Creative (and decorative) Mending

Picture owned by Karen Barbe

This is a nice post about mending on Karen Barbe's blog
As someone who has done a lot of mending I really felt inspired by this post about mending, along with its instructions.  Mending, renewing and embellishing (particularly to upcycle) is something that I talk about a lot, and think about more.  I find myself having a mending binge every few months, sewing on buttons and patches, the very occasional bit of darning, and mending rips etc.   I like the look of something that has been mended.  In a way I feel it highlights the life that piece of clothing has had; every piece of furniture should tell a story as the saying goes!  I have bought clothing and cloth from charity shops before that has clearly been mended and recently I have started printing on these darns etc to highlight the mend further.  I like the work of artist Susan Collis whose work such as Better Days uses the idea of a mark on cloth as a starting point for something beautiful and unusual. 

Notebook Pages, thoughts on the run

 

Another page of thoughts from my sketchbook/notebook. Thinking on the run about possible loosely designed experiences to provoke thinking and discourse - free/rough workmanship of the participant leading to physical outcome of experience.

Harvey Nichols Spring Windows

Spring windows at Harvey Nichols, Knightsbridge.

Embellishing possibilities, is it co-design?

A question:  If you add something , embellish or mend a garment that already exists are you collaborating with the maker?  is it collaboration or is it one step removed?

The Time-Eating Clock – a story of invention

18 April – October 2011 - FREE - Science Museum, London

 The celebrated time-eating Chronophage clock, designed by Dr John Taylor OBE, will go on display at the Science Museum from Monday 18 April, in The Time-Eating Clock – a story of invention.  It will be displayed alongside an original Harrison clock in an installation designed to give insight into the mind of one of today’s most creative and successful inventors.  Walking atop the 1.5 metre golden face is a large kinetic sculpture of a mythical beast. The creature, an integral part of the mechanics of the clock, appears to devour time -the name Chronophage literally means Time-Eater from the Greek: Chronos (Time) and Phago (I eat). The hour is tolled by the sound of a chain clanking into a small wooden coffin concealed in the back of the clock to remind us that our time on earth is limited.  

(taken from the science museum website, see link)

This sounds so exciting.  Admittedly I am a bit of a time-geek but still!

Guardian article
BBC article

Words of Note; flux, visile, node

flux

A flow or flowing: A continued flow; a flood. The flowing in of the tide. The rate of flow of fluid, particles, or energy through a given surface. The lines of force of an electric or magnetic field. Constant or frequent change; fluctuation

visile

1. An obsolete term denoting the type of mental imagery in which one recalls most readily that which has been seen.

Compare: audile, motile.

2. A person with such mental imagery.

Synonym: visual.

node

1.  a knot, protuberance, or knob.

2.  a centering point of component parts.

3.  Anatomy . a knotlike mass of tissue: lymph node.

4.  Pathology . circumscribed swelling.

5.  Botany .

  a.  a joint in a stem.

  b.  a part of a stem that normally bears a leaf.

6.  Mathematics . knot ( def. 12 ) .

7.  Geometry . a point on a curve or surface at which there can   be more than one tangent line or tangent plane.

8.  Physics . a point, line, or region in a standing wave at   which there is relatively little or no vibration.

9.  Astronomy . either of the two points at which the orbit of a heavenly body intersects a given plane, especially the plane of the ecliptic or of the celestial equator. Compare ascending node, descending node.

10.  Linguistics . an element of a tree diagram that represents a constituent of a linguistic construction.

11.  Optics . nodal point.

12.  Engineering . panel point.

13.  nodus.  Origin: 1565–75;  < Latin nōdus  knot

Mike Press

Mike Press is speaking at Chelsea today, 2pm in the Lecture theatre at John Islip Street.  He is talking on Hand-made Knowledge, its open entry and free...come along!!

http://mikepress.wordpress.com/   

check him out!

Co-Design Workshop

Recently I have been participating in co-design workshops hosted by The Textile Sampler.  We have been making scarves as part for a group project, discussing the principles of co-design and its implications, and working together, digitally and physically.  I lead a small workshop on mark-making and from this a series of scarves were developed and printed.  There are still more workshops to come as part of the project - they are open to anyone so come along if you fancy it.

My scarf from the last workshop

http://thetextilesampler.blogspot.com/

Slow Cloth

An interesting article here on Handeye Mag about slow cloth and cloth work.

Words of Note; multivalent, didactic, veneration, trenchant, auguries

multivalent - having many interpretations, uses or values

didactic - intended to teach or give moral guidance

veneration - respectfulness

trenchant - expressed forcefully and clearly


auguries - signs of the future, omens

David Pye

Reading this book (written 1968) has truely got my brain going.  This is a primary list of questions/thoughts it has inspired in me, and quotes from it:

'On the workman's depends a great part of the quality of our environment' (p17)
'It may be mentioned in passing that in workmanship the care counts for more than the judgement and dexterity; though care may well become habitual and unconscious.' (p20)

If risk is only in the workmans hand, does the making of a (successful) machine lead from stored risk to stored success and deflated/depleted risk?
'"Is the result predetermined and unalterable once production begins?"'(p22)
Can risk lead to the creation of certainty?

'The workmanship of risk has no exclusive perogative of quality.  What it has exclusively is an immensely various range of qualities, without which at its command the art of design becomes arid and impoverished.'(p23)
Is this still relevant?  I believe it is, however I also believe the quality of mechanical production has improved sine the advent of computerisation.

And once again, the tool as an extension of the hand crops up (p28) - when making, are we, the makers, part of the machinery?  Do we become the tool?

David Pye

Am currently reading this book and thoroughly enjoying it.  David Pye was a great thinker.  His best known idea was about the workmanship of risk - where one slip of the human hand making the object could ruin or change the outcome of the whole piece - and the workmanship of certainty, mechanised mass production, where a machine churns out many identical and well made copies of one object.

What makes a maker?

 

Recently I have started to question what makes one a maker and what drives us to make.  I have noticed that during the recent co-design workshops led by The Textile Sampler and the previous workshops to those that the participants, myself included, light up and become more energised as soon as they are armed with a making tool, even if it is as simple as a felt tip and a post it.  The discourse comes alive and ideas flow.  However I have also noticed that the more involved in making one becomes the less interactive it can be - the participants, absorbed in their making/drawing/experience, quieten down and withdraw from group communication, albeit it with occasional input - they are still listening, a very different but equally important form of engagement.  I wonder if the same interest bubbles up in a business environment, whether people in those fields feel more alive when given the chance to create/draw/write in a bright colour.

Interesting Article

http://www.beautifulwood.co.uk/blog/grayson-perry-on-art-and-craft.html

Worth a read!

New Bracelets!

New handmade bracelets on my etsy and folksy shops.