So today my Uncle, Aunt and Grandmother arrived for my great Uncle's funeral on Friday. My Uncle Robert, is always supportive of my and his own daughter's forray into the Arts. In fact it was because of him that I first fell in love with design. I had gone to New York one summer to spend time with his daughter Shinay who signed up for a summer program at the
Fashion Institute of Technology in Manhattan and since I would be bored at home, Uncle signed me up too. Of course it was such late notice that I didn't get into my first choice, Fashion (because I've always wanted to learn to sew) and was stuck with whatever classes the hundreds of other students hadn't signed up for. One of the few options left was Textile Design and I thought "Boy, this is gonna be BORING!". I was surprised that I not only had fun, but I also produced textiles that actually caught the eye of my teacher who gave me his card and seriously asked me to join the school when I graduated from High School. I had never thought of Art as anything but a hobby and certainly not something to complete in school as throughout my Secondary School career I did Sciences. But life never goes as you expect.
Here are some of the textiles I designed there:
Black and White Irises in Goache on Paper
Fruits in Marker on Paper
Fruits and Blocks in Marker on Paper
Not only have I become a Visual Arts student in University, but I also took Surface and Textile Design classes the whole of my second year. I'm fascinated by the idea of textile design with a Caribbean flavour. So naturally while standing outside my house this evening the natural answer to my Uncle's question of my post-graduation plans led to a conversation that I was very interested in textile design. This led to him telling me about his friend,
Clara Applewhite Mitchell, a Trinidadian Printmaker/Textile artist living in New Jersey.
I immediately went in search of her designs and came across her
website which featured the exact kind of flair I wish to produce in my work,
beautiful Caribbean inspired design in the textile arts inspired by our flora and fauna. Personally, I would have loved to have seen some even more vivid colouring, but her art is inspiring nonetheless and I also know it's a challenge to produce vivid colours when silk painting. It's always great to find not only Design that you desire to emulate, but also great design that's close to home.
Some of my favourites of hers from both her products and gallery are:
"Spring Hibiscus" "Fern Shadows"- Charmeuse "Anthurium Patch"- Smokey Chocolate
"Paisley Watermark" "Floral Paisley Scroll" "Mother's Rose"
I wish I could have embedded the pics here but they refused to link images from her site so please click the link above to view her work. So instead here's some Surface Design end of semester project photos from my class in which we did Screen Printing, Silk Painting/Line Resist and Batik a.k.a ALOT of cloth!!!
