After an art tutorial...

Last Wednesday I met with one of my tutors at uni: I have not felt much like being out and about at the moment as Carl's anniversary was so hard this year and everything has hit a bit of a wall, however, I have had plenty of experience of these sort of feelings and I do know that things will get better. This is quite how I felt about this tutorial on Wednesday - I was told that I am not quite where I was last year with my work and I went home with a slight feeling of panic - Christmas holidays are approaching and then we really only have one term left. I need to be brave and remember that I have been in this sort of situation before; take on board the advice that I was given and then try to go forward whilst I also give myself some time to manage the grief I am feeling at the moment.

We discussed my free machine sculptures and it was suggested that they needed to be a little more feminine and have a greater suggestion of stitch rather than packaging. Whilst I am a little worried about whether this will work, I really think it is worth investigating and plan to get started as soon as my  cream / pale leather remnants arrive from Pittards (leather and  free machine embroidery sculpture). 

However, during this crit I did show my tutor these images:

The Bristol - 6 cylinder, 2 litre engine,
straight 6, side view

The Bristol- 6 cylinder, 2 litre engine, straight 6, back view

The Workshop

These pictures were taken at 'Spencer Lane Jones, Warminster': the company  lovingly restore these wonderful old cars - some are so unique as only one car was made - bespoke - I never realised that was possible. The engineers that worked on the cars were so helpful, informative and patient with me as I tried to remember which way round the engine went and what some of the key components were called. But they were also very supportive of my plans and ideas to reconstruct an engine in thread. My tutor was also quite excited about this idea - a masculine engine drawn in thread but how to go about it. 

Last year all my work was drawn freehand at the sewing machine, direct observation and  no preliminary pencil drawings. But at this crit it was suggested that I might want to use a projector to help me copy the image before I start the embroidery. Will this still be a free machine drawing or will that make it an embroidery? Will I be breaking away from my original idea - to make a drawing that just can't be perfect because it is made freehand? But   does the fact that it is made in a way that also supports this theory - on dissolvable fabric which when removed subjects the work to a loss of control and the loss of perfection? 

This is a complicated drawing and to help me solve this problem I will make some trial pieces - one freehand and another with some pencil marks but these will be with my own hand and not the projector: at the moment that is one step to far. I still want to explore the idea that good art does not have to be perfect; if I draw the design I will be trying to hard and therefor it may not work. But then, for this size project, maybe I do need a little help!