Ammonite

In 2014 I took a fossil to the American Needlepoint Guild Seminar in Chicago.
I also took Jane-Beth.

Chicago is big and tall, and The Magnificent Mile is a bit breath-taking. That might have been something to do with having to walk with my neck twisted up to look at the architecture. The city is filled with new glass monoliths, but the older 'skyscrapers' in the centre are a glory of early 20th Century architecture. They're not just buildings, they are works of art. I particularly liked the reliefs on the walls, so I'm putting in pictures of a few of my favourites.

To appreciate Chicago, you really need to accept the crick in the neck.

Of course the main reason for going to Seminar was to stitch, to learn and to exhibit my latest piece of needlepoint.
In 2014 I exhibited "Ammonite"

"Ammonite" started life as a spiral doodle. It was a boring meeting. The spiral was joined by some curved lines and it reminded me of an ammonite. I love the shape of the ammonite, the regularity of the shape and the blending of colours where different chemicals have seeped into the shell and fossilised it.
When I got home I decided to up-scale it into a design roughly based on this fossil:

At an early stage I decided that although Ammonites have a regular mathematical progression in the expanding size of their compartments, my maths was never going to be up to the challenge, so I decided to go for effect rather than accuracy. My intention was to capture the spirit of the ammonite and produce a piece of work that was instantly recognisable as the fossil, not an exact copy of any specific fossil.

Ammonite measures 6" by 6" and took 100 hours to design and stitch. It is worked in basketweave on 18 count pewter canvas. The outline and the dividing lines between the chambers are done in Kreinik braids. The infill of the chambers is Soie d'Alger. I used six different colours on the infill of the chambers. To achieve the look of the chemicals seeping into the fossil I blended my threads. As the colours fade into each other I started with four strands of one colour, then three of that and one of the next, then two and two, then one of the first and three of the second.
The background, the 'mother stone' also uses thread blending to define the variety of shades and colours found in any piece of stone.

I was quite pleased with this, and so must the judges have been as they awarded it 2nd in Class. It's always nice to get the recognition.

Ammonite was later published as a chart, with instructions and stitch guide, in Needlepointers, September 2015, Volume XLIII, Number 5

4:30:1836

"Remember The Alamo."
Not that I do, but when I heard that the American Needlepoint Guild Seminar for 2011 was to be in San Antonio it was probably the first thing that came to mind, closely followed by John Wayne throwing a burning torch into the magazine and "The Green Leaves of Summer".
San Antonio? Had to be!  To paraphrase Congressman Crockett, "Work can go to hell, I'm going to Texas!"

Next question. What was I going to submit to the Exhibit, the annual exhibition and competition? I was looking for some sort of connection, a link that would inspire a piece of work.
Long Story Alert!

There's an old Scottish myth (well not that old) about a Scotsman, fresh from 'The Old Country'. He gets off the ship in Texas and starts walking inland, looking at the place, wondering where to set down roots, when he reaches San Antonio.
The town is in a ferment. There are people building barricades and herding animals into 'yon auld kirk'.
Being inquisitive of nature he stops as passer-by and asks what all the excitement is about.
"Mister," he is told. "Texas has declared its freedom. General Santa Anna is marching towards us with an army of fifteen thousand men. There are one hundred men garrisoning the Alamo, and they aim to stop him."
"Weel 'jings'," quoth the Scotsman. "That's no fair. son. Thoosands against a hunner?"
"General Santa Anna says that when he arrives he will march over the Americanos in the blink of an eye."
"Och he does, does he," said the Scotsman. "Weel if yon's his attitude, I think I'll just hae tae ging in ta yon fort and gie them a hand."

Unlikely or not, I decided I'd do some research. I found the Alamo website. What I discovered was educational, enlightening and made me a little proud of my Scots blood.
There was not a Scotsman at The Alamo, there were four. I also discovered that 30 of the defenders had Scottish ancestry. This was less surprising considering the influx of Scots into America following the Jacobite Risings, but still quite a high proportion.

I was looking at pictures of The Alamo when inspiration, thankfully, struck. I had a link, and I had a general idea of the image I wanted to create. I even had a working title. 4:30:1836 was, if not born, in gestation.

The front view of The Alamo is an iconic image. I decided to take the curve, to ignore all the architecture apart from the front door and the upper window, and use the tartans of the four first generation Scots defenders. The door and window would be replaced with numbers, 30 for the defenders of Scots ancestry, 1836 for the year of the battle.

Simple? Well no, not really. I had to graph out each of the tartans, then I had to manipulate them slightly so that the horizontal and vertical lines met in a continuous pattern that drew the eye from one tartan to the next. My notes tell me that I took 70 hours to design this.

4:30:1836 is worked in tent-stitch on congress cloth using two strands of Soie d' Alger.  It is 7½ inches square and it took a total of 240 hours to stitch.
And I was awarded Ribbons!!!

The ribbon on the right is The Princess Grace Award for the best piece of basketweave/tent stitch in the Exhibit. I was overwhelmed, I was even speechless for a moment when it was announced. It was also awarded 3rd place in Class and, at the end of Seminar, the Delegates Choice Ribbon. The Princess Grace Award also comes with a rose:

This lovely piece of porcelain lives under a glass dome, and I admit to being so proud to have received it that I'm inclined to show it off.

I couldn't have done it without the four Scotsmen, so I'd like to introduce them:

Richard W. Ballentine was born in Scotland in 1814. He travelled to Texas from Alabama aboard the Santiago and disembarked on December 9, 1835. He and the other passengers signed a statement declaring, "we have left every endearment at our respective places of abode in the United States of America, to maintain and defend our brethren, at the peril of our lives, liberties and fortunes."

John McGregor was born in Scotland in 1808. McGregor lived in early 1836 in Nacogdoches. He took part in the siege of Bexar and later served in the Alamo garrison as a second sergeant of Capt. William R. Carey's artillery company. It is said that during the siege of the Alamo, he engaged in musical duels with David Crockett, McGregor playing the bagpipes and Crockett the fiddle.

Isaac Robinson was born in Scotland in 1808 and came to Texas from Louisiana. He took part in the siege of Bexar and later served in the Alamo garrison as a fourth sergeant in Capt. William R. Carey's artillery company.

David L. Wilson, son of James and Susanna (Wesley) Wilson, was born in Scotland in 1807. In Texas he lived in Nacogdoches with his wife, Ophelia. Wilson was probably one of the volunteers who accompanied Capt. Philip Dimmitt to Bexar and the Alamo in the early months of 1836. He remained at the Alamo after Dimmitt left on the first day of the siege.

Tea Anyone?

Inspiration can come from all sorts of places. In 1987 I was given a present of a small book of examples of Japanese woodcuts in the Ukio-e (Pictures of the Floating World) style. One of the woodcuts was by Utagawa Toyoharu (1733-1844) and was titled "Interior and Winter Landscape: A gay party, men and Geishas".

Despite my lack of experience I decided that I would like to render the image in needlepoint.

I began this project in March 1988, starting from the 6 inch by 4 inch, postcard sized picture in the book. Not quite as clueless as heretofore, I realised that the figures were very detailed and that to do them any justice they must be stitched on a high count canvas, with a finer thread. The rest of the picture did not feel, to me, as though it needed the same level of detail. Somewhere along the line I made the first design decision. I would work the figures on 22 count and the rest on 11 count. Not being particularly aware of other flosses or yarns, I stuck with Appletons Crewel and DMC Medici.

Back then, with no computers, limited access to photocopiers and no digital nothing, it all had to be done by hand. I have alluded to my lack of ability to draw, but if you seek hard enough you can find a solution. My solution was the pantograph. Using one, I traced the outlines of the figures onto graph paper expanding them to the size required, and filled in the detail by eye. Each figure was charted and stitched separately apart from the two overlapping figures on the right which were completed as one piece. All the figures were worked in tent stitch on 22 count canvas using 2 strands of DMC Medici and appliqued to the background.

The background was drawn out on graph paper by hand and eye. It was stitched on 11 count using 3 strands of Appletons. The background is mostly tent stitch, but with a flash of bravery (or boredom?) I essayed into different stitches for the Tatami matting and the bamboo porch behind the figures. The completed project, not including the mount and frame, measures 27 inches by 13 inches. The standing Geisha is about 11 inches in height.

Was there a lesson to be learned?

First, let's start with frames. Scroll frames are a pain. At no time can you see the whole canvas, and every time you move the canvas you have to re-lace it, and keeping it suitably taut and even is not as easy as it looks. I found that the further on I got with the project the more I was struggling to stop the canvas going out of shape. I partly solved the problem by padding the unstitched areas, but only partly! It was some time later that I discovered the joy of stretcher bars and thumb tacks.

Secondly, there's size. Size matters! I failed to leave sufficient extra space beyond the area to be stitched. At times I was working so close to the side bars that I had difficulty in controlling the needle and ending threads. (Of course that might just have been me.) Now I always leave at least a two inch space between the edges of my design and the edge of the canvas on all sides. (That extra couple of inches also means that you can do quick doodles in the corners if you don't have a doodle cloth handy.) That extra two inches can mean the difference between satisfaction and frustration.

I also learned how fiddly it is to try and join two pieces of canvas invisibly, though I did cheat by planning (or more likely by luck?) to have the join run vertically behind the standing figure. I also discovered that in general, picture framers have little experience of framing needlepoint.

I started "Tea Dance - Nippon Style" in March 1988 and did not complete it until June 1989. I learned so many things about designing and stitching during this project, and though today I can look at it and see many things I would do differently now, it still hangs in our sitting room and I am still proud of it. One day perhaps I will revisit it. I still have the original design sheets somewhere!