In the Studio Archives - Page 2 of 3

Category Archives: In the Studio

Busy Signal Got Me Thinking…

As I look back at that last post, I realize that much has changed:

gave my website a makeover for a cleaner, fresher look
rearranged my studio for better energy flow
finished and found the perfect title for my newest piece.

Ta-Daa…I give you Busy Signal

Lea McComas
Busy Signal, 36 in x 36 in, thread-painted portrait of girl with cell phone.
moveable machine stitching over fused fabric applique’
copyright: Lea McComas, 2017, all rights reserved

In my last post, I was just beginning the stitching phase of the work. Take a look at the results up close.

Lea McComas
Busy Signal, detail stitching of mouth
copyright: Lea McComas, 2017, all rights reserved

Lea McComas
Busy Signal, detail stitching of hand
copyright: Lea McComas, 2017, all rights reserved

What really excites me about this piece were the challenges that led to an evolution in my process.

One of the difficulties in thread painting is to balance the stitching in such a way as to keep the surface relatively flat, and then mitigate when it isn’t. This usually involves a process called “blocking” where the surface is moistened and then heat and pressure are applied until the piece is dry. If all goes well, the bulk is redistributed.

That was not working for me, until panic and frustration led to inspiration. I realized that Busy Signal was flat except for the face. When pushed from the back, it was beautifully convex, if not a bit unstable.

I went with it; attached a reinforced panel, slightly larger than the face, to the back of the piece and filled the space between with batting for support. I’m thrilled with the result. It may be difficult to fully appreciate in photos, but when you see the piece in person, you can realize how it enhances the sense of depth in the piece.

Why I love being an Artist?

problem-solving — thinking outside the box — discovering something new

Where can you see it in person? I’m currently working on a few options. I’m also hard at work on my next piece, and a new series, that will use this new technique again. Stay tuned because you’ll see it and read about it here, first.

Moving from Fabric to Thread

Shifting gears, moving to the next phase, changing the focus; that’s what I’ve been doing in these last couple of weeks as I transition from the fusing stage of my project to the stitching stage. I find it helpful to take a break and clear my head so that I can look at the project with fresh eyes. So, during this period, an idea that has been floating around in my brain for several years actually came alive and demanded to be brought to creation. I’ll share that with you in a few weeks. It is a total departure from this project and did allow for the fresh perspective I needed.

Before going of on this side trip, the fused fabric foundation for “We Don’t Talk” was loaded onto my longarm machine. You can see here all of the layers and how they are placed. If you’ve done your own thread painting, you may know that it is always a struggle to end with a piece that lies flat. I’m always on the quest for a better solution. In the past, I’ve used a layer of raw artist canvas. This has been marginally successful, so, this time I will use 2 layers positioned under the batting so that the grains are perpendicular to each other. I’m giving it a shot, but the tradeoff is weight. This baby is going to be heavy for it’s size.

(2 weeks go by)

Thread, thread, so much thread needed. Just as with my fabrics, I like to create selections for each element in the project, and just like with fabric, I use my trusty value scale to make good choices. However, with threads, I usually put together sets of 7-10 threads: one each of the #1 and 5 values, and then two or three each of values 2,3,4. However, given the size of the figure in this piece, I may have 3-5 threads in every value. Here is what it looks like in my studio when the threads come out to play.

Hmmm, I think I’ll start on the face first. Check back next week to see the progress.

Finally, Finished Fusing

Yes, Finally, all of the body pieces are working together and creating the depth of field that I’m looking for. With the face in place, I add some hair.

Helmet Hair

Yuck, that hair looks a bit too much like a helmet, but I’ll fix that when the background is in place. I rehearsed several fabrics for the background and settled on a piece that I made a few years ago in a dye/print/paint surface design class that I took with Susan Brooks in Louisville, CO.

Periodically, I take a class that is out of my comfort zone, just to learn some new things and get a fresh perspective. That was Susan’s class. I came home with lots of interesting pieces of fabric with no idea what would ever come of them.

Dye class fabrics

more dye fabrics

How happy am I to find the perfect background in that stash of “experimental” fabrics.

Background ini place

Now, back to that hair….

This is better. Phase 1: Fusing is complete.

Keep Your Eyes Where They Belong…and nose and mouth

Use Calipers to position facial features.

Finally, I’ve posted a new video on my YouTube channel

This latest video is Golden Mean Calipers Part 4 where I share how to find the optimum position of eyes, nose, and mouth in a portrait quilt.

There will be new video coming each month on how to use my calipers and other design tools. Subscribe to my You Tube Channel: Lea McComas Fiber Art to follow along.

Body Work

I’ve reached a place with my latest piece where I need to finalize a color scheme before moving on. So far, I’ve only chosen fabrics for the flesh. As I put these various body parts together, I’ve got to fill in the other elements of the composition (ie. dress, phone, background, hair.) I use my Itten Color Star to work this out.

Color Scheme

This Color Star is my favorite color wheel for making these kinds of decisions. It comes with a full set of templates that let me block out colors I don’t want to use and let’s me get a better sense of what colors I will be incorporating.

The hair is going to include yellow and yellow-oranges, while the phone will be blue-green, and her dress will be blue.

No decisions on the background yet, I’m going to put the figure all together and let it talk to me (or perhaps text me).

This week I’m able to complete the body along with the hand holding the phone. I’ve dipped into my special stash for the phone. It is made from some hand marbled fabrics I picked up in Venice back in the 90’s.

A body to go with the hands

Placing the face with the body, I have a real sense of progress. I’m not sure about the darkness of the upper body, but I’m going to move forward. I’ll audition some background fabrics before I decide whether or not to replace the body with lighter values.

A face with the body

Talk to the Hand

The fusing has begun. This week I was able to put together the hand for “We Don’t Talk”. It is created from warm red-orange flesh tones that I hope will pop off the surface and give it a real “in your face” feeling. For greater realism, I’m working with 7, rather than my standard 5 values.

The hand

Next, the face emerges from those cooler red-violet fabrics. You can begin to see that there is a significant contrast in the temperature of these 2 features. I hope it works as planned.

The face

I’m liking the detail in the eyes and mouth.

Next week I hope to fuse the body and put the pieces together.

A New Beginning

After 8 months of buying a new home, selling an old home, packing, unpacking, FINALLY, it’s time to be back in the studio. For my next piece, I’m taking another break from the historical series I’ve been working on. This next piece addresses a contemporary social issue.

Waiting for a table

I’ve long been uncomfortable with a shift in communication that takes us away from face to face contact, replacing it with texting. Several years ago, I took this photo outside a restaurant, intending to use it for a piece titled “We Don’t Talk Anymore.”

In my day job, teaching high schoolers, I set aside a period of time each week for “Community Building” where we engage in an activity, purely for fun, that requires us to talk with each other. At the start of this school year, I’m aware of how uncomfortable this is for many of my new students. This is the inspiration for a new project.

Photo of Maya

Instead of the original photo, I’m working from photos I took of my step-daughter, Maya. In the interest of full disclosure, she posed for these photos. They were not candid shots. If she has actually done this to anyone, it hasn’t been me.

With the photo cropped, edited, and printed to size, fabric selection is next. Usually, I choose a set of flesh toned fabrics for each person in my compositions so that they have individual complexions. In this case, with this bold close up of Maya, I’m going to need to establish 3 sets of fabrics just for her. I want to establish her body on 3 different planes: hand in front, face in mid-ground, and upper body in background and in shadow. I’m hoping, by doing this, to pop the hand forward and give real depth and dimension to this piece.

I start by choosing fabrics for the face. It’s in the mid ground so I choose pinkish, red-violet fabrics. For the hand, I choose warmer fabrics in the red-orange range to make them feel closer. Finally, the main body is in cooler, violet fabrics. The cooler temps of these fabrics will push them back. The tricky part will be the arm that transitions from the hand to the body.

Check in next week to see this piece coming together.

Making Faces All Summer Long

As a school teacher, I love summer vacation as much as my student, maybe more. For me, it’s a chance to spend more time showing my fiber art, talking about my process, teaching my techniques, and of course, making thread-painted portraits.

This summer was no exception. Check out this photo travelogue”

Thread-Painting workshop in Colorado Springs:

5-day Summer Retreat in Lyons, Colorado:

Portraits on Parade

Fused fabric portraits in Wichita, KS:

A quick visit to Longwood Gardens with Cheryl Lynch after speaking to the Calico Cutters guild in Philadelphia, PA:

And a mini-workshop and gallery lecture in Brigham City, UT

But the fun doesn’t stop… There are more opportunities in the fall. Join me if you can:

Workshops in LaConner, WA and Fort Collins, CO. See my “Upcoming Events” for more details

Puppy Love, Part 2

Oh joy!!! I’ve finished something in less than a month; 2 1/2 weeks actually. It’s such a thrill to jump into a project and just breeze through to the end. With this piece, I took a break from thread painting and just did some dense stitching. The new challenge was to establish some designs that would fit with each element of the composition.

The blonde hair of the girl was easy. I used various values of yellow threads in long, undulated lines of stitching.

Next, similar, but shorter, wavy lines were put down with some variegated threads in a pattern that alluded to the hair of the dog. Several times I had to stop and pet my dear Coco’s face in order to really understand the changing direction of her hair. She didn’t mind too much.

Stitching the face was a leap of faith. It is so tricky to stitch the face! If you try to recreate the actual contours, and the lines aren’t just right, it throws off the perceived shape and makes the face look distorted. I decided to go in a completely new direction: loop-d-loops. I covered the entire face in a small repetitive design that had nothing to do with its shape or contour. I still varied the threads, letting the values do the work. I’m really pleased with the results.

The background was the most troublesome decision, just as with choosing the fabric. The print was complex and busy. Afraid that it would become too strong and overpower other elements, I didn’t want to stitch the printed design. I came up with a wandering ribbon design with a tiny meandering stitch to fill in the spaces. I feel like the 2 patterns of the fabric and stitching sort of neutralize each other and take away their power to dominate.

Finally, here’s the finished piece.

Puppy Love, Part 1

Maya’s selfie

This week I’ve jumped back into my art with gusto. I’m tired of being on hold. I need to be creative!! With a 4-day weekend and plans to pack and move postponed (again!) it was time to make up for lost time.

4″ x 6″ thread painting.

This past week has been devoted to making a piece titled “Puppy Love”. I’ve done smaller versions of this piece in the past for small art auction donation pieces, but this one is big and bold.

It started with a selfie taken by my step-daughter, Maya with our little dachshund, Coco. While previous versions were printed on fabric and thread-painted, this one is raw-edge fused appliqué and 30″ x 40″.

My color scheme is an analogous run of yellow-orange, orange, red, red-violet. This kind of scheme tends to be calm and mellow, so, to punch it up, I threw in some blue-green.

A couple of marathon work days, and the piece was nearly completed. Selecting the background fabric had me stalled for day as I just couldn’t decide. I took audition photos with my phone and toggled back and forth between the shots until I was able to make a decision.

Background option 1

Background option 2

Now, it’s on to the stitching. I’m going to try something new and will share that with you next week. Check back in next week.

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