One of the recent 'International Threads' group challenges was set by Gillian Travis - to base the 40 x 80 cm quilt on a sketch. Having enjoyed putting together the change of scale door piece, I thought I'd base it on one of my many watercolours of crumbly Greek doors. This particular one was done in 1998 in a village at the top of the Anavriti Gorge near Sparta. I've long wanted to use this particular drawing as inspiration - it was one I also worked on during an Elizabeth Barton masterclass - simplifying the shapes and looking at it tonally was a very useful exercise.
Question- should I include the blue grey scaffolding pole on the left or not? It wasn't in the original sketch but when I saw the same doorway again a few years ago on a return visit in 2006 , there were poles in position that I thought enhanced the composition. Interested to hear what you think.
8 comments:
Hi Mags,
I love it and think you got all the detail in that it needed. Personally I wouldn't have put the scaffolding pole in as it is too symmetrical with the other vertical dark line.
Enjoy quilting it.
Hilary xx
I think there is more deptf with the pole.
How interesting to see this exercise come to fruition.
I like the scaffolding pole in position. As Ineke said it creates more depth but also encourages your eye to travel around the piece. Without it I found the stripes rather distracting.
Most interesting as I have accepted a personal challenge to use thread sketching to convert some photos or sketches to fiber pieces & and always interested to see how others use their sketches for this conversion. I do think the addition of the pole enhances the composition. Seems to give it a stability and place for the eye to rest with all those horizontal and angled lines so prominent in the central portion.
It seems to me the 2 poles are too centralized, equidistant and similar tonally to leave in. There is some merit to adding one, though but perhaps in the next one.
Go for the two poles. It works because they are not both continuous lines. As Linda has said, it stops the stripes becoming too distracting.
I really like the strong organizing vertical the pole gives. And I think you have done a fantastic job of taking the sketch through to a finished work. It's very inspiring.
Yes on the second pole. Provides structure and depth. I love seeing how you interpret a photo using abstraction.
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