A great week artistically! Not only did I sell one of the pieces at the Knitting and Stitching Show in London, but I also sold a painting at The Framing Rooms Gallery , Nelson, the day after it went up.
I have been working on the piece for the Bernina International Pictogram exhibition.
The stenciling on the ghastly mustard fabric has worked well. I decided I needed to have a mental adjustment and think of it as being 'old gold' , not calf-poo yellow.
I continued to stamp on it in various bronze and gold colours which has created a sumptuous background.

I machine stitched swirls all over this patterning to give a subtle look of textural interest. I have now fused the pictogram shape in a soft bronze silk, and machine stitched it in fine gold thread. This has given a lovely texture to the dress..
I then collected together some small scraps of silks in golds, bronze and soft browns and appliqued tiny Klimt-like circles on the left side.
I am beginning to integrate these with hand stitching in circles and little french knots.  I have introduced some touches of blue-purple as accent 'guest" colour to give some zing. The right side looked too empty, so I machine stitched lines of varying widths like falling vines in gold thread, then fused some touches of gold foils. Over the whole right edge I made up a checkerboard pattern in almost black paint. I felt  I had to take another leap of faith as I applied this.. it may not have worked. I feel it has give a strong statement on that side, and has balanced the swirls and organic shapes.
I am now hand stitching on the background in very subtle tones of cream and gold.

Okay ,so not as efficient with technology as I thought. After I wrote my blog post somehow only part of it posted so trying again...
My pack arrived and I opened it to find that there were the two colours I dislike the most....orange and mustard. I spent several days looking at them. Maybe if I smiled nicely then a miracle would happen and I would be struck with the perfect design inspiration! Surprisingly, this didn’t happen and I was back to the next best thing-hard work. I played around with ideas which utilised those colours (autumn, sandy beaches etc) , but that was working.
I then thought about a grungy graffiti look where I used black, browns and dirty whites, but that didn’t feel very different. There has been a lot of art produced recently with that style.
After several more sessions it suddenly struck me- I could use the influence of Klimt, one of my favourite artists. I began to experiment with stencils and stamps on scrap fabric. After finding a colour palette of bronze, gold, burnt orange and dark blue-purples it began to look more promising.
As I only have one piece of the mustard felt it had to be right before I started on the actual piece.
Today was the day. I mixed several different bronze colours and stencilled straight on to the felt. I am now committed.

Today I could procrastinate no longer. I have agreed to take part in the International Bernina Pictogram Project. We have been sent a base fabric, some lovely Madeira threads and a male or female Pictogram to be used on the piece.
This all sounded great, and I am excited to be part of this. I couldn't wait for my pack to arrive.