Shadow Drawing

Above is a photograph, taken by my late husband, of evening light through our front window.  I've also been fascinated by the different shapes cast onto my bedroom curtains at night shining through my neighbour's plum-tree.  At first I agonised over what to do - have always been fascinated by light through trees but wanted to do something different.  As time grew closer to the deadline I came across the photograph which reminded me of the shadow-drawings done by a former art teacher.

I have a method for approaching artwork - it begins with a long period of reflection and observation.  Sometimes but not always it will involve drawings, painting and so on.  In this case not.  The period of reflection allowed me to see that the shadows on my bedroom window were paler in some places than others, that in places shapes were crisp and elsewhere blurred, for example.  (I think this is my equivalent of the processes used by Oriental artists traditionally - according at any rate to a book I read as a teenager - of spending a whole morning looking at something and then drawing it in a single stroke).

Anyway, here it is.  I found a nice piece of silk charmeuse I'd dyed, plus hand-dyed silk organzas and polyester voile, together with back mistyfuse-type stuff, ironed the mistyfuse stuff onto the organzas, then cut and overlapped the shapes onto the background fairly freely, using different colours and fabrics to give different depths of shadows (Mags, you are NOT to try to identify any real botanical items - this is an abstraction of the sorts of shapes you get in gardens (well that's my story and I'm sticking to it)).  Then layered and machine-stitched (free motion) and bound with more of the silk which was the most difficult part - rotary cutting silk binding strips isn't something I'd recommend.

Not exactly a single stroke but pretty quick nevertheless.  Started Monday night, finished Weds afternoon whilst sitting chatting to a friend.  Not a great work of art but I sorta like it..