref 5.12.4

Ref 5.12.5

But before a cut is made thought it best to review all my chapters to date and reread Sian's comments on each chapter.  The following points were noted and place on a crib sheet; Digital manipulation - an interesting feature; stitch - how and with what?; edges - ragged, frayed, pulled out, consider use of stitch and sheer fabric, can reverse become the front?
  So now to sit down and play with fabric and shapes. Wanted to get key shapes and sequences of fabric layers into my head to muse on. If I was too take my digital image literally I could fall into a trap of too much detail and too many small pieces that would be difficult and fiddly to work on

Ref 5.12.6

Ref 5.12.7

First faltering steps on layering :
top layer: machine stitched thrums on soluble fabric
second layer: yellow velvet 'knocked back' with black FuseX
third layer : rust felt
Lots of fidgeting and then machine stitched, in long zig zag stitch. Then attached in machine running to stitch to fourth layer of black felt. Note to self - I would pull out some of these running stitches later. The next decision was to add a fifth double layer of bronze silk which would be revealed with cut through channels and fraying. 

Ref 5.12.8

As I looked at sample pieces realised I wanted to stuff them rather than use vilene, wanted to keep the pieces rounded, would possibly restrict stuffing just two of the pieces. Still in my mind was the thought of cutting through these pieces.  But before making too many decisions on this first series I  wanted to construct lower layers that these pieces would 'sit' on. Abaca paper, slubbed yellow silk layered over black felt was the decision. 

Ref 5.12.9

Ref 5.12.10

Three hours later and that concept was abandoned. Its all thanks to a power cut!  I had been stitching away and was getting frustrated and started cutting up and re stitching , see ref 5.12.9 and POW off went the power for 4 hours courtesy of hurricane Bertha. I decided it was all getting overly complicated and that reverse applique could be more effective stitching into more layers of fabrics I had already used see ref 5.12.10.  

Ref 5.12.11

It seemed to pull the piece together when looking at it through a frame.  The scale of the piece to be stitched, the bottom right hand corner, suddenly became apparent.  I was not wanting to frame the piece but seeing size relationships cleared my mind. Machined lines into the piece as soon as power came back on.  Stitching the bottom corner stabilised the work and made for easier handling and hopefully the flow of stitching patterns across the picture.  The four dimensional pieces had just been tacked in position.  Selecting threads from these four pieces I started hand stitching and cutting through the layers. 

As work progressed, realised a groove was appearing needed the needle to be moved off the record a little more frequently! Was I falling into a trap of stitching too much and getting involved in too much detail?  The idea of a relationship of texture, layer and contrast across the piece has produced a very tactile piece that is great to run your hands over but whether it is as attractive to the eye is  questionable either way up! My mantra that , 'less is more' seems to have been proved by producing the opposite - the explanation, indulgence!

Ref 5.12.12a

Ref 5.12.12b

The decision for the final look: to give more stuffing to the shaped pieces on the right hand side and to mount on a black felt stretched over a canvas board allowing a 2 inch border!

Ref 5.12.13