Thoughts on Sketch Books

My sister, Dorothy, told me some time ago that there was a Quilting exhibition on in Hanley Swan which is about two miles away from us. I don't even know where the Hanley Swan Village Hall is. I thought I would investigate and a Google search produced a time and date. It is the Region 11 of the Quilting Guild's Show so I will try to get there. But in the event above the Hanley Swan one in the Events list was a note on a show on in Ledbury this minute. Given that we have family coming at the weekend and Michael seeing his consultant tomorrow, I went this afternoon. It is a 'quilting' show by Sue Spooner and Helen Keenan. To me, they are rather painterly art works. Good Colour sense and well balanced pictures. However they had put out some sketchbooks. I can't resist looking at other people's sketch books. For years I have had a love/hate relationship with them. I am unconvinced that weavers can make much use of sketchbooks.

The ones at Ledbury seemed to be one sketchbook per series, say 'Storm'. There were some Postcards/photos/paper cuttings at the start with drawings interpersed. Then more painterly drawings and then samples. A set of different coloured organzas overlaying a textured dark material, samples of different materials and stitches. Building up to larger samples appraoching the final work.

Why is this no use to a weaver?

A weaver is stuck with a warp. Once you have decided the colours and the threading draft, you do not have much freedom except to change the weft colours/ thickness/texture. What is more, it is very time consuming to try out lots of threadings for one project and you are much more likely to select the draft based on previous experience. About the best you can do is use a weavette (small square of wood with nails in all four sides . You wind on a warp and insert the weft with a tapestry needle). That does not allow you to sample patterns because it is difficult to do much more complex patterns than two-and-two twill with a needle. It does allow you to see what the colour mix looks like. In a perfect world, you might do full scale samples but that takes time. I know that Stacey Harvey-Brown creates samples in a big way and finishes them differently. She just builds up a library which she can call on when needed. And Cally Booker did sketch books when doing the Bradford course. I don't know whether she has kept that up.

I have tried. I did do a weekend on story boards with Loraine McClean once, and while it was great fun, I never did any more.

And yet I love looking at other people's Sketch Books. Maybe I should try harder.