Labels of a decorative sensibility

The original tags for the jeans that are now, sadly deceased (a moment of silence), 

but preserved in photos in this old blog post here. 

Love the simple graphic stripes with these 

wonderful decorative floral like shapes.

Blue skies, rain and denim

Then orange, then pink, so denim splurge.

John Lewis Edition (unknown)

Marie Claire. January 2011, pp. unknown

Embroidery on denim too is something that really fascinates me at the moment, 

some of my own embroidery below:

Testing out watercolour brush in MS Paint - nice texture, really irritating point/beginning of it though. If it was a gimp moving brush maybe that would be better? Blues abundance. 

John Lewis Edition Spring 2014/2013, pp. unknown

References:

John Lewis Edition. Spring 2013/2014, pp. unknown

Marie Claire. Spring/Summer 2013, pp. unknown

Blue masks, dots and diamonds

A fabric piece that I am working with at the minute, patching it with white pieces of similarly stretchy fabric to create larger pieces, originally an old trouser kindly donated.

 

The pattern looks quite aggressive up close. Like masks all bunched together to scare off irritating people? Brilliant range of blues on the fabric that are hard to capture using a scanner or camera. Quite pretty with the lilac bit of paint I dropped on the corner. 

Yee Sook Yung, Blue Ceramics and Gold

2010
Ceramic trash, epoxy, 24k gold leaf

 

Upon seeing this advert in an old copy of Art Review, I did a little digging on the artist.

Website: http://www.yeesookyung.com/

Using what is thrown aside and normally thrown away by a ceramics master. An artisan who reproduces old Korean ceramics (Joseon Baekja or Celadon), the pieces deemed by the master as not up to a high enough standard are cast out.

After baking in a kiln by using the old method, these Korean ceramic masters break almost 70 percent of the porcelains, they don't reach up to their masterpiece standards. Then she takes over, putting 'the broken bits and pieces of ceramic trash together one by one as if I'm putting together a jigsaw puzzle. And I cover the seams with 24 karat gold leaf. The result was uncanny and bumpy objects. Each broken piece operates as a self forming into an infinite proliferation toward as unexpected fabrication-fictitious loquacity and stuttering discards from standard conventional masterpieces.' (Yung, 2014.)

Yung works with these pieces like she is forming a 3D collage, with cracks and raw or rough edges imitating the torn edges found on paper and card, and representing similarities with the sculptural forms of Henry Moor works, in terms of curved and bulbous shapes that look like their glooping in places and splitting by process of mitosis, a fantastic mess of what has been chucked. Busts and bodies and displayed limbs and creeping trunks that weave and wind and grow into obtuse shapes. These works give us a glimpse of a mastery that we may never really see again. Each piece is unique, and special in its present particular state, unlike the historical whole counterparts that are copied from - these have rebelled against their identities, their beautiful shapes becoming grotesque but then so brilliantly given lines of gold. Precious again.

 

 

References:

Art Review. (2011) 'Yee Sook Yung 14.01.11 - 17.02.11', [Advertisement] issue. 47, January - February 2011, p.13.

Saatchi (2014) Yee Sook Yung. Available at: http://www.saatchigallery.com/artists/yeesookyung.htm?section_name=body_language (accessed on: 3rd March 2014).

Y.S.Yung (2014) Translated Vase. Available at: http://www.yeesookyung.com/01_translatedvase2006-2011.html (accessed on: 29th March 2014).

 

Colour Archive: Bisazza Mosaico

An A4 advertisement from a forgotten magazine, advertising Bisazza Mosaico,
the luxury tile and glass mosaic designers for interior and exterior decoration.
Nice to know such Artisans still exist.

Their website: http://www.bisazza.com/
(They have music playing in the background.)

Zoomed in, the use of tinted but clear glass works well with 

the sand colours and pretty motifs.

Odd Colours and Leaves

Royal blue and olive green leaves, with these lines that form flower heads and leaves. An interesting colour palette, at first I thought it was awkward and not very nice to look at, but actually after spending time working with the fabric itself the pattern grew on me.  

 

The blue so striking and seems to almost move and glow, whilst the odd touches of a mid green add a little stability.

Postcards: the last of an old species of written word

Source: Post cards/promotional material from mid 2000s for
My So-Called Life (The Tragically Normal Diary of Rachel Riley)
By Joanna Nadin

Not actually read this book and probably never will at the rate its taking me to read my way through some books, but the covers of the postcards I found are bold and amusing, with soft mellow colours and swirls. I am going through a bit of a swirl doodling obsession at the moment, so though this doesn't help with that, at least it fuels it (in felt tip like colours).

White Hibiscus and the Blue

Originally fabric I have used in some past pieces of artwork. I scanned in some of the largest parts of it before actually working with the material, simply because the pattern is gorgeous.
I've just started noticing the way the leaves swirl in on themselves. 

The slight pink at the top middle is where I spilt some dylon dye. 

This is just one of them, the quality is quite poor to save up on room. I always worry about running out, and having to go through all the scans and photos on my Google Picasa account.
Resort to Photobucket maybe?

Clothing Labels: Maximalism and Floral

 

Falmer Heritage
Label @ Matalan

 



Lovely floral motifs which I find are rare on clothing label tags. Really pretty in red with the dark green swirls, all finished off with the grunge effect, giving the label an aged appearance.

Matalan's quality and price are an amazing combination, more often or not their clothing items are made from better cloth (and better stitched), with prices that are almost akin to Primark.

 

 

Denim Co.

Label @ Primark

 

Details on this one are simple, Greece like in motif and the colour is modern and indeed the very image of Primark with its ever colourful items of clothing, items that can be used as layers, leggings, bags and hats and so forth. A thin grey ribbon adds a neat finishing touch on top of the thin semi sheer fabric.

Primark's key to success is maximum sales at lower prices and importantly reacting to the fashion world and its trends of the moment.

Colour Archive: Stylist (unknown issue no, 2012/13)

Magazine online @ http://www.stylist.co.uk/

 

 The pages below, scanned in from the magazine, would make a particularly beautiful desktop or mobile wallpaper (maybe even literal wallpaper for interior design?).

Why not include the text too?

See, this is why I use magazines to collage from, their sources of colour is immeasurable.

Due to the cost of inkjet printing and colour laser printing (which is mind numbingly high), printing sheets and sheets of coloured stuff just seems like madness. In the end using pages from found or bought magazines makes more sense and to sweeten the deal different magazines use different kinds of papers. For example, Stylist uses this soft paper that is like newsprint but much better quality for printing on and unlike its glossy sisters, you can in fact draw, annotate and doodle on the pages.

 

Beautiful Technicolor.

Yes ladies and gents, that is colour spelt the British way :) 

 

 

 

Archived Snip: Independant Radar, grunge and sequins

Scans from an old Independent Radar magazine from a Saturday Independent

- dunno the date but I can say with a bit of certainty that is it from this year.  

The above costume is really fascinating just because of the abundance of blue glittering sequins.

They catch the light really well, making the costume look more and more intricate and

expensive or couture like.

Then there is the mask made from a kind of net that is also lined with sequins.

The face made highlights the unconventional use of sequins over the facial features.     

 In the above and below images, the singer is dressed in different textures, including feathered,

which beside the grungy and splattered background makes everything look raw and edgy.   

Chintz roses; odd colours of pink, red and purple-blue

The chintz pattern has a lot of history and many books written about it.

But here are some chintz patterns that are have been brought to the present,

to the contemporary pattern structures and use of colours.

        

The colour palette is very expressive and bright and warm,

despite fabric having faded through multiple washes,

the colours still strike me as being original.

Especially that strange purple-blue.

These tiny rose buds are beautifully printed onto the fabric,

which is a kind of synthetic blend of materials -

and seems like it would be difficult to print upon.

Archived Snip: Blue flowers and Golden Light

Some found clippings from magazine advertisements:
(Can't remember which one).

This beautiful very simply coloured pale blue on white

presents two different flowers in a repeating pattern

surrounded by stems and leaves. Its hard to tell where the

repeat begins and ends in the original snippet. 

The edge of the cutting presents a nice

picture of real (or maybe fabric/fake?)

flower with the carefully printed floral image

that is either a wallpaper or a vinyl sticker.

In a beautiful kind of rhubarb red/pink.

This damask like pattern is very regal looking - suiting the wedding based advertisement naturally. The rich golds and the lighting of the image seem to show a richness of the pattern that perhaps wouldn't be seen without such effects. the pattern is very Victorianesque.

Testing Sumptuous Plum and Teal Tension

Photos form some recent experiments on paper and an old cotton bed sheet,

using emulsion colours from the Dulux range:

The rich teal that becomes more blue than green here

thanks to being watered down and mixed slightly with white.

Bits of Dylon dye powder dropped it begin to absorb the wetness around them.
A 2B pencil drawn set of random lines.

The shiny silver effect upon emulsion is actually quite pretty.

 A bold pink that I have really began to love.

It is a very strong and bold pink - like a hot pink? 

The effect of these strokes is done by putting some white paint down first,

a thick blob that is then brushes out into a line or shape, and then

a bit of a colour on the same brush that is then brushed out on top of the white.

Not too much of the colour otherwise the effect isn't as strong.

Painting on cloth is something that really interests me at the moment -

the way the paint seems to react alongside a material that

rarely carries something so heavy as emulsion or wet ink.

Again white paint is laid out and then some random

splodges of blue are added with a smaller brush.

Unpicking knits, pilling and colour

I had hoped to re-use this knit but as of yet nothing has been done.
Originally a scarf, I am guessing it was discarded because

it was bubbling up (another term is 'pilling'),

but the colours are still really beautiful and

the wool itself is soft with a nice

golden metallic thread running through it.  

Light colours and organic forms

 

 

 

 

 

I took these scraps from various interior catalogues.

Where there is a bit of pattern, it is broken up by layers of light colours.

The organic forms of brambles and holly

play with these muted hues of blues and greens beautifully.

 

I couldn't help but include a random bit of pink.
Like a ribbon.

Billboard - a collaged surface

The billboard has become a collage of papers, I just remembered these photos I took when today I saw the billboard that looked so amazing as it was below, now has another advert upon it, covering the lovely torn and worn and wet surface.
Lots of torn papers - segments and odd bits of imagery and words.

Vintage Clip-Ons (Accessories)

Vintage earrings and clip ons found at the Vintage fair in Newcastle:

A very delayed post but it is here.
Back at the vintage Fair in May I noticed how commonplace vintage clip ons were, clearly a type of thing that was popular at this time as in shops now there tends to just be earrings or studs that fit an ear piercing.

I know incredibly little about vintage wares, but these really interested me:

Above a great selection of all kinds of clip ons, most of which seemed shape derrived from this flower like shape with between 5-8 points, some in shapes of hexagons, heptagons and octagons - creating beautiful shiny bloomage.
A few close ups of my favourites:.

This pair form a star like shape, tapered of with points creating the octagon shape. The choice of blues is particularly interesting, one being pale and the other light - maybe they were meant to appear to be stars?

The brooch is particularly interesting with its glaze over the center that creates a boiled sweet like appearance and that beautiful border.

Below the slightly off white lines remind me of icing and the shapes themselves seem to imitate netting or lace of some kind. These would be my favourite simply with this reference to fabric.  

The abundance in usage of beads in the photos is pretty sweet, it has been rare for me to see such beautiful arrays of earrings with such a high standard of design and look using beads to construct and define.