Thursday, September 12, 2013

Unlocking the Muse for an Open Challenge

You may have been wondering what I’ve been up to since the last post.  On the other hand maybe not.  Nevertheless, today is reveal day over at the Tangled Textiles blog for the challenge theme OPEN.  That’s what I have been busy doing; working feverishly on my piece.  I was initially drawing a blank on where to go with this one. Various suggestions, such as OPEN mail, parcels, presents, OPEN doors, policy, and eyes wide OPEN; were not ringing any chimes for me, so to speak.

Okay out I went for a drive to the park, passed several homes, and an industrial park.  Sat on a bench for a while and came home passing that same industrial park.  This time however, I noticed a gate with a lock and thought to myself, "you'll need the right key to open that one."  Bing.  An idea was beginning to germinate.  I had painted some fabric that resembled an industrial park and posted about it.  Remember?  It looked like this.
 
If I cut it in half and use the lower half, it might work to represent a chain link fence.  Keys?  Will they work?  How will I portray them?  I remembered a stenciling technique I had seen done with Shiva paintsticks.  I also remembered a pointillist technique I had learned.  I found an image of an old key and went to work.  I also gathered up old keys around the house, traced them onto freezer paper, cut out the shape and pressed the resulting stencil to the fabric.  This just might work.
 

I went on a hunt through antique stores, thrift shops and found an old skeleton key and decided that I would do a rubbing.  I didn’t like the result, so I set the key aside. The piece needed some hand stitching along with the machine quilting to add what I thought would give it some depth. 

 
It still needed something else, but what?  I added just what an old key would need; keyholes.  Next, I added the keys.  Everyone needs THE RIGHT KEY to open something, don’t they?  There you have it.  I hope you enjoy my resulting challenge piece. 


Hop over to the Tangled Textiles blog to see what the others have produced.