New Felt Work

Taking a little break from posting pictures of Newfoundland and showing you some of my new felt work. The first one is fungi from the forest floor on a cast of a friend's body. Some of the fungus is made from wool roving and needle felted and some is Tyvek that has been painted and had a heat gun applied to it. there are other bits and pieces added in amongst the larger bits. The cast is taken from a mold and done in heavy brown paper covered in beads and sprayed with "stone" texture paint and a little acrylic brush work.

 

 

 

The full figure is done in a similar fashion, but this time it's coral. Some is wet felted and some is done with the needle. There is beading, embroidery and a few odds and ends added.

 

Below is a Hawk Moth made with wet felting and stiffener, wire , and machine embroidery. I plan on doing a whole series under glass like this.

 

This one is also a coral reef but in a different format. It's all done with needle felting, embroidery, beading and yarn. It was in the Huron-Perth exhibit at Gallery Stratford and won viewer's choice. This piece prompted the curator to ask me to do a large installation  on  a similar theme. I will be spending the next year building an oversized coral reef for one of the rooms at Gallery Stratford. Yeah , my first public gallery exhibition. I'm really excited about this as are some of my closest friends.

 

The last one is another one under glass but this time it is a forest floor fungi piece built around a found stick. It includes Tyvek again along with wet and needle felting and found bits, embroidery, yarn and beads. I can't afford a lot of actual bell jars so I've been going to thrift shops to find bits and pieces to put together. I do have a couple of bell jars, but it depends on the piece which piece of glass I will use.

I'm currently working on miles of seaweed for the aforementioned exhibit. I'll post more on it later on.

Flowers of Newfoundland

I continue to go on about my trip to Newfoundland, but it was terrific. So many flowers on the roadsides, all over the place really. Here are some. We had just been to Hillgrade for a round of fresh fish and chips and took a little side jaunt to Fairchild and an old wooden church. the area around the church and by the water was filled with daisies, wild iris, campanula and a tiny white flower I don't know the name of .

 

Campanula at Herring Neck

 

                                                     Foxglove on the way to Cow Head

 

Fireweed at Gros Mourne

 

Picture Plant at Gros Mourne

 

Wild Roses

 

By the road at Woody Point

 

The next 3 I have to research the names of.

 

 

More of Newfoundland

This is truly a beautiful province, I've come away with a lot of fodder for future artwork, whether it is drawing painting or fibre art. Here are some more photos.


       Lobster traps and buoys near Woody Point along with fishing boats and the fishing stages.

 

 The remains of the St. that that ran aground in 1919. It's amazing what is still there after so long.

 

 

 

 

The variety in colour and pattern on the stones and rocks was amazing.

 

 

Newfoundland Summer

I have been away most of the summer, I had a great trip to Newfoundland for 5 weeks and 2 up at my cottage. I will post a bit at a time about the Newfoundland trip. It was fantastic and I can not wait to go back some day. While I was there I stayed with a friend who has a place in Herring Neck near Twillingate on the north east side of the island.

 

The fishing stage nearest the water is being turned into an outdoor studio. Fantastic atmosphere.

 

 

The neighbours

 

Degas the resident raven with a piece of a hot dog.

 

The gull missed out all altogether because he could not figure out how to land under the clothesline.

 

 

Yet another fishing stage, I like these buildings . They pitch at different angles.

 

The habour at Twillingate.

 

The Town

 

 Another shot in the habour

 

 

I like all the painted clapboard homes.

 

Nina Keogh, home and studio. She is a painter and puppeteer.

 

 

 

Pinterest

This is just a quick one....you can now find me on Pinterest @

http://pinterest.com/quinnalex26/boards/

After the Storm

Spring has finally sprung, the cleanup from the storm is over with . The trees and branches have been cut up and are lined up for burning. We are going to have a lot of weennie roasts this summer. The gouges in the ground have been rolled and seeded down so as long as the barn cats leave them alone we might see some grass. Mind you, you know what they say about hearding cats!

A new show opened at Galery 96 last week and runs until May 19th at Factory 163 on King St. here in Stratford. I did 2 new felted pieces for this; Forst Floor and Hawk Moth. Both are under glass. I am working on  a series here. The first one is on land and the next will be coral reefs. I am not just usung traditional glass cloches, but making some of my own out glass pieces from the Goodwill. Here are the pictures....

Ice Storm

Yes it's April,but here in southwestrn Ontario, winter just doesn't want to give up. Last Friday we had a horiffic ice storm. We lost power for 16 hours and ended up spending the latter half of the day with a friend who did. Sadly many people to the north of us didn't have power for 3-4 days and had to go to warm-up centres. What a thought.

There were trees and power lines down all over the place, fortunately no one was hurt or injured.
Here are a few photos from around our place. The ice has melted, but here is some of the damage.

 

Yes it's an old open faced garage but it offers protection from frosty windhields and piles of snow (sometimes). We are lucky, the car was in there on the day.

 

 

It uprooted trees and decapitated others.

 

Limbs everywhere!

 

 

THE CLEAN UP

 

Working on the tree.

 

Starting a pile.

                                             Getting ready to pull a big piece down.

 

Even the girlfriend is pitching in.

 

Thanks Paul

 

Not Chris's best shot, but....

Pardon the pun.

 

 

Thanks to Chris H. Tyler, Josh, Paul, Quinn, Rachel and my hubby. Me, I spent the time cooking....do you know how much these hungry fellows can eat? The clean up continues, but it keeps raining so the ground is too soft. The other eveing my son got stuck with the trailer and my husband had to pull him out with the big tractor, so things are on hold. I'm afraid that the ducks and geese that land in the puddles may decide to nest. WE HAVE BARN CATS AND A BIG DOG!