Happy Christmas

I thought I would share my Christmas with you. As you can imagine, I love decorating the house for Christmas, and this year I gave the house a natural look with lots of greenery from the garden. My tree was a large oak branch that had broken off in the storm. It is amazing what a bit of ivy can do to transform something ordinary into something special.

Beautiful Florence

I thought I would share my recent city break to Florence. It is astounding how one small city has such a treasure trove of culture. There was so much artwork to behold, four days did not really do the city justice.  I have returned refreshed and ready to make new works myself.

 

 

Here I am taking a photograph of the painted mirror and found myself in the frame.

 

 

 

Every where we seemed to turn there are amazing buildings.

 

We stumbled across a small, dark shop window in a small side street, on the west side of Florence, only to see the most amazing jewellery. Here inside was something very special. The man responsible for this artwork is self taught jeweller Allesandro Dari. What a find, and the icing on the cake for me.

 

I loved the fact the Florence curators have allowed artists to place contemporary work within the realm of a historic building. Here a modern day tree house sits majestically in a 17th century courtyard.

 

 

I now know where Dolce & Gabbana got their inspiration for their 2013 fall collection. 

 

Recent Commission

 

I was asked to make my butterfly necklace in a new colour way for a client. Black, orange and red. It made a nice change from my original blue and gold version of which I have made several. 

 



The Knitting & Stitching Show 2013, Alexandra Palace

 

I wanted to create a stunning display to promote my new book "Embroidered Art" and I thought I had succeeded. The problem became apparent after several hours when no one looked to pick up my book, just engaging in the display. At first I could not understand what the problem was, but my neighbouring exhibitors soon twigged on. So I went from this display .............................

 

........To This

 

I hid most of my work, and managed to get hold of a table to display the books and arranged them as you would expect to see a display in most book stores. Now every one knew what I was selling.

 

L'ete Indien @ Gill Wing Jewellery

 

Several of my latest jewellery range "Dutch Masters" is being exhibited at Gill Wing Jewellery in Islington, London.

Waterstones Book Launch

  

     Launching my book in my home town of Newport, on the Isle Of Wight.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Book Launch, The Royal Botanical Gardens, Kew

 

I cannot really believe my book is actually out. This the hottest day of the year so far, Thursday 1st August. With around 150 people attended over the course of three hours. It is moments like this that do not happen often in life, but make special memories. All the photography is by David Paul Betts. Except the image with him in it, his wife Heather took that shot.

 

 

 

Left: Katie French who worked with me closely on the book. Katie had the task of formatting the book.

 

 

 

With my band of photographers, who if it was not for them my book would have looked entirely different. I have been blessed. Right to left Paul Cotton, me, Julie Yeo & David Paul Betts. Sadly David Shih could not be with us. David is from Shanghai, China and had to return home as his visa had expired. When I met David Shih he was finishing his M.A in photography at one of the London university's.

 

Work on display

Kew Garden

Prior to the book launch at Kew, I went for the day to sort out the final arrangements. What an amazing garden. I took so many photographs I really did not know what to choose!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tom Hare "Willow Man" How amazing are these? I want a piece for my garden

 

"Alice In Wonderland" This is my world!

Search Press Warehouse Party

 

Back in July and in conjunction with Woman's Weekly Magazine, Search Press hung almost two miles of knitted bunting. The Readers knitted and broke the world record for the longest knitted bunting. It took the Search Press team five hours to hang from the crates of books.

We then had a party in the Warehouse.

"Collect" at the Saatchi Gallery 9-13 May 2013

My work for "Collect" in the Project Space has been inspired by images taken by photographer Chris Jordan. The sad images are of dead Albatross chicks, washed up on the beach. The chicks have been fed lethal quantities of plastic debris by the parents. The chick is unable to regurgitate the plastic and dies from hunger.

Armed with a bag to collect plastic rubbish and a camera to photograph the evidence, I headed to the south of the Isle Of Wight, to a beach called Grange Chine. This rural beach is situated near the beautiful village of Brighstone.The currents has brought a huge quantity of rubbish and dumped it on this beach.

 

Title "Plastic Soup"



This is my first finished piece.

 

 



 

 

 

 

Title "Bag For Life"

 

 

 

All this nylon rope was picked up on one single afternoon in the space of about 60 minutes. There is so much of the stuff sitting on the beach I could have filled this box several times over. This piece was inspired by an image I found in a photography book and taken by John Cancalosi. Many rubbish tips have rich pickings and white Storks now flock to dumps. Having taken an image of a bird trapped in a plastic bag the photographer waded through the rubbish and set the bird free. With so many plastic bags still filling our dumps, why are they still so widely in use? In Wales and Ireland there has been a 96% usage drop since a charge has been put into place.I choose to use a Heron for my piece.

 

 

 

Title "Stranglehold"

 

 

This plastic can four pack ring was not easy to spot. Due to the weathering it had faded almost to opaque, but when I did eventually spot one it was like finding treasure. It must be a good thing I struggled to find one discarded.

 

 

 

 

This nylon netting was found in a hedge along from my house. I jumped out of the car, prized it from the bush and took it home. I then incorporated it in my last piece for the exhibition.

 

 

Title "Entangled"

 

 

 

 

 

Set up for the exhibition.

 

 



 

 

 

Collect 2013 Crafts Council. Photo Sophie Mutevelian