I'm taking a break from making a couple more triangular coin purses to fill you in on what I got up to yesterday. It was another Stitch Art event at the city art gallery, a free monthly session that usually takes place in the drawing room just off the art library (also housed within the gallery building). This month's event had a distinctly Japanese feel.
As usual, it was a group of middle aged and older women who attended - we're definitely their core demographic! - and we began with a demonstration of sumanagashi. Suman-a-what? No, I'd never heard of it either. It's a traditional Japanese form of paper marbling. There was a large table, and on it were several cat litter trays. Not containing cat litter, but water. We had a small bowl of black ink each, and one of water with a squeeze of dishwashing liquid in it. The idea was that you dip a paintbrush in the ink and another in the water. Then let a drop of ink fall into the cat litter tray where it floats on the surface. Then let a drop of water fall into the tray, which disperses the ink and makes a pattern in it. You alternate the ink and water until you have a pattern you like, then take an A4 sheet of paper and lay it on the surface to pick up the pattern. That was tricky as initially I was getting the paper far too wet by dipping it in the tray, but it's more that you're skimming the ink off the water's surface. If you want to give it a try, here are the instructions, plus background on sumanagashi.
There were swatches of silk that'd been marbled with ink too, making delicate patterns on the fabric. Which led on to the next part of the session where we were introduced to boro.
You're probably familiar with boro as it goes alongside the Visible Mending movement which is all over Instagram. We layered silk and little pieces of cotton and denim, using simple running stitches to sew our layers together. As usual, because I'm not the fastest of stitchers I didn't get a massive amount done during the session, but I finished off my piece at home. There's a grey linen background and oblongs of grey and pale blue silk on top, plus the wrong side of a swatch of denim.
The line of blue running stitch around the edges is where I've sewn my boro into a fabric book I'm making, something to keep my Stitch Art pieces in.
The book's under construction, and it's going to have pockets where I can store leaflets, handouts and things like the 'Let Cities Grow' banner that I made in a previous class.
Anyway, back to yesterday's Stitch Art. After we had a go at boro, we'd just about time to squeeze in a few minutes of sashiko stitching. We were given a square of indigo coloured cotton, a white fabric marker pen and a sashiko template, which I hadn't come across before. I may have to order one online though as you get a lovely effect by using a template.
As the class was ending, everyone's stitching was gathered together for a group photo.
It's always interesting to see the range of work that's done by different people using largely the same materials. So much variety.
I really want to learn more about boro and sashiko. The slow stitching element attracts to me, as does boro's sustainable make-do-and-mend approach to textiles. There's also something very calming about working with a limited range of colours. Much as I love vibrant shades and busy patterns, these indigo and neutral, natural colours are very appealing, don't you think?
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