Light as a feather

 Still playing around with feather designs...here's one I finished on my lunchbreak today and coloured digitally.  Might paint it these colours and turn it into a collage!

Interviewed

Just a note to say there's an interview with me up on the Auckland Fair blog which you can read here!   I'm hoping to bring some prints with crazy patterned feathers to the Fair this time and this is a design I've been playing around with... 

Slings and arrows

The last few nights I've been drawing some repetitive stylised feathers and playing round with colour combinations, painting them with watercolours.  Tonight's feathers are going to be pastel icecream colours I think!  

Feathered

I finished painting my feather drawing the other night - I used watercolour and a bit of gouache.  The drawing's A3 so I'm thinking of having some printed as A3 prints...and I'll bring them along to my stall at the Auckland Art and Craft Fair.  I'm working on a hand-lettered print at the moment and then I think the next thing in my drawing queue is to draw a mermaid and mariner for my new band with Mr. Millicent Crow!  

My creative space: burgundy

 I finished trimming, interfacing and zigzagging my big pile of burgundy feathers this afternoon and now they're all ready to be sewn on as patches, turned into brooches, used as bookmarks...

  I'm having fun screenprinting coloured feathers instead of my usual black and white - I'm thinking bright red or gold might be then next colour I try.

And speaking of burgundy how red was the sunset last night!  So pretty.  

Joining in with My Creative Space today.

Happy Thursday to you! 

Four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie

I needed a quick making things fix this afternoon so I screenprinted some more of my feather patches, in a burgundy ink this time.  When they were all laid out I thought the colour of the calico looked like a delicious pie crust.  The way the cat was weaving around them when I was trying to take photos made me think she wouldn't have minded eating a giant feather pie!

My Creative Space: calico and blue

 I've been loving the combination of blue and calico lately, so I thought I'd have a change from my usual black on white, or white on black feathers and print up some blue ones.  Which leaves my lounge looking like I've just plucked a giant macaw!

 I'm going to turn the feathers into brooches and patches and hopefully bring them along to the next First Thursdays Market.  2 May, 6pm, St. Kevin's Arcade.  Might see you there?

Joining in with "My Creative Space" over here today.  Happy Thursday!

My creative space: red leaves

 

In my creative space today I've got my second attempt at this watercolour and gouache painting of some of the red leaves I've been collecting.  You can see my first attempt in the background here:

I'm hoping to do a version with green leaves too, so that I can have something vaguely christmassy for my Millicent Crow stall.  Although hearing "All I want for Christmas is yooooou" in a shop the other day made my skin crawl!

 I like all the reddish splotches on the envelopes I've been using as palattes.

 My next project involves these - guinea fowl feathers.  Much as I wish I had a flock of guinea fowl I bought these beauties off Trade Me, from someone in Nelson.  Crazy the things you can buy on the internet! 

How about you, what have you been making?  Got any christmassy projects on the go?

Joining in with "My Creative Space" over here.

Happy Thursday to you!

This little collection

 ...is what I pulled out of my pockets after my evening walk around Western Springs last night.  I've been collecting a whole lot of red leaves lately, I'm hoping to do a drawing of them soon.

I had to ward off a very angry swan to pick that feather up off the ground!

My creative space: willow pattern

 Today in my creative space I've been printing up a storm.  I just got a whole lot of lovely sturdy linen cheaply because it was a bit water damaged and I've been trying out some blue ink on it. 

The colours reminded me of willow pattern.

 I'll probably sew it up into some more pouches - I've been thinking about making myself a screen printed obi-style belt too - using the same pattern you can see in these photos.

Joining in today with "My Creative Space" over here.

Happy Thursday!

Feathering my nest

My workmate was given two mysterious bags full of feathers the other day, and I borrowed a few of them to draw over the weekend.  Here they are in pencil and in pen...I'm going to hopefully turn them into a gocco print in the next couple of days. 

 

I think they once belonged to a hawk, a pheasant, a kereru and a mallard. 

Dots on sticks and a splash of colour

Some more late night pattern practice...'night!

Playing with patterns

I'm borrowing my sister's computer this weekend and having a play with making patterns in Photoshop.  I'm making patterns from some drawings I did a while back - they're similar to some of the stamps I've made to use on fabric.  I'm hoping to turn a design like this into a silk screen so that I can make fabric with a repeating pattern...

My creative space: giant embroidery hoop

A year or so ago I found, in an op shop, the biggest embroidery hoop I'd ever seen:

 

 I've finally got around to using it - I've screen printed some giant feathers and used it to frame them...might need a bit more ironing methinks!  

 

Here are the feathers up close

Joining in with "my creative space" over here today.  Hope you're having a great Thursday, I'm looking forward to jumping on a plane tonight and heading out of town for a few days!