sunshiny day

It's the kind of day that I never want to end...it has been a day with the most perfect Melbourne weather and I've been pottering about doing lovely research things at home.  I've been trialling some photography of my gleaned __________ garments and catching up on some reading.  Enjoy what might be the last day before winter sets in y'll!

garden windfall

I've been starting a series of workshops in the studio to unpack what is happening in this space...privileging making is the focus and I'm experimenting with what this means in various ways in the garden and the workroom and hopefully making some more tangible links between the two.  So far I've been thinking about dressing the garden and the workroom and objects within the space...

 It has been a windfall of sorts with a bit of rejuvenation being injected into my work...but I also had a very suprising garden windfall on the weekend...I was weeding and tidying up the garden edging under the apple trees and what I thought was a bit of rubbish (maybe something pulled out of the bin by the doggles or blown into the garden), was a cripsy $20 note!  It might just have been washed and fallen out of a hung on the line garment pocket, but I like to think that like the said rubbish sometimes does, it blew into the garden in a happy accident :o)

Gem and Hugs also got blessed and dressed by the garden on the weekend...pretty pups!

apple tiser

My six apple trees have been developing nicely in the garden...all of them are getting fruit except for the snow apple which insists on only growing bushy foliage at the moment.  This is their 3rd year and I've only had fruit off my summer strawberry and sturmer before, so this is exciting!
What I'm enjoying is seeing how the fruit all looks the same then as they grow their individual characteristics start to show...a celebration of difference!

Sugarloaf pippin is an early apple with a long shape...starting to become just a bit more bulbous at the top...

Esopus spitzenburg is an old variety of a classic round shape...is said to be brilliant red and is looking that way!

Caville blanc d'hiver is an old french apple, particularly good for cider.  It has a knobbly shape which is quickly becoming evident here!

And just for fun...a flash back to last years summer strawberry apple as featured on a gleaning apron :o)

what else can the apron panels do?

There are plenty of remnants from the summer gleaning cloth...I spoke about the apron parts here...and we did some gleaning of the cloth here...
I've been working on what my next gleaning steps might be...
To experiment with the component parts of the cloth - the apron panels and the waistband/tie strips, I'm working in 1/2 scale...it means less cloth used when experimenting, it's quicker, and it's easier to get an overall sense of scale and proportion without constantly stepping back...

And it's so darn cute too!  I started with a 1/2 scale apron made from the unprinted cloth remnants...

An apron panel makes up the front and back of this top, with waistband strip used for the shoulder panel and a little gusset under the arm to create a square armhole.  There are two small cuts into the apron panels to set in the gusset.

It is modeled by "Claudette" (named by 'super'visor PD), the 1/2 scale mannequin I made while teaching a 2nd year studio about scale earlier this year :o)

Then I'm thinking about how the apron interacts with the top...it shapes the top...it is shaped through interaction with the wearers body...is shaped through use by the wearer...the experience of use shapes the wearers being.
This is related to something about Heidegger's thinging which I was thinking about back here!

back to tessellations

My teaching duties are finished for the year...I've had a lovely semester leading a studio about heavy materials...check out this fantastic students work!
It's been time for a serious do-over of my work plan to try to fit everything into the day and to get some balance in my life...I've now timetabled exercise alongside reading, writing, gardening and making.  Hopefully there will be some fruitful and sane times ahead!
A while back I revisited some old tessellation techniques when reflecting on the potential of my newer bits...

I spoke about these remnants a while back...

And utilised the tessellation technique to create something similar to the broadbean apron

I also revisited a tessellated dress which emerged from early tests back in May last year to think about the potential of merging the aesthetics of the pieced leather with the gathered garden images.  With one side leather, one side garden, this apron represents the reflective window space where these worlds merge and converse.  Garment as map.

potentials

Nicola potatoes planted in bright laundry tubs with holes drilled in the bottom...the ones you see Josh on Gardening Australia using all the time :o)  There's about 4 inches of soil in the bottom, and as they grow I'll build the soil up around the stems.  They are in a nice sunny spot next to back door.  I'm using this method as my potatoes in the past have never manged to survive dogs sitting on them and there isn't enough room for dedicated potato growing in the fenced patch.

When my digital printing for summer gleaning was produced, the sheer voile had to be backed...for the first round of printing they didn't have wide enough paper in stock, so it was backed with a cheap poly tricot.  The strike through is amazing and is almost a full strength print.  The second lot of printing was backed with paper, and by the time I realised and asked for the paper, retrieval from the bin was attempted at the printers, but when I unrolled it weeks later it was mostly blank - my paper obviously went to the tip! 

I've been working with the remnants anyhow, and the paper has some potential for construction...perhaps as a transient, impermanent material.

Seeds have been doing quite nicely...here's some lettuce and japanese cucumbers germinating in re purposed remnant toilet rolls
Enjoy the good gardening weather all!

FASHION event finished...my fav moment!

Hiya...thanks to everyone that dropped by for a look at Tabliers pour le Printemps...it was a lot of fun!
If you missed out and you would still like a private viewing, drop me a line at remnantgleaning@gmail.com, and I may be able to accommodate you!

Here's my favourite moment...oh Gemma, will you ever learn!

Tabliers pour le Printemps

EXCLUSIVE premiere...


Tabliers pour le Printemps from tania splawa-neyman on Vimeo.

FASHION event preview: Tabliers pour le Printemps

For most, a celebration of SPRINGtime doesn’t go much beyond seed catalogues, soil preparation, manure, mulch and snail hunting, but for this fanatic from Melbourne obsession goes way beyond the ordinary. “APRONs are just what everyone needs for springtime,” explains remnant gleaner Tania Splawa-Neyman as she prepares for a showcase of DOMESTIC delights to celebrate the upcoming spring of FASHION. Think 60s influenced popovers and an abundance of garden inspired prints to channel an appreciation of all that is homegrown.
WATCH the online fashion show for a limited time from the comfort of your own screen only at www.remnantgleaning.blogspot.com
EXCLUSIVE premiere @ 6.30pm EST, 6th September 2011.

RSVP @ www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=240601929308331

summer gleaning aprons revisit

I've been taking a mental break from showing summer gleaning things while I go slightly mental trying to write about it!  There's lots more to share so I thought I'd put together some extra details of the aprons themselves...

We tried a shop style window display using one of the lovely GPO windows...

The washing line apron worn...

The aprons were pegged onto the lines I hung inside the canopy to create a kind of pop-up shop (seen in the 2nd piccy here)...

gleaned!

sunlight and blossom

Beautiful day today with a real hint of spring in the air.  The damson plum is blossoming and it brings some other sunlight and blossoms to mind...

hand picks a lemon

Kamakura-Shobo Publishing Co. Pattern Drafting, vol. 2, p 154

apron parts...to glean or not to glean?

 





The aim of the summer gleaning workshop was to glean and cut the cloth into to parts and sew these parts into aprons.  The apron pattern was the starting point for the design of the print for the cloth.  This pattern acts literally and metaphorically as the building blocks for the design.

Each apron skirt is a brick, and the waistband/tie panels look like the weather boards of the summer gleaning 'house'.  Reflecting back on this process makes me wonder whether this is really gleaning if this intentional use of the cloth actually partly shaped its design.  It is the leftovers from another use of the cloth, but it was one that I intended and embedded into it, although not at the inception of the project.  The initial idea was to create a canopy of cloth that would evoke to the viewer/occupant an experience of a bygone summer.  The canopy is like a harvesting machine that I knew was going to be imperfect in gathering the entire crop, so knowing that this would be the case, I thought about how the gleaning after the canopy could take place.  This projected action shaped the gleaning cloth.  Notions of harvesting and gleaning get rather slippery here, the cloth in some ways harvests, and in other ways gleans.  I feel that the obvious is a harvest, and the peripheral, less tangible aspects are gleanings.

gleaning...gleaning...gone!

Summer gleaning was taken down last night.  It was a sad moment, but nice to have captured its demise.  It occurred to me that I haven't posted a full pic of the canopy, so that's where i'll start :o)