This blog post repeats excerpts from my latest newsletter, with a few more pictures!
The new Pattern posts start tomorrow!
No surprise, I love patterns; Patterns in art, patterns in buildings, patterns on fabric, patterns that move, patterns of words and letters -- just about any pattern at all. Most recently, it's those natural patterns that have caught my imagination.
I'm neck deep in designing fabric patterns for a new series of work based on my recent trips out to Big Bend and the Chihuahuan desert. In the Sensory Alphabet lingo, pattern equals rhythm, and i can practically hear the patterns I see and reimagine for my work. As rhythm, patterns are one of those design tools that "hold together" a composition. A pattern of shapes or colors or lines makes an image make sense, and helps us to connect it to other images and ideas outside of the picture frame.
Of course, doing this work has taken me on a host of other less car-dependent journeys than were the two recent 700 round trip treks to Big Bend National Park. I've researched and explored countless pattern sites, apps and resources on the web. And this newsletter gives me a chance to share some of them.
Big Bend photos and drawings transformed to fabric designs and textile art.
The big share will come in October with the opening of an exhibit at theTemple (Texas) Cultural Activities Center where and I will collaborate with a large exhibit of textile art, prints and paintings. Junanne has been a teacher with me at my Summer Art Camp in New Mexico for two years and will be back (with metal and fiber artist Dale Jenssen) this summer. We'll also be hosting an opening and several workshops during the two month run of the exhibit. Stay tuned to this newsletter for dates to come!
Spoonflower Pattern Play
Spoonflower is the online POD (Print on Demand) site that I use for producing the fabrics that I design with the help of my iPadand Mac (mostly the iPad!). Spoonflower links my uploaded art to an online editing site called PicMonkey (you can access it -- with even more tools available from your desktop, too)> It's a disrupter for sure, no doubt if you sew you've seen the news that Hancock's is going out of business. With online sites for fabric purchase and even the ability for textile people like me to design my own fabrics, it's another sign of the times. A fabric store today has to offer something really special, have a niche market or cater extremely well to a loyal client base.
With Spoonflower, I can upload a simple image. This pomegranate design is a rough, really rough, seamless design (see below) that I cut from construction paper and photographed to use as a repeat. I uploaded it to Spoonflower, then made variations with its repeat tools and using PicMonkey. The possibilities are endless for just one simple design. If I want a related group of fabrics, all I need to do is tweak! Soonflower even gives me ways to change the colors of a design to make the same pattern in a different color way. You get the picture!