Lately I have been busy trying to resurect something I created while I was in school. At the time I was working on a series about elements and this was my "Earth" piece. I liked the textures, the colours, and I felt there was something askew about the shape and the movement made me uncomfortable. It has been curled up in my studio, resting, for years.
Recently I pulled it out and decided to cut it all up. Pulled off the binding and lots of the backing. I was surprised to find that I still had some of the hand dyed fabric left over from the original!!
Sometimes it pays to hoard....
I wasn't sure where I wanted to go with this, but I did know that I was unhappy with the overall shape and composition and so I tried auditioning extra bits and pieces and putting it back together in a different way.
Then I 'unearthed' this old photo of my father working as a field labourer in central America. It fit in well with the theme and I had found my focal point. I decided to work the photo into some of the areas of my earth. I used the method of adjusting the photo in photoshop and printing it out onto water soluble paper and stitching through it. (much like I have done before). My father was compelled to leave Poland, leave his family and all he knew, as a young man and seek out a new life. There was no hope for him if he stayed, and there was nothing but mystery if he left. He had an adventurous spirit and travelled throughout central and south America. I know very little about his travelling adventures and even less of the family he lost. This is my loss as well. This is one of the few photos I have of him during this time.
I found this experiment in my stash as well. This had been an exercise in removing dye from the cloth. I had been using my thermofax prints with a bleaching process. It never came to anything but it was almost the exact same size as my newly sized earth piece and so this became the new back!
This is the final piece.
Here's a detail.
