Happy Christmas!

and a finished object

Silk and cotton threads, including some silk indigo-dyed by me last autumn.
French knots and bullions on velvet

I'm really enjoying making these little brooches - they are an inch an a half across and very satisfying to stitch.  The velvet looks black in this photo but is actually a deep inky, purpley-blue.

the latest wips

a 'what's happening in the studio' post

 All on their way to being something.

blogoversary giveaway winner!

Thank you everyone for entering the blogoversary giveaway - 40 comments was amazing! So this morning I cut up all the comments, screwed them up tight and put them in the fruit and veg delivery box,

then enlisted the help of my son - you can trust him as he a) is an ethics student and b) doesn't know any of you.

Here he is being impartial (and a little bemused).

 and drumroll.... the winner is

catsmum!!! yayayayayay! Kermit cheering!!

Send me your address catsmum and the book (that I'm in...) will be yours - and maybe a few extra Christmas goodies....

Making / re-making

Making is a process, which in terms of the finished thing, is no longer available. Yet 'making' is how things come to be; the 'thing' once finished, is in-process, on the other side; at the moment of its finish it begins and begins without destination, this is its object-ive. This thing touches, stokes, destroys, sets in motion other things, which in turn press it on, free it, make it, and undo it. The thing - thought does the same, and it is made, made and re-made in the same manner.
Jean-Luc Nancy The Heart of things in The Birth to Presence. Stanford University Press 1993

I found this quote serendipitously on Katherine Bowman's blog  - she is the Melbourne artist who made our wedding rings :)

We particularly liked the lack of perfection in Katherine's work - you can see and feel the marks of making. And the little diamonds in my ring are loosely based on the Pleiades - my favourite constellation that usually appears somewhere in my work. Work full of resonances, referencing the process and continually remaking itself.

le weekend

It has been a quiet weekend here - Kind Dog and I have been quite unwell this spring with gout and asthma respectively. So we have been pottering around tending to the animals and the garden - I'll do a separate post on Betty and Vera - everyone is growing and settling in wonderfully.

I spent some time in the studio quietly embroidering some Christmas presents - silk and cotton thread on velvet.

 And this evening we will have a little champagne to celebrate our special day - we met on 8 December 2010. We met for coffee, talked for seven hours straight and have been blissfully happy ever since.

blogoversary giveaway!

On 5 December 2005 I started textile seahorse in the usual faltering style of the novice blogger.  Blogging has been a salvation during the dark times, and a bit of a drag when I couldn't think of anything to say but said it anyway.  It has definitely made me a better artist - blogging a project kept me up to the mark in trying to do my best work, experimenting and connecting with so many people across the vast interwebby oceans. There are people I now count as dear friends who found me through my blog. For a while the blog felt like it had run its course and I nearly gave up on it, but everything seems to be working again now and the blogging momentum is back.

So, to celebrate 8 years of wittering I am going to give away a copy of Seth Apter's new book (have I mentioned it before??) The Mixed Media Artist  Art Tips, Tricks, Secrets and Dreams From Over 40 Amazing Artists.

Apart from the fact that I'm in it (did I tell you?), the book features the work and techniques of a bunch of mixed media artists and is a really good read. Seth has crammed as much as he possibly could into 143 pages while still making it a beautiful object in itself.

So, leave a comment and there will be a random drawing of the lucky winner next week.