For centuries women have used cloth as a tool of comfort and as an expression of beauty within their homes. Creating cloth for warmth, cloth for shelter, our female predecessors embellished these linens with hand stitch using laborious and time consuming techniques thereby enhancing the functional beauty of objects which enveloped and protected their families. Inspired by these women I hope my creations pay tribute to and recognise the devotion expressed in cloth by our female ancestors .







''the use of traditional often time consuming process alludes to the devotion of a mother''. c K. A. Ruane 2007







Friday, May 8, 2009

Beads, puffs and discuss please

Oh my goodness, another post after only two days! All the blood must have rushed to my head! Not many images, how fast do you think my fingers can go??? I just had to post today though because I have a burning desire to explain why, despite appreciating Jackie's comment and I really do, believe me I am always ultra ultra thankful for any suggestions, I just can't bring myself to do it. I have so many craetive hangups that I must be a psychiatrist's dream. Despite my best efforts and despite trying soooooooooo many times, I cannot really do simple, minimal, bear bones embroidery. I have this thing that if it's not complicated...it can't be good. Or should I say, if it's not complicated I am not happy. Just about everything I create evolves from research I carried out for my Degree. That research centred on how women, mothers, grandmothers, performed slow, laborious, time comnsuming tasks to improve, enhance, enrich etc etc etc the lives of their families. ''making the functional beautiful'' is a quote that springs to mind. I just can't sell myself or my motivations short and because of the afforementioned hang ups, that is how I would feel if I merely produced for the commercial aspect, not for the love of fabric and thread. And there my friends is the reason I will probably never be able to make a proper living from this, (despite badly wanting to), deep down it's about love and obsession. However, that doesn't mean I am going to give up trying, I've never been a quitter. You know I agonised for hours over the price of my last two dolls. Honestly, honestly they are not overpriced. For example it took me a full day on sunday just to put the last one together. That illustrates another problem I have, (any good therapists out there??) The more I make an item the more ideas I get, the more complicated they become. Well there you have it, how I feel, where I am coming from, I hope you understand and more importantly I hope you don't mind me going on about it, I really needed to get it out of my head and lay it out.
And now for something completely different,,,,( and another thing, my grammar is appalling, starting sentences with ''and'' all the time) these lovely little puffs are now in the shop. I figure if I keep listing, when it comes to July I can just empty the shop and take it all with me, what do you reckon?

I also listed my lace buttons, and some more of these.
Enough now about the shop!! Yay!! It's the weekend. Tommorrow I intend to embroider, a take away to eat in the evening equals no cooking, more embroidery and time for blog visiting. I hope you have an amazing weekend and I hope I haven't bored you rigid with my ranting and uncontrolable insanity!

8 comments:

méri said...

How I understand you, Karen!!!

Gina said...

I know that from a commercial point of view I agreed with Jackie but I can understand where you are coming from on this.

Helen said...

Bravo! Bravo! Bravo! Don't ever compromise your standards!

Jane said...

It wouldn't be you if it was any different. You enjoy your day

Jackie said...

Sorry to have caused you so much anxiety and soul searching.
I completely understand..but I also understand the difficulty in making money from our kind of work.
Your dolls are under priced if anything..its obvious you have put in hours of work.
I sometimes wonder if I should put in so much effort with the things I sell. Its not obvious that I have dyed most of the fabrics and fibres I use,or constructed the paper and felt, but I wouldn't enjoy doing it if I didn't satisfy my own creative urges with these preliminary processes.
You just have to do the work in the way you enjoy the best and hope the buyers will appreciate it.
x

Jacky said...

Beautiful pieces as always...your work always has its own special "Karen" touches.

Can understand your plight at the moment. As long as you keep your integrity, all is well.

I LOVE your plantation dolls (and will be putting one on my wishlist).

Jacky xox

Michala Gyetvai (Kayla coo) said...

Hi Karen,
Your thoughtful pieces are more art than craft so perhaps this is a different market?
I do understand, as all my pieces are, like you taken from many drawings,observations,paintings etc,then theres hand dying, like Jackie, again the list goes on before you even reach the outcome.

Threadspider said...

It is so hard to make a living from this way of creating-but you get so much from the work itself. One day I feel sure you will hit the big time-you have something unique and very beautiful here.