Predictive Dormancy

The students were going to be exhibiting their final year coursework in a large external venue. We (the staff) decided that we should also exhibit some of our own work. So with three weeks notice ...

I have an allotment and loved the shapes of the seedheads left to overwinter. I wanted to show how these plants that looked dead would re-emerge in the spring. I decided to use the shapes but use spring colours.

I started with transfer printing. This involved actually using the plants as a mask whilst I ironed prepainted (with transfer paints) paper onto polyester cotton fabric.

This is what the plants end up looking like.

I used a mixture of yellow and blue for this background printing. I then experimented with free machining and painting.

I wanted to add further layers of fabric, net and chiffon have been added to the next sample.

I also added lino printing both underneath and on top of these layers. To complete the piece I added some 3D seedheads created by stitching on dissolvable fabric. The final piece is 90cm long and 35cm wide.

Here is a detail: