CrumpArt » Spinning

Lace Galaxies.

May 7th, 2008 by Crumpet

Part of my project this semester involves spinning yarn and knitting it into lace circles based on Elizabeth Zimmermann’s pi shawl pattern. To put it in the vaguest terms possible, it’s a scienc-y, mathematical meditation-y mandala thing — a reflection on creation and the clash of scepticism and belief. I’ll be printing on each piece of knitting repeatedly to build up colour, and will also try printing with them on my paper works. Next semester they’ll be ripped out and made into something new, playing into my destruction/creation theme.

I started with a bag of wool that I already had, but it hadn’t been carded and was just too lumpy and uneven for what I wanted. I could have hand-carded it, but the thought of processing 500g of fibre that way made me want to cry real tears. Instead, I paid a visit to the Yarn Barn in Coburg to see what they had, and came out with 700g of processed superwash merino that had already been pre-drafted and wound onto a cone. Freaking score!

It still took me a few skeins to get my tension right for the project I have in mind next semester, but I’m still using the first efforts this time around, and will use them for a different piece later.

Here’s what the singles needed to look like…

And here they are plied.

And posing with Neil Gaiman’s signature in my sketchbook (yep, definitely fangirl.)

I’m really quite disgustingly proud of my spinning job. It took at least two full days to spin the singles, and another half day of plying just for two skeins. The knitting feels like flying in comparison.

Posted in Geekery, Universe, Spinning, Art, Knitting | | 2 Comments

Submerged.

March 10th, 2008 by Crumpet

I started back at uni last week. I’m in the final year of my undergrad, and it’s already pretty full on. After much to-ing and fro-ing with admin, I managed to be approved for an uneven workload, so I’m doing five subjects this semester and three next semester. Doing this means that I don’t have to give up an extra day of work next semester, and I’ll also be able to concentrate more on all the big end of year assignments and whatnot. So, this semester I’m at uni for pretty much four full days. I’m very excited about it all though. My theory class (Theme and Variation) seems really interesting — there are two 1500 word essays due for this one, and I’m hoping to write the first on Dave McKean. I’ve just finished Cages, and it was one of the single greatest reading experiences I’ve ever had. Very, very relevant thematically to the work I’m planning at the moment. Hence the essay for Theme and Variation.

It’s been a big week or two with the reading. Aside from Cages, I’m working my way through a bunch of other sciency library books, another philosophic astronomy book I bought earlier in the year and the Librivox recording of Moby Dick. Suffice to say, all the reading and processing of information has left me pretty exhausted. And of course, it being the Labour Day long weekend here and all, I had to work today.

I did have yesterday to myself though, and I made the most of it.

I finally, finally, finally finished spinning the yarn that’s been sitting on my bobbins for over a year.

It’s 100% merino spun from tops, which I realised I’d spun and plied in the wrong order during the last step. I meant to ply the purple and green together then ply it again with a thicker single of the teal, which I’d bought extra of on purpose, but screwed up by plying the teal and purple together. Of course, I didn’t have enough of the green to finish the job, but it turned out for the best anyway, because I ended up making a yarn I love more.

It’s the rest of the blue and teal plied together with a strand of commercial acrylic yarn that I received a massive cone of on my birthday, then plied again with a very fine strand of orange wool I bought a long time ago. I see a very cute handbag in my future.

And the best thing from all this spinning? The bobbins are completely clear and I can start the mammoth spinning/knitting/crocheting project I have planned for school.

Yep, I get to spin, knit and crochet for class! I’m in the best. course. ever.

Posted in Books, photography, Spinning, Art | | 2 Comments

Waiting for the bell to go (to go where?)

March 3rd, 2008 by Crumpet

It’s the first day of school today. I have my art theory class at 9:30 this morning, and have about 20 minutes before I’m due to leave.

In what seemed like another birthday treat, but was really just a case of good timing, myself and some others from work organised to go to the Creswick Alpaca Mill on Saturday. We sell the beautiful Creswick alpaca blankets where I work, and we thought it would be fun to go to one of the mill sales that happen occasionally. Instead, the family who run the company organised a special day to show us around the mill and take us out to lunch!

I’ve been to the mill once before, but I didn’t get to see all the machinery and whatnot last time. It was so cool.

The massive alpaca carding machine was in action when we arrived. I started taking photos, but quickly handed the camera across to Mr C. He has much better pictures than I do, but hasn’t had a chance to upload them to Flickr yet. The photo above is the alpaca fibre mid carding, just before it’s run through another set of softer cards and separated into cones of long thin unspun yarn.

After that process, they send the yarn through a big spinning machine, then it’s loaded onto massive warp spools (in the photo at the top of this poost) and sent to the loom room.

Here is the yarn being prepared for the warp:

None of the looms are computerised, so to weave in the right pattern, holes are punched into long plastic sheets that are loaded into the looms, which follow the pattern sheets kind of like how a pianola plays a tune.

I was going to buy some merino fibre for a uni project while I was there, but they didn’t have any this time around. I settled for a gorgeous blanket and a new throw rug.

And that’s my 20 minutes up! Next time, I’ll catch up on the blog housekeeping…

(The title of this post is from a poem by Roger McGough called First Day of School.)

Posted in Spinning, Knitting | | 1 Comments

Bobbin of Blues

January 21st, 2008 by Crumpet

I just made me a bobbin of blues
Some strange comfort for a soul to soothe
It was hard
It was hard,
To stop the drive band from falling right off

And I’ve been waiting for a year, a day
To make this yarn but things got in my way
Cause I had no time to spin or to play,
To treadle in time

I made plans for a loud colour scheme
Used laws of physics to make my own string
Put extra twist in to help with plying
I spun faster and slower
I spun faster and slower
Like a crazy crafter
With nothing’ to knit
And nowhere to put
This bobbin of blues

The drive band
Would not stay on
The damn wheel
Drove me crazy
Fred would not deliver
Fibre from the sliver
There just was no relief

I told myself that I really can’t hate
This stupid-arsed wheel
Cos it’s usually great
And the tension built
In the old-school machine
And it rang through my bones

I saw the knot that was causing the slip
I found the scissors and gave it the clip
Put a splice in the ends of the string
I glued over and over
And made the tension lower
Like a tired crafter
With nothing’ to lose
I fixed it up to get this
Bobbin of blues

Posted in Spinning | | 1 Comments

Just in time for our return…

June 28th, 2007 by Crumpet

The 130th Australian Sheep and Wool Show in Bendigo. Who’s in?

Posted in Spinning, Knitting | | 2 Comments

I made things.

June 13th, 2007 by Crumpet

And I’m still making things. Here’s an update on where I’m at with my uni stuff. Assessment is Friday.

All my prints dismantled and on the cards.

On the wheel.

Finished yarn. It’s a 100% silk, 2-ply worsted-esque weight yarn that weighs just under 50 grams and measures 55 metres.

And here’s my first set of circles all sewn together. I sewed them onto dissolvable backing, and this shot was taken just after I took them out of the water. The washing made the silk shrink slightly, which made the colours much more vibrant â€” a helpful side-effect…

I’m still working on the second set of circles, and I have to finish a digital project, a (simple) website and a bunch of prints that need to be cut up and laid out on the floor at uni like quilt squares.

Eek.

Posted in Spinning, General crafts, Art, Embroidery | | 0 Comments

Menial or Meaningful?

May 15th, 2007 by Crumpet

I’m a printmaker. My favourite process is lithography.

To make one lithograph, I need to move my heavy limestone to the graining bench, wet it, then sand it by hand in a rhythmic pattern with 60 grit carborundum and a levigator. I do that four or five times before moving on to the 90 grit carborundum, followed by the 180 grit and 220 grit. When my stone is clean and smooth, I dry it off with a hand flag and move it to a bench, where I draw/paint a wash/transfer/etc. until I have the image I want to print. Then I do the first etch. This involves rubbing talc into the surface of the stone, applying a special nitric acid mix to the surface, and then buffing it back so it’s smooth. A few hours later, I go back to the stone and apply the second etch. I apply gum arabic to the surface, buff it back, remove the image from the stone with turps, rub/buff in liquid bitumen, wash the gum off the stone with water, wipe the stone with a drier sponge so that the layer of water is thin, then roll up the image with black ink. I wipe back the stone with water again, dry it with the hand flag, then follow the steps from the first etch. After a few hours or a day, depending on both deadlines and patience, the stone is ready to print. I won’t go through the whole printing process, suffice to say that it includes preparing paper, lots of ink rolling and keeping the stone wet to stop it from drying out, among other things.

I could get ten prints or a hundred prints this way. Or I could save myself all the effort, send an image to a printing business, and have them do the work for me. I mean, who would want to do all that work for a printout? Kris posted links to this blog post and the article it relates to, and this kind of thing always gets my defences up. I mean, really, why bother doing something when you can get someone else, or some other machine to do it for you?

I had a bit of an artistic epiphany in my bookmaking class last year. My lecturer and I were clashing, and I finally figured out why. She didn’t like my first project â€”Â I didn’t understand why and she didn’t understand why I didn’t understand. She also didn’t think I’d done enough work considering how far we were along in the semester. When I finally figured it out and sent her an email explaining why I do things and how I work, she stepped back, let my do my thing, and I created some of my favourite pieces ever. And she gave me a high distinction. Anyway, for her, it’s the finished piece that matters. The process doesn’t inform the final artwork, rather, the final artwork informs the processes. She does a lot of digital printing, and is more than happy to outsource any type of printing she does.

For me, it’s the other way around. My processes are very important in developing the ideas, and the finished piece is less important than the journey I go through to get there. The methodical nature of printmaking allows my mind to rest and focus, and it gives me the time to think and dream and make obscure connections. Concentrating on the rote tasks also stops me stressing about irrelevant things. There’s also a magic in printmaking â€” taking a moment to notice how sunlight shining through the window plays on a stone and sparkling carborundum when you are graining it; running your hand over an exquisitely smooth, wet surface; the chemical magic in the way that the image will pick up ink when you roll over it, but the damp, non-image areas won’t; pulling back the paper after your first proof; the flexibility involved in printing something yourself. Although lithography is my favourite, I do other forms of printmaking for the same reasons â€” lino/woodblock prints, etchings, engravings, collographs… And when it’s all said and done, I’ve made something beautiful and unique that I can keep or sell. Or keep AND sell, which is another one of the joys of printmaking.

I love to knit and spin and sew and embroider and all the other somewhat antiquated things I do for the same reasons that I love printmaking. It’s about the magic in giving myself time to think while I construct something stitch by stitch. And watching something slowly grow and evolve is fascinating. It’s like a good book â€” you desperately want to get to the end to find out what happens, but at the same time, you want to enjoy the story for as long as possible.

Posted in Sewing, Book making, Spinning, General crafts, Embroidery, Art, Knitting | | 3 Comments

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