Tuesday, November 17, 2015

"Mindless" Embroidery

I belong to a great fiber arts group that meets in Louisville, KY. LAFTA (Louisville Area Fiber and Textile Artists) is a good mix of all types of fiber artists. One of the best things about the group is that it offers free classes to group members. LAFTA members volunteer to lead workshops in a wide variety of areas such as screen printing, felting, beading, bead embroidery, design, and "mindless" embroidery to name a few.
I just took the "mindless" embroidery class led by Felice Sachs. Felice explained that she has been stitching on small canvas pieces. She uses the stitching to keep her hands busy as she watches TV. You can see one of her pieces in the picture below.
 

Felice was kind enough to allow me to take photos of a few of her pieces to share with you. These are some of my favorites. She sometimes uses pieces of fabric collaged onto her pieces.

Here she has collaged a piece of lace onto the canvas.

Sometimes she simply uses threads.

I do a lot of embroidery, but I NEVER use just one strand of floss. (I'm a bit more of an "extreme" embroiderer. My work is a little more "in your face.") For these pieces, Felice always uses only one strand. She sometimes stitches over an area more than once, but she sticks to the one strand "rule." I like the more delicate look of the stitching with one strand. I appreciate that Felice shared her expertise with us in this class. I really enjoyed it. I'd also like to give a big shout out to Preston's Art Center on Bardstown Road. They let us use their classroom space for free. If you can visit the shop in person, you should. It is a GREAT store. If you don't live close enough to visit, check out their website here.

I really feel lucky to belong to a group that promotes all areas of fiber arts.

4 comments:

Lisa at Greenbow said...

I would find this fascinating even tho I don't do fiber art. I am drawn to it. It is powerful in my eyes.

Robbie said...

So cool to learn from each other isn't it!! Small groups are wonderful to be part of and having a location to meet is priceless.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for sharing this. I couldn't imagine what your post title meant! I wish I lived closer to Louisville. I was there last May to meet a friend from Ohio, and we had a great time. Except the traffic was terrible. =)

k.somerville said...

Felice is such a lovely person and I've always loved her quirky style. Glad you had a great time.
K.