Fiber Friday: Embroidering water

When we turned on the pond for the first time this spring, the water got all foamy and bubbly as it rushed down the waterfalls. It was almost as if we'd put a drop of dishwashing liquid in it. It has taken a while but it seems like the water is finally getting its chemistry straightened out and is done with that quirky behavior. 

But before it ended, Mark snapped a bunch of photos of this unusual event and I fell in love with the images he captured. As the water moved and swirled around in the pond the pattern kept changing.

It is easy to understand what you are looking at if you know the story. Otherwise I think these images have a very other worldly aspect.

To my eye they look like wonderfully evocative abstract drawings full of texture and layered marks.

Then again, sometimes they look like elaborate embroideries with lots of french knots and lace and crushed silk and sequins and who knows what all.

I took an art workshop — "Experimental and Expressive Drawing" — last Friday with Wisconsin artist Kay Brathol-Hostvet that made me want to set aside time to make artwork without waiting for gardening season to end. What my eye is seeing in these photographs suggests they are the perfect inspiration needed for me to get back to drawing and needlework.

Comments

[Barbara H.]

I love them all - it would be hard to pick a favorite. I'm glad I remembered to click on the picture to make it bigger. How wonderful that these water views are inspiring you to art action - that not always an easy thing.

[Peter/Outlaw]

Very interesting. Can't wait to see what you do with this inspiration!

[Nell]

The water image would be wonderful as embroidery -- but so dense and complex that it would be quite a long project even for a highly skilled needleworker!

Mark's photos of the pond surface also remind me strongly of an image that mesmerized me as a child. It was an illustration from a Hans Christian Andersen story in which a young woman is given a Dress of the Moon and then a Dress of the Sun. The Sun dress was gold and glittery, but no more memorable than an over-the-top Met Gala outfit. The Dress of the Moon, though! It captured the look and feel of those moments when the moon is behind a cloud but about to emerge, and the stars are dusted at the edges of an inky sky. I'd love to see the illustration again; my mother gave that book away to a little girl while I was in college (I hope she was just as entranced).

[Lisa at Greenbow]

If you have a drawing urge don't deny it. Your garden will be there for you when you get there. I can't wait to see what you do. This time of year I don't do much other than garden, at least until it gets too hot. Then I hibernate until fall.

[Alison]

The water images are wonderfully lacy, chaotic and organic. I can totally see your infatuation with them. I hope you make some fabulous art.

[Linda Brazill]

When you are looking at your pond trying to figure out what is the matter with it, it is easy to miss the beauty. I was amazed when I saw these photos. They are certainly art in their own right but they would also be fun to use at the starting point in another media.

[Linda Brazill]

Rain in the forecast so I will have some non-garden time to do something else like this.

[Linda Brazill]

You are right about the density of those images. Not sure what I will do but I find them mesmerizing. Isn't it amazing how images and stories from childhood remain forever. You have no clue (usually) when you are young that you will still be pulling this information out of your memory years later.

[Linda Brazill]

I am the same as you: the summer is usually for nothing but gardening and the winter for other projects. But hot weather sends me indoors. We went down into the 30s overnight and today won't get out of the 40s. I am preparing for a nutty year weatherwise.

[Beth @ PlantPostings]

Like Barbara, I clicked on the images to make them larger and...wow! Patterns in nature are so fascinating. Yes, "lovely" cold and rain are keeping me inside and planning instead of outside and planting.

[Linda Brazill]

Glad you enlarged the images. Sometimes I mention it, though I forgot to this time. I usually try to do it if I can't see something clearly but not everyone's photos blow up.

[Erin @ The Impatient Gardener]

Without reading, I would have guessed these to be satellite photographs. Mark has an amazing eye.

[Linda Brazill]

I think it is hard to tell just what they are without some info. Did you see that Nell said they reminded her of moonlight in a childhood picture book?