Japanese Embroidery

We went to the Gallery, Nature in Art, today. This is at Twigworth, a little north of Gloucester and is a slightly odd place. I am entitled to say that - we are Friends. It has artworks based on nature which run from Japanese drawings/woodblock prints/paintings to David Shepherd's elephants. Lots of sculpture, ceramics, even bookbinding on occasion. They had an exhibition of BBC Wildlife Photographer of the Year in spring 2009, the first time that show has ever been outside London. And it is not all animals.

Anyway the expedition today was because they have Japanese embroideries done in the UK on show for 2 weeks and this weekend they had two practitioners, Barbara Wright and Jackie Hall, demonstrating. No photography was allowed which means you will have to look at samples such as Michelle Ellender. The item shown there was in the exhibition as a Level 1!! There was an example from everyone of the 10 levels. By the time you got to 6, the brain was reeling. Level 4 was a stunning embroidery of 8 kumihimo braids in grey, white, pink and maroon and one maroon tassels. Imagine embroidering a picture of a kumihimo braid!! Later there was a picture of pansies done in flat and twisted threads of silk of varying thicknesses (Kathy Read). There must have been 30 or so embroideries on show.

The technique seems to be called nihon shishu and is carried out on silk fabric with silk and metallic threads. Various types of fabric are used. Some have metallic threads wefts, one was goose eye twill but most were a tabby in heavy silk. I spotted two which had been dyed with careful blending of colours.  I cannot find much on the web with photos by these named individuals which is a pity.

We have signed up for a lecture by Jackie Hall next week so I will report further then