KICK START 2013

Flowers

Design by Angie Lewin showing inspiration from the work of Eric Ravilious

Flowers This year’s work will be based on a study of flowers, grand or otherwise, in all their glory.

You are invited by

into your local open gardens to see some small or large, beautiful, private gardens , that open their gates for charity every year.Visit http://www.ngs.org.uk/gardens-to-visit.aspx to checkout any of the 3,700 open

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gardens near you – the charity raises over £2.5 million pounds per year for good causes so is well worth supporting. “Gardening is how I relax. It's another form of creating and playing with colors.” Oscar de la Renta

“Flowers always make people better, happier, and more helpful; they are sunshine, food and medicine for the soul.” Luther Burbank

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Contents

Welcome 5How to Start 7Pattern 8Colour 11Design 16All things Bright and Beautiful 19Other cultures 20Books 23Websites 24Inspiration and Education days 25

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Alysn Midgelow-Marsden 26Ruth Brown 28Phiona Richards 29Fiery Felts Dye from plants 30Entry 31Workshop Booking Form 35Acknowledgments 37

Welcome to Kick Start.

The East Midland Region of the Embroiderers’ Guild runs Kick Start as part of its educational programme.The aim is to stimulate the creativity of embroiderers of all kinds and to celebrate their work in a public exhibition. By joining in

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we hope members will develop their skills, grow in confidence and really enjoy the journey.Inspiration from flowers, their shape, colour, or raison d'être, will form the start of this year’s journey.Kick Start is not a course with a syllabus but instead offers a series of self-development ideas. This is not a competition.In order to exhibit your work participants are expected to attend one of the ‘Inspiration and Education’ days. You may travel to whichever venue you choose, and you may attend as many as you wish.

Flowers.What a lovely subject.It is full of colour and life and movement.How many of us grow and love a garden full of flowers? Welcoming old favourites as each season brings it’s own blooms.

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Flowers enhance our walks. These can be walking along a familiar path with the dog or climbing a valley in some distant country.For many of us snowdrops, bluebells, hawthorn and buttercups mark off the stages of the year.There are the flowers we buy for ourselves that add their own zing to our homes. There are the flowers we buy to give as a ‘Thank You’, ‘Get well’, ‘Congratulations’, and ‘Here Comes the Bride’.

Lastly we surround ourselves with flowers on cushions and curtains, clothes and carpets; not to mention delicate china.This is a subject close to many people’s hearts.

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HOW TO START?The simple answer is to look, and look closely.

Draw.Use a magnifying glass to peer right into the heart of the flower.Take a close up photograph. May be get it printed much bigger than life size. I suggest you then cover it with a sheet of tracing paper and draw round the main features. Put the complex picture of the flower away and

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work with the skeleton outline and make it yours.

Study botanical paintings and scientific drawings.Look at lots of flowers both in life and in art.PATTERN.

I love flowers used in pattern. There are the exuberant silks of India, and the flower filled carpets of the East. There is the curliness of William Morris and the off centre drop patterns of C R Mackintosh.

I have a soft spot for the daisy of Mary Quant, so much a symbol of my youth.

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Then there was Laura Ashley looking to the past but making designs that were very much of her time.

When C.R. Mackintosh was designing for fabric it appears that he would draw a flower and then lay tracing paper marked with a grid over it. He created his pattern in outline. He often filled in the spaces between the flowers with blocks of colour or his familiar small checks and spots.

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If you produced patterns in this way they could lead to appliqué, canvas work, crewelwork, printing or quilting.

Another approach is to make multiple photocopies of a flower, cutting them out gives repeat shapes that can be easily

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arranged and rearranged to start the pattern making process.

Think William Morris…The Strawberry Thief, Acanthus, Pimpernel, Bird and Pomegranate.

At Wightwick Manor in Wolverhampton you can see a great many of Morris’s designs. There is a wreath of roses over the fireplace; being the house of a political family this meant that conversation at the fire side was ‘Sub-Rosa’..The Latin phrase sub rosa means "under the rose" and is used in English to denote secrecy or confidentiality. The rose as a symbol of secrecy has an ancient history.

COLOUR.Flowers are full of colour. There are gentle shades and ‘sock it to you’ ones.

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It can be a difficult step to progress from looking at a beautiful flower or picture to working out the colours you will actually use.

Here are two suggestions as to how it could be approached:

One way is to make a colour stick. Cut a piece of cardboard roughly the size and shape of a ruler. Lay a length of double-sided

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tape down the length of one side. Gather and wrap round small pieces of fabric and thread in roughly the proportions you think you might use. We all know that blue bells are blue, but which blue?

Look in the darker parts and contrast with where the light hits the flower. What about all the shades in between?

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A second suggestion is very different. Copy your drawing or photograph but only print it in black and white. (This can be done in the library or copy shop if you do not have your own machinery.) Work out your design using shades of grey. Choose your colours last; they may have no connection with the ones you started with.

Eric Ravilious design

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Pick words from lists like these and find the colours to bring them to life:

Livelyquietbrightmutedbold

subtle

complexsimpleshinymatt

texturedsmooth

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Look at ways in which flowers have been depicted:

o by other artists e.g. O’Keefe or Monet

o by art movements e.g. Art Nouveau

For inspiration consider: Kitchen Garden flowers Food from flowers Seedpods – under the microscope (Kew’s

seed repository at Wakehurst) Britain in Bloom Park flower beds (images depicted in

flowers) Symbolism of flowers in Art (particularly

Victorian art) Flowers used in other cultures Botanical illustration (CR Mackintosh was

a flower illustrator as was Beatrix Potter)17

Chelsea/Tatton Park flower show etc?

DESIGN.

Kaffe Fassett is a hero of mine as he was the first artist to make it clear to me that designing is a process and that, for most people, ideas do not arrive fully formed and beautiful.

He found his images in many places, ceramics, paintings, mosaics, historic clothes, garden plant catalogues. Flowers that have already been shaped for use on a bowl or to explain a biological point can be a comfortable starting point. These he would draw, change and combine to make his own unique designs.

Design is a word that strikes terror into many hearts. But someone buying a new kitchen would take the time to gather images of cabinets, bring home samples, look at

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colours, shapes and lighting and may be visit kitchens already up and running. Give yourself the time to do the same.

Gather images, photos, drawings, prints, tracings. Why choose these particular flowers? Put the feelings of joy or memory or regret into words. Visit a museum or stately home and look at how the flowers have been portrayed. Find an artist whose work stops you in your tracks and try to analyse why.

Push your own boundaries just a little. But above all else, enjoy!Toni Stanford

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Aspects to think about:

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Tapestry "The Triumph of Death, or the Three Fates" with a typical mille-fleurs background, Flemish, c. 1510-20.

Mille-fleurs, millefleur or mille-fleur literally means "thousand flowers" and refers to a background made of many small flowers and plants. It was an especially popular motif in tapestry and other applied arts and crafts during the Middle Ages in Europe.

Mille-fleurs style was most popular in late 15th and early 16th century French and

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Flemish tapestry, with the best known examples including The Lady and the Unicorn and The Hunt of the Unicorn. The term is also used to describe Oriental rugs with a similar design, originally Persian but later produced in much of the Middle East and Mughal India – the medieval European style may have been influenced by Persian miniatures or carpets.

All things Bright and Beautiful…

Princess Charlotte’s bellflower dresshttp://

www.museumoflondon.org.uk/archive/exhibits/royal/bell.htm

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Look at dresses, this regency example is no longer on display because of its fragility but there are many others…Consider other cultures:Gardens of Mughal India

While Western societies glamorise and commercialise flowers, Indians have blended their lives with flowers. Traditionally, the days began with men and women plucking flowers for worship and the wives

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complained if the man forgot to bring flowers from the marketplace. Marriages and festivities are special occasions to engage in floral design and decorations.  

Lord Krishna is believed to have said   "Bring me flowers or even water, with devotion, and I will be pleased". Rich or poor, Hindu worshippers always offer flowers to their deity and the flowers are a popular item to sell on the streets.

In the Hindu thought, the blooming of a flower is often described the Magic of the

Master (God's Maya) and glorified by ancient poets and artists.

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Making Art with Flowers - using petals as hue for a temple decoration

Spalding in Lincolnshire has a tradition of flower festooned floats in May each year.http://www.spalding-flower-parade.org.uk/homeYou may have a very strong connection with one aspect of flowers. Go for it!

CutSow

PropagateGerminate

WaterWeedFeed

FertiliseProtect

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LabelDeadhead

Enjoy

Moving on.Kick Start is part of the East Midland Region’s Education Programme. The aim is for participants to grow and develop their potential as they take part. This means that if you want to include your design process in an adult education programme you are following that is fine. You might search out a one-day course to help you over a hurdle. Having a discussion with a friend or supportive group could suit you.Getting help if you need it is part of the learning process.When an idea has taken hold try to resist starting from cold on the piece, make a paper model, a rough layout; put some

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colours together in paint and thread to assess the impact.Give yourself time; pin the ideas up somewhere so that you see it at unexpected times. Take a digital photograph and print it in black and white. Try printing it larger and smaller can you see what to do now? Go to a copy shop and reverse the colours.Suggested Books

Angie Lewin: Plants and Places by Leslie Geddes Brown

Stitched Textiles: Flowers by Bobby Britnell

The Art of Embroidered Flowers by Gilda Baron

The Pre-Raphaelite Language of Flowers by Debra N. Mancoff

Your book list:

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Suggested websites:

http://sadhanapeterson.com.au/e/flower-heads---water-lilly

http://www.andrea-graham.com/portfolio.html

http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/yourpaintings/paintings/search

http://egkickstart.blogspot.co.uk/

Your web sites:

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Inspiration and Education days In order to exhibit their work, participants are expected to attend one of our inspiration and education days.

The Inspiration and Education days, run by four different artists this year will have varying concerns.From starting points in design, using flower products integral to your work, to creating 3d sculptures, you will have the opportunity to look at how other artists may develop ideas into designs that will be useful for a variety

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of techniques, ideas, research and developmental processes.

Workshop 1:Alysn Midgelow-MarsdenSaturday 27th July 2013 10am to 4pmWest Bridgford Nottinghamshire

Title: ‘Getting ideas from nowhere and making good ideas better’

The aim of this day is to help you to create a strong, personally relevant beginning to your Kickstart textiles using the theme of ‘flowers’.

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On this day, in keeping with the founding principles of the Kickstart project, you are being asked to stretch yourself a little, to push a boundary, to open the lid on a box that not everyone finds easy – in other words to ‘design’.

The ‘D’ word – ‘design’, is often the elephant in the room, an unsay able and rude word, but equally it is undeniably important.Using a few simple guidelines we will spend time taking inspiration from your original images and starting points in whatever form you have them and we will gradually move away from the littoral representation of the subject matter.

We will get away from deciding in advance what to create and surprise ourselves with more interesting results to use to create our finished works.Including some easy steps towards creating abstract images and testing a few testing a few ideas which will expand your creative possibilities, I will guide you to develop a concept and plan for a piece which is based on this, reflecting the character or message of the piece, whilst

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abstracting the essential elements and emphasising the qualities of the original which attracted you.

Flowers are probably universally attractive, both in themselves and their associations. They not only have enormous visual appeal at many stages of their life, but are a strong visual connection to our natural environment, our human history, they have a symbolic life and have many and varied personal and social connections. I look forward to seeing the journey from original inspiration to completed pieces.

Workshop 2:Ruth BrownStone creek SilkSaturday 17th AugustScunthorpe

http://www.stonecreeksilk.co.uk/index.php

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Cyanotypes on Fabric

Cyanotyping is a simple process for producing subtle, detailed images on fabric. Prussian blue and white - calm, cool, classical and utterly beautiful. Mix this technique from the 1840s with natural leaves and flowers or with modern digital negatives, and perhaps some textile techniques, and you have a wide range of image making possibilities.

This is an introduction to the wonderful techniques of cyanotyping on fabric for producing beautiful, detailed white photographic images. You will cover preparing the light sensitive fabric, producing photograms (printing flowers, foliage, lace and many other objects). We will also touch on tinting the final image. All in all a blue and white extravaganza!

Please Note: Additional Material fee £5

Workshop 3:Phiona RichardsSaturday 21st September 2013 10 til 4Corby Northants.

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http://www.rarenotions.co.uk/

3d paper sculpture

Phiona Richards will work with you to create mini sculptures using traditional needlework techniques.

"Having been brought up with a make do and mend mentality I tend to collect and gather materials including books near the end of their existence and regenerate them into pleasing tactile structures using a variety of needlework techniques. Although they appear to be fragile and delicate they are quite robust . Phiona Richards is a freelance artist/tutor working predominantly with traditional paper crafts such as origami and paper filigree; she incorporates a variety of needlework skills to produce wonderful flower structures.

Workshop 4:Helen Melvin

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Saturday October 19th 2013 10 til 4Ashbourne, Derbyshire www.fieryfelts.co.uk http://growingcolour.blogspot.com/Dyes from the Garden

Using some of the 65 dye plants grown in the Blaen Wern Dye Garden to both mordant and dye fabrics and yarns with the soft but subtle colours of the natural world.Colours produced : blue , greens, yellows, oranges, black, grey , peaches and corals. Some of the flowers you may use might include:Gensita tinctoria - dyers green weedGolden rod Solidago CanadensisTansy Tanacetum vulgareCoreopsis sp and Coreopis tinctoriaPurple Loostrife, Lythrum salicaria

Dyers Chamomile Anthemis tinctoria

Please Note: Additional Material fee of £13.50 in order to provide all pre-mordanted fabric and threads. Entry

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You will need to send in your exhibition entry form (which will be sent to you if you have attended one of the workshops).

Make sure you return it by the deadline written on the form – it will be towards the end of March 2014.

Cheques should be made payable to:

East Midlands Region of the Embroiderers’ Guild

Preparing your finished piece for display

Please attach mirror plates to any work that needs to be hung:Framed work - on the back of the frame half way down each of the vertical sides.Unframed soft hanging - attach to a strip of wood (Velcro or in a sleeve); attach mirror plates to each end of the strip of wood.

If the work is small and/or freestanding, decide if you need it to be displayed in a cabinet.

Work does not need to be expensively mounted and framed behind glass.

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Value and Insurance

The Embroiderers Guild, whilst in our keeping, insures your work against loss or damage. Therefore each piece must be given a value whether it is for sale or not.

PriceTo sell your work, you need to decide on a price. The insurance value need not be the same as the price for which you sell the piece.

Handing in the WorkAll work should be clearly labelled using a parcel label (Paddington Bear style) firmly attached to the back of the piece with your:Name, Address, Telephone NumberBranch (if you attend one)Title of the piecePrice for Sale or N.F.S.

For 2014 the Kick Start exhibition will be staying in Leicestershire, at the Charnwood Museum.

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The Exhibition will be from the beginning of June, continuing to mid-July 2014.

Information for delivering/collecting work for the exhibition will be provided with your entry form which will be sent to participants nearer the time.

StewardingAnyone, whether you have entered a piece or not, who is willing to spend a while at the exhibition, chatting to the public and keeping an eye on things, even sitting sewing, would be welcome.

Course Registration Information:

Please send details with payment, cheques made payable to: East Midlands Region of the Embroiderers’ Guild (EM Region EG)and either a Stamped Addressed Envelope OR preferably an email address to:

Kick Startc/o Penny MarsdenFalconcliffe HouseWards EndRiber Road

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MATLOCKDerbyshireDE4 5JB

01629 584487

If you are attending two or more workshops please complete all the information on one sheet.

State which workshop you wish to attend:

Saturday July 27th Nottingham £30

Saturday 17th August Scunthorpe £30

Saturday 21st September Corby £30

Saturday 19th October Ashbourne £30

(please note material charges where applicable)Total …………

Name: .....................................................…

Address ……………………………………..………………………………………………..………………………………………………

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Telephone: ................................................

Email: ........................................................

Embroiderers’ Guild Branch...................................................................

Acknowledgements:

This booklet has been produced by the East Midlands Region of the Embroiderers’ Guild.

Thank you to Antonia Stanford for help in putting this book together.

Thanks also to YOU for taking part in Kick Start. There can be no exhibition without participants and we hope you enjoy both the working process as well as the exhibition.

General Kick Start queries:penny.marsden@btinternet.comPenny Marsden 01629 584487

Extra booklets can be obtained from Carol Anderson, 46 Cavendish Way

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Mickleover, Derby, DE3 9BL

Cheques payable to: EMRegionEG

Dates for your diary:

March 2014 Return Entry Form

May 2014 Hand in Work – further details sent with course registration information

SUMMER SCHOOL – 201412th to 14th July 2014.  details TBCdiana.turner.44@btinternet.com

Inspiration and Education days 2013:

Alysn Midgelow-MarsdenSaturday July 27th Nottingham

Ruth BrownSaturday 17th August Scunthorpe

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Phiona RichardsSaturday 21st September Leicester

Helen MelvinSaturday 19th October Ashbourne

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