Page 2.2 A materials Library

A Materials Library

This is merged with my visual collection, I find it difficult to pull them apart.

Weaving and Crochet

Crochet samples giving burst of
colour intensity for a hot flush

The way I approached the materials library was to work initially with wool to weave and crochet. In different ways to represent the sharp bursts of hot throughout a women's body. The build up and intensity and length changes dependent on women, how they are feeling, atmosphere etc.

I knew early on that in order to make this more powerful I had to look at colourways, these were developed from by visual collection and I kept this for the materials library.

weaves which can be scaled up to be almost a curtain
which people would have to walk through

long weave

I sampled lots of weaving ideas working on small scale samples which can be scaled up for installation work. 

The aim of my materials library is to work mainly with warm materials, fabrics like jersey and wool and cotton. 

These represent warmth touch on the body. But there is also a feeling of comfort and empathy towards the person experiencing them.

Mixed media weaving

The ovary shawl would wrap round the wearer to give a source of comfort.

Mixed media weaving

My weaving then developed in to mixed media with a range of different materials which were no longer warm or comforting, they were a mixture of textures these are moving in to a more combative feeling to the hot flush. In an idea to challenge the norm.

Hessian and machine embroidery

I thought of using hessian to represent the rawness of nerves when people are not sleeping due to the hot flushes and night sweats. The raw harshness of not being yourself and still having to function suited hessian and the machine embroidery I used. This is something to develop in the future to focus on how materials can convey emotion through their touch.

Hessian and muslin embroidered samples

I used beetroot dye to create colour along with the cotton and then wanted to add words to the sample to see how they would fit in. 

This will need more work and refining but I liked the feel of the samples and the chaos of the body when going through a hot flush which had a different feeling to the weaving which was more of a consistent build up and fall of the heat.



Other sampling ideas for a quilt were on different fabrics in the colour scheme, reusing fabrics which had been garments etc. These are ideas which could be a quilt or a wall hanging with words or images embroidered or printed to represent feelings and thoughts of the hot sweats or menopause in general.

From there in conjunction with my visual collection and looking at extremes I became interested in looking at slogans and words to create an impact and question the wearer and the onlooker
.
The first idea was for a range of t-shirts to gradually show the development of a hot flush on top half of the body by using colour in particular areas on a white t-shirt.



The second idea is for these to be slogans and use the embroidery and recycled fabrics. This also falls in to the 'Extremes' module.



Dyeing and Felt

The idea of using felt for a sample came from the felling of warmth and how this could engulf the body. By slashing the felt and weaving through ribbons indicated the strong presence of a flush in sharp persistence bursts through the day and the night. 

The hand stitching is more in the background representing that constant fear that builds up for many women during the day and night that the flushes will come at the most inappropriate times.

By creating a 3D work I was able to create a piece that indicated more of the surround feeling of a flush which was useful for me to review and think about for future pieces.

Some of my materials collection is mounted and some are not this is because it will be a dynamic collection which I will add to when I want to sample something else.

Again this overlaps with my visual collection as I have said before I found it very difficult to separate the two ideas.