2024, the year in review

 This time of year is good for so many things - slowing down, forgetting what day it is, as well as looking back and looking forward.

Each year I reflect on what I made in the course of the year, and consider the pieces I like the most; or those of which I am most proud. Sometimes they are real works; at other times they are simply little pieces that gave me great pleasure.

This year I have a real blend of things, as it was a busy year exhibition-wise and I experimented with different things.

In alphabetical order only, no listing of favourites by ranking, here are the ten pieces I made this year which I like the most.

1. All That Was Lost

The feature piece of my exhibition Hame, these five scrolls cascaded beautifully into their rusty tins, with the hand stitched words depicting such rich and full lives and homes. My heart still feels warm when I look at this piece and I'm thrilled it has a new home at the Strathnaver Museum.

2. Bundled and Burnt

Another piece for my exhibition Hame, this piece is so simple, so elegant and so poignant. It too now resides with the Strathnaver Museum and whilst I will miss it, I hope to visit it there again one day. The background story can be found here.

3. Grief is a Stone book-ets and cards

The three poems here, pondering grief at different points along the way; hand illustrated, embossed and stitched; are quiet and gentle acknowledgements of grief.

4. Hame exhibition activity

Alongside the exhibition Hame this activity brought me so much joy! Visitors participated by writing their responses to four questions over the four weeks and I hand stitched each week's responses into a book. I loved to read people's thoughts and was impressed by the time and consideration they gave to them. Such a lovely record of what home means to folk.

5. I Hit a Wall

This one kind of came out of the blue towards the end of the year, when I was just taken by the notion that this work, incomplete as it appeared, was in fact complete. I tacked the pages together and it was done. Telling the story of the pandemic in 2021 and how weary we were all were; how many things we had to deal with; how many decisions were made daily and how we were transfixed by press conferences, updates and data.

6. Pebble Jewellery

The Pebbles exhibition offered me the opportunity to expand my work into all sorts of mediums - laser jet cut steel words into stone sculptures; and hand formed-silver jewellery in the form of pebbles. I discovered I loved making pebble jewellery! And folk also seem to appreciate it. I now have an exclusive arrangement with a shop to sell it for me - who knew?!?!

7. The Emigrants

This unbound book was another new direction for me with the overlaying of photographs onto lightweight papers as illustration and image. Although the postcard size, Letraset and hand stitching meant it didn't venture toooo far away from me. Another piece for my Hame exhibition.

8. The Shape of Things 6

Although this piece was not my favourite amongst all of the books for The Shape of Things, it does make me happy as it reminds me what a lovely collaborative exchange it was with Annwyn Dean. It was also the only piece completed this year as all the others were made in 2023.

9. Together

Sometimes its a large exhibition or collection-worthy piece; sometimes its a small gift or offering that heads out and around... These together cards are the latter; and they just remind me of how important it is to stand alongside folk and remind ourselves we are not alone.

10. Travelling Home

Last, but definitely not least. This piece has been in the making for years. More than five, as ideas about pegs and threads and two homes percolated about in my brain. Hame offered me the place to put it together with notions of here and there, of travelling and of reminders of home. I quite simply love this piece and it is the only piece of my own work I have ever put up on our wall.

Thanks for coming along on the wander back through the works of 2024. On reflection having so many exhibitions to participate in meant I really did create some work! For once I was spoiled for choice for selection rather than rummaging through and trying to find the small things... It also looks a lot like my palette - the soft muted tones and a surprising amount of blue.

I focussed on the notion of home a lot, and the impacts of displacement on women; pebbles also featured in different ways, as did grief. Community, collaboration and care are there; along with my new found passion for silversmithing. Life is good and it was a very fortunate year.

Here's to more making.

Completing the pegs

 And here we are, with the work completed.

I had done so much to get this work this far, but there were still plenty of moments that needed to be worked through in order to get it done. I had managed to do the stitching lines, and to attach the pegs with wire. But now the challenge was to attach the paper to the canvas.

As Barry had looked at my design earlier, he had said - maybe the  Xs could be how you attach the paper to the canvas. And I was so excited as it sure beat trying to line up the pegs and poke holes in the canvas and tie the wire through the canvas!

First up I wanted to secure the paper to the canvas so it didn't slip and slide - I had cut it to fit perfectly so there was not a lot of margin for error. Bull dog clips and some grey board to protect the paper did the job. It felt really secure.

And then the funniest stitching team work began. I sat on the floor, we extended the canvas beyond the edge of the table, I would begin underneath the canvas; B would take the needle through the canvas from the top; together he would then help me find the next hole to pierce from below; and then he would send the needle back through from the top.

My abs got a minor workout as well!

Me finishing one of the Xs off underneath.

B about to pass the needle back through from the top.

Then we had to line up the canvas within the frame and secure it in there. It came with some spacers os that really helped.

And then we screwed the canvas and its boards into the frame and ta- da it was done!

I oftentimes include a little X somewhere in my work - to place me within it, help me find my place, connect me to the work, and so on.  Here they do the same thing, but also often an excellent anchoring option!

And so it is done, This labour of love and pondering over years. It will head to Scotland to be shown in my exhibition "Hame" in September. It explores how I feel about having two homes, both beautiful, and how somehow, across the many miles, they connect and are one in my heart. Beautiful threads from here, and from there, connect.

I am still deciding on a title, but it is somehow about threads connecting...

Attaching pegs and other bits

 The moment of truth arrived and I had to attach the pegs to the paper.  I had fiddled with some different wires,  and found that some of them cut and sliced my finger tips quite a bit and the risk of blood on the work was too great.

In then end I went with some wire with a beautiful history. I received from a friend in the village where we live, some fine wire used in her husband's musical instrument making business. He had died last year, and it is just so lovely to be able to include little bit of him in this piece.

It didn't cut my fingertips, but they were very tender for a day or two afterwards.

Each peg needed six holes pierced and three lengths of wire cut. I worked out the best way to attach the pegs was to place them, then pierce the holes. Remove the peg, pop the two leg wires in, then slip the legs of the peg through, hold it tight in place and turn the paper over. Then tighten and twist the wire.

What it looks like underneath.

I need to attach the paper to the canvas and the long lengths of excess wire made a snug fit impossible, so I snipped them all back to about 1cm in length.

And created a lovely shimmery pile of off cuts.

All in all, the attachment went pretty well, with just a few minor adjusmtents needed here and there.

It was very focussed and intense work so I had a bit of a break and went playing with what if?

I had blind embossed these pebble forms and I was wondering if stitching might add to them, make them more interesting?

I did some practice stitching around them and inside them. I think the wider border for stitching made them more interesting; the closer to the edge of them didn't add anything it seemed to me.

So I drew up a couple of test/trial outlines and will give them a go.

So much to do, but its good to also find time to play.

Slow stitching - and measuring, and marking, and piercing...

 My work is slow and sometimes some work is slower than others.

I am preparing the final piece of my pegs. My pegs, which I have carried around with me since at leat 2019. That I have wrapped and unwrapped, tidied up, switched over the style of peg, played with as an art installation and finally worked out what they are meant to be.

I have loved these pegs at every stage of our relationship and am thrilled, and scared to be finally committing to their artwork.

It involves attaching them to a large sheet of paper, and adding stitching around them. 

I have spent hours considering which threads to use. I have spent time trying to work out their layout and sequence. I have spent ages determining their placement and measuring the distance between them. I have spent many mouton working out what colour threads and combination might support them. I have done so much thinking and preparing, and now the time has come.

I committed to the paper and started a trial piece.  This nevertheless involved all the measuring and marking that the final will need.

I was trying for a vertical central line to stitch to; vertical lines to line up the heads of the pegs with; and horizontal lines for the running stitches. The running stitch lines then had to be marked out at 5mm distances, then holes pierced. One always pierces the holes in paper before stitching, rather than try to rely on the needle to pierce the papers we do with most fabrics.

I was trying to workout here as well, whether or not, and how to, include the labels I had been using.

I had to determine how long to make the stitching lines, and whether I wanted this little bit of meeting in the middle and overlap or not. I did.

Working out the next pairings.

Coming together. After piercing I worked out from this trial that I needed to rub out the line; other than try to do it after the stitching had happened. All good learning. I also learnt that after each row of stitching I would use the bone folder (above) to smooth down the top of the paper so that the pierced holes sit flat. The needle movement from below pushes some of the paper up and out and that is the part that needs smoothing.

Progress on the final piece. Rubbing out as I go.

I had to turn the paper around to keep stitching - otherwiseI was leaning over way too far.

In with one hand, 

Underneath, the bobbles of the pierced holes.

All the stitching rows complete! The dangling threads are quite long and whilst I like the loose look I am not sure if they will distract from the pegs or not. We shall see, and decide later.

Onwards.