Imagined journeys: new work in progress August 2021
Hand and machine stitch with applied fabrics.
Combining images of unknown people from the family album with images from the Alcázar Real in Seville, Spain; symbols of heritage combine with memories to make the composition and bring together an imagined journey to another time and place.
There’s still a fair way to go but it seems to be coming together!
I’m really excited to be teaching again for TextileArtist.org Stitch Club next week. It’s a textile story telling workshop and this week they have published a new article about my New York travel story pieces. Check it out here.
Girls in a Doorway
a new iPad drawing for work to be made in 2021.
Which Way Now? (below) aka A Self Portrait in Turmoil is perhaps an indication of my frame of mind during lockdown.
size:132 x 59 cms
mixed media
The Girls who made the Suits version 2 (below) is an experiment in texture and pattern
3 new self portraits (below) for the ongoing self portraits now numbering 67. 2 are replacements for portraits that have gone to new homes numbers 26 and 27 and a new one number 67.
A Book Before Bedtime (below) was a commission for the Grimsby Fishing heritage Centre – GFHC in a Box project supported by Arts council England
Made in 2020
Size: 54.5 x 40 cms
Materials: Acrylic gouache, pencil crayon, cotton and wool threads on cotton calico
Techniques: Hand embroidery, painting
A domestic scene from the 1950s when every night my Mum would read me a book at bedtime. We would sit on the settee with me ready for bed in my pyjamas. Our 1950s living room had heavy, dark utility furniture, a patterned carpet, patterned cushions, antimacassars on the settee, and faded patterned wallpaper with plaster ducks flying across the wall. Always a handbag, letters to post, and a favourite photo of my older sister on the side board and always a pair of shoes underneath the sideboard. The wireless set (radio) has a particular significance in capturing the atmosphere of the times. It was via the wireless that we would hear the news, both good and bad, of triumph and of loss. On the wall a picture of my Dad, Fred Stone working on the old pontoon on Grimsby docks in the 1950s with his brother, my Uncle Harry.
I am very proud of my Grimsby heritage and the close ties my family had with the Grimsby fishing industry in the 1950s is often reflected in the artwork I make. I was born in 1952 and as a child I spent a lot of time ‘down dock’ with my Dad, a Grimsby fish merchant. ‘Down Dock’ was a community within a community.
The passing on of knowledge has always been an important part of my artistic practice so when the chance to be involved with this project arose I was honoured to be able to take the opportunity to revisit my roots and make a piece of work for the Fishing Heritage Centre Collection and I welcome the chance for my work to reach a new audience through the loans boxes.
This Life Matters (below)
Work size w 190 cms x 35 cms
Portrait sizes 2 x 17 x 21 cms, 2 x 18.5 x 23.5 cms, 3 x 21 x 26 cms
Recycled linen clothing fabrics, cotton cambric, acrylic film, stranded cotton threads, cotton machine threads, industrial felt mat
Hand stitch, machine stitch, appliqué
‘This Life Matters’ is a series of 7 small portraits which focus on the inequality spotlighted by the Covid 19 pandemic. Each representative of the global community wears the same white t shirt with a slogan ‘This Life Matters’, a nod to Katherine Hamnett’s ‘Choose Life’ slogan t-shirts of the 1980s, Each has their own word embroidered at their side which indicates their circumstances or mindset: Displaced, disenfranchised, disconsolate, dispossessed, dispirited, disabled, and lastly disappearing. Each life is as important as the next.
A series of new teaching samples (Below) made in 2020
Narrative, Strip Weaving & Portrait – hand stitch & mixed media
Portrait of Anne Morrell (below)
hand stitch 26 x 30 cms
A commissioned work to accompany the article Roots in Two continents by Brinda Gill for Issue 95 (July /August) of Selvedge magazine
Brooklyn: Recollection, Return and Repartee (below)
Completed January 2020
Materials: linen & cotton fabrics, cotton & linen threads, acrylic paint
Size 100 x 77 x 2 cms
Techniques: hand stitch, machine stitch, appliqué, painting
Part of a series of work called From Grimsby* to Greenpoint & Beyond this piece Brooklyn: Recollection, Return, and Repartee recounts the artist’s memories of return visit to Brooklyn in March 2019. The viewer is taken on a journey during which flashbacks and glimpses of everyday life, are encapsulated in the ‘mind’s eye’ of the artist; attempting to capture of the essence of a specific New York borough and recalling the brogue of Brooklyn in the form of sights, experiences and written word.
Meandering lines plot our paths and the conversations twist and turn; from small talk on the subway to bantering with tall statues in Banker St, taking in gibberish and graffiti in Greenpoint, a powwow at Prospect Park, books at the Brooklyn public library and the buzz of Brooklyn Museum on the way.
The references in this piece include a homage to the street artist ESPO aka Stephen Powers & artist Deborah Kass
*Grimsby is the artist’s hometown in the UK.
Detail of ‘Which Way Now?’ 132 x 59 cms
‘Which Way Now?’ aka ‘A Self Portrait in Turmoil’ is perhaps an indication of my frame of mind during lockdown.
At first I couldn’t make any work at all and then I became a little obsessed with ideas that I had to get out of my system whatever the result.
I have worked in my studio most days on both large and smaller work and my larger work seems to have become more free and experimental.
I am delighted that my stitched illustration of textile artist Anne Morrell will be featured alongside an article entitled ROOTS IN TWO CONTINENTS by Brinda Gill who dives into Anne Morrell’s textile life.
Issue 95 (July /August) of Selvedge magazine will be published on the 15th of June. This issue will be available in print and digital formats from the Selvedge website but will not be available as usual at galleries and the newsstand. It is available for pre-order now #selvedgemagazine
The next 62 Group exhibition ‘Ctrl/Shift’ opens on 21 July 2018 and I am delighted that my work ‘From Grimsby to Greenpoint & Beyond’ has been selected to be shown at MAC, Birmingham.
The exhibition is grouped into four main thematic areas but could equally have been split many other ways. There is also a Project Space in which samples, tools, photos, short films and other materials will shed some light on the making process. We hope that the works will delight, provoke, entertain and educate; and inspire others to explore this most powerful of media, textiles.
The exhibition concept has been developed in partnership with the 62 Group and independent curator Liz Cooper.
The exhibiting artists are:
Imogen Aust, Caroline Bartlett, Heather Belcher, Eszter Bornemisza, Lucy Brown, Penny Burnfield, Nigel Cheney, Daisy Collingridge, Isobel Currie, Flox den Hartog Jager, Catherine Dormor, Dawn Dupree, Caren Garfen, Emily Jo Gibbs, Ann Goddard, Joanna Kinnersly-Taylor, Hannah Lamb, Debbie Lyddon, Sîan Martin, Jane McKeating, Sumi Perera, Shuna Rendel, Vanessa Rolf, and Sue Stone
The Ctrl/Shift Private view is on Saturday 21 July at the MAC and I have attached an invitation, with details, as you are all welcome to come and celebrate the opening with us and to meet some of the artists. Admission is free but booking is essential. Book Here
Sue Stone – Personal Narratives and Creative Characters
4 – 11 August 2018
In August I am delighted to be teaching a workshop at Chateau Dumas in SW France in conjunction with Selvedge . Booking is open now
In this residential workshop I will introduce you to the many ways of working figuratively. We will look at a series of different artists and the various methods they use to depict the human figure from the substantial and serious to the light-hearted and whimsical.
During the week we will create some characters, and make some small studies using figurative and narrative elements and look at ways to incorporate your own narratives and memories using images and text.
I will guide you through quick & easy ways to get started and share the simple processes I use myself. There will be a focus on hand stitch, layering and appliqué with an option to add machine stitch if you wish.
I will advise you on how to use your own drawings, photographs or vintage illustrations to convey ideas, thoughts and memories. You’ll quickly gain the confidence to stamp your own personality on your work.
We will take a break from the course mid-week to enjoy a day of dyeing with the original blue dye from the woad plant, grown in the Toulouse area since medieval times. You can bring things to dye from home, pick items up at local markets or buy natural fabric from Chateau Dumas.
During the week there is also a visit to the nearby atmospheric Sunday morning food and craft market in St Antonin-Noble-Val, the medieval town where the films Charlotte Gray and The Hundred Foot Journey were filmed.
The workshop is suitable for all abilities. For those who are worried about their drawing ability I will provide some simple black & white guides and some vintage illustrations as a base from which to work and a collection of my own handling samples to inspire you. By the end of the workshop you will have new ideas with which to work and the necessary skills to develop your own work further.
About the Chateau
Chateau Dumas
Every year, Selvedge hosts several all-inclusive residential craft workshops at Chateau Dumas, a private estate with 18th century interiors, a large pool and glorious panoramic views – set amongst rolling hills in peaceful, scenic countryside less than an hour north of Toulouse international airport. Owned and run by Lizzie Hulme the Chateau is a place you can relax, unwind and be truly creative in.
‘From Grimsby to Greenpoint and Beyond’ has been selected for the 62 Group exhibition ‘Ctrl/Shift’ which will open at MAC, Birmingham on 21 July and runs until 9 September. The piece is made up of 9 sections measures 175 x 123 cms when assembled.
Materials :Linen/recycled clothing fabrics,cotton threads, InkTense pencils,acrylic paint
Techniques: Hand and machine stitch.appliqué, piecing, drawing, painting
Details of ‘From Grimsby to Greenpoint & Beyond’ photos by Yeshen Venema
A visit to Greenpoint, Brooklyn, New York sparked the idea for this work in which the emphasis shifts slightly away from people, and towards place, a specific place, New York and a snapshot of a specific time period 21/12/16 to 3/01/17. Another small shift is in the use of materials, black thread was used abundantly in this piece this is a new departure as was the use of Derwent InkTense pencils to draw and colour the background fabric.
A new approach, an attempt to capture a new energy in the work and a move away from control in the design process meant the work evolved and has had several incarnations during the making process rather than being pre-planned.
There are a multitude of references in this work; to the atmosphere and fast pace of New York City to the areas and places visited and to great beer, coffee and food consumed. Also referenced are a selection of the many street artists in Greenpoint and Bushwick including Faille, a Brooklyn-based artistic collaboration between Patrick McNeil and Patrick Miller and there’s tribute paid to particular artworks, ‘Jawbone of an Ass’ by Jean-Michel Basquiat and ‘The Mermaid’ a sculpture by Liz Craft at the Whitney Museum of American Art in Manhattan.
Last week I gave a talk and taught a 2 Day self-portrait workshop in Cork for Cork Textiles network. They are a talented and diverse group spanning many different textile disciplines. Here you can see a selection of the work produced at the workshop. The finished portraits will be shown at the Knitting & Stitching shows next year (2018) on the Cork Textiles Network stand and I’m itching to see the final results. All portraits will be A3 in size.
I Am Me 2017
first shown at Festival of Quilts 2017 in the Through Our Hands gallery ‘A Portrait’
Individuality, distinctiveness, uniqueness form our identity; who or what we are. This series of self-portraits was inspired by the humankind’s urge to categorise. Whatever you think you see in these images it is still me.
Visual decoration or types of clothing may suggest class, culture, creed, religion or ethnicity. The outer shell and its various wrappings; skin, clothing, accessories, may change and alter appearance as they do. The viewer is asked to form their own opinion of who I really am. The person portrayed whose the inner soul remains the same throughout is me.
Faith, Hope & Fate commissioned artist for ‘Unknown People’
Go to Retrospective • an Archive of work 2016
Retrospective • An Archive of work from 2015
Retrospective • An Archive of work from 2013/14
Retrospective • An Archive of work from 2011/12
Retrospective • An Archive of work from 2009/10
Retrospective • An Archive of work from 2007/8
Retrospective • An Archive of work from 2003 to 2006
womanwithafish 