Saturday, May 22, 2021

I Stitch

...for Me

I love my embroidery.  I have literally an endless amount of ideas in my head at all times. The hardest thing for me is deciding on which one to try and make. I love the sound of the needle and thread pulling through the fabric in the quiet. Stitching makes me happy. 

Of coarse is great if other folks like it...but what if they dont?  If you read the comments on my last post my Mother commented that she didnt like some of my leaves and thought they looked sloppy.  I wont lie, I was a bit surprised.  For a moment I questioned the stitches I used and asked myself if I should take them out...were they really that bad?  

They are the large two tone leaves to the center in the panel above. A 17th c technique known as Flecking used two different threads in the needle. Usually a light colour thread was wrapped round a darker one. The effect is quite striking with long and short stitch, and can be appreciated fully on this embroidered jacket at the V&A.  I was using that in my brain for inspiration to combine two colours of untwisted flat filament silk for a more random effect that looks like a different colour from afar on my leaves.  

I kept going back and looking at the finished leaves and asked myself if I should take them out and redo them...but my answer was always the same, 'But I like them.'  Which brings me to my point I'm trying to make. My stitching is for me. If I am in a room of 100 folks and I'm the only one that likes it, well thats just fine, because I like it and it makes my heart happy. There will always be folks who may not like what you are stitching...or the fabric you choose for a quilt...or the colours you chose to paint that flower. As long as you like it, thats all that matters!
 

2 comments:

Momma Bear said...

I have been thinking about this in my own work, the parallel thoughts of precision and perfection. I how precision is a word I feel I can own and perfection is an unobtainable creativity stealer. I go for symmetry and balance instead, as something more readily found in nature. We feel nature is perfect but it is not, it is however symmetrical. The Fibonacci spiral come immediately to mind and are found everywhere in nature, including your back yard flowerbed. "I like it" is the best metric for doing something I can imagine.

Barbara Brown said...

You're so right, Honey! You do what makes you happy and if you like it, well, that's the way it will be! I do the same thing with my painting, if I like it, piss on everybody else....I didn't paint it for them. I could give a "sh-t" what everybody else thinks. It's ME I'm trying to make happy. I was just worried you were still having some issues with your covid headaches and that was why your leaves looked just a little "off" to me. Ly, Mom