Looking for a gift for a bride and groom to be or perhaps that special someone in your life? May I suggest something with just the right mix of sass and class...
Commission a hand sewn underwear portrait! See below a recently completed piece,created with thread and hand made paper. You need only photograph the unmentionables of the happy couple and send it to me via email. Contact me for time frame and prices.
With all the images I've been doing of corsets, I thought it was time to try one on.
I was recently fortunate enough to meet designer Thea Yeatman of Woven Streams Couture, who not only makes beautifully custom design clothing but creates period costumes including corsets. I spent a couple of fun afternoons at her studio sketching and photographing corsets from different ages.
Shown above is a corset from the Seventeen Hundreds as distinguished by the plain fabric and tabs at the bottom which allowed the garment to flair gently into the lower portion of the body just above the hips, creating a willowy form. Also notice the straps which pushed the shoulders back and the chest forward. The Victorian corset in contrast curved outwards more dramatically to accentuate the hips, resulting in an hour glass figure. It was also made with lavish silks and laces.
With a body like mine there isn't a lot to shift around, the change in posture was the most dramatic effect. Wearing corset is as I suspected a bit claustrophobic but not too uncomfortable as long as you aren't planning to exert yourself...
I'm still at work on my paper and encaustics. I've given the series the tentative title "Between the Lines". More in progress images soon...
The creases and contours of clothing become a topography of the wearer's experience. While the cut and pattern of a garment often reflects cultural semiotics, the wear and tear on an item reflects the habits and history of the individual who wore it. Like a palm reader the sensitive viewer may find life lines, heart lines and head lines hidden about a discarded T-shirt. Like roads on a map we may follow the fold down a sleeve or pant leg to discern the psychology of crossed legs or folded arms.
The lines in my work are drawn with stitch-work on hand made paper. While some pieces are left in a raw state, others have been used to create encaustic paintings in which the paper becomes transparent or almost vanishes. While the sensitive contours of my work express the idiosyncrasies of the personal, the colours of the encaustic paint, or collage elements like bits of fabric, evoke environments. In the triptych “On the Line” patterns on the fabric escape the boundaries of the items of clothing to merge with the sea side setting. In “Pinstripes” the vertical lines of the text evoke the prison an office can become. A conversation emerges, between the cultural expression and restrictions embodied by clothing, and the details of private worlds.
Last September I began a Masters in Art Education at Concordia University. While I've certainly been a busy girl this year with papers to write and undergraduate students to grade, in my studio courses I continued to experiment with my new favourite medium; handmade paper I have also revived to my usage of encaustics . There is something particularly fascinating about the combination of the two textures. Clothing has continued to be an obsession of mine. The airing of the private and personal is expressed in "Underwear on the Line" shown above. Look for the upcoming issue of Arc Poetry magazine which will feature a new work with similar subject with a bit of twist.
An assigned theme in the past winters studio course, Culture/Nature, has also lead to new developments in subject matter; maps. This was perhaps a natural progression due to my interest in city spaces and the phenomenology of space. It has also provided an excellent opportunity to become familiar w
ith my new home Montreal.
Another school project in a course entitled "Narrative History" lead to a very rewarding collaboration with my classmate Renee Jackson. Our task was to interview one another focusing on a chosen question related to art education. We were then to communicate this experience through a collaborative work of art. In no time Renee and I discovered a mutual interest in Surrealism. Using the game "exquisite corpse" we conversed on a series of themes which eventually lead to an installation and performance entitled "The Conversation Umbrellas." This summer I am working on a website which will showcase the arts based research projects of the whole class. Look for a link in the near future.
After a long winter's hibernation I am at last ready to emerge.
The first weekend in June I will take part in Ottawa's Art in the Park and on July 8th the Centretown Art Tour, or CAT Walk (link soon to come). I am also working out the dates for a week long solo show.
The result of my last few months in hiding is Retrievals and Alternations. This series of paintings on canvas is inspired by my earlier work My Spinster Aunt Who was also a Seamstress for Eatons. My Great Aunt Doreen did repairs and alterations for the now defunct Canadian department store. It is my effort in these new works to retrieve faces from the past most of which belong to the muses and models of famous modern artists. I'm hoping I've painted Franzi (shown here), Erna and Dora Mar, among others, as subjects in their own right or the personalities behind the bodies.
The images in these works have been drawn from old photographs. I've used both fabric and paint to alter the story told by the eye told by the camera lens. My Spinster Aunt will make a reappearance. The original was purchased by Anita Lahey, editor of the poetry magazine ARC. She did not seem to mind the awkward title though it was stitched right onto the canvas. Perhaps she attached a couple of commas when she got it home.