Monday, April 25, 2016

Internationale Arte Textile Biennale Beaujolais

Is time flying faster or have I simply been ridiculously busy? I know that since my last blog post I have been stitching like crazy trying to get new work finished  for Quilts en Beaujolais (Internationale Arte Textile Biennale Beaujolais) and printing fabrics and trying to make some explanatory notes for a french audience about banksias as most people have not encountered banksias. I then thought I had killed my friends' sewing machine, but fortunately it has lived to tell another tale and sew another quilt.

Then I met my middle daughter in Milan for a few days before returning to le Triadou. However by this time a little worm had got into my head. Some years ago I did a week long printmaking course in Florence- they also run a year long program or a 6 month program, and the thought struck me that this might be the ideal course for my daughter to do, as she loved her travel in Italy and loved Florence and makes wonderful drawings. The course is also well respected. So on a whim we are leaving later today for Florence so we can visit the print making studio and explore possibilities, after all it is not possible to just  get there and see when you are in Australia.It meant changing plans a bit but I am a bit excited about visiting Florence again( I was there around this time last year and loved it)

So I wanted to quickly update what I have been making and some of  my encounters! I also ran out of my favourite threads but Aurifil came to rescue and sent me some threads thank goodness! Thank you Alex Veronelli!


The banksia piece above was hand printed and machine stitched and appliqued.


The Babbling banksia mouths beside the previous banksia piece- all hand dyed fabrics and machine stitched

The small hand stitched piece seems a little dwarfed by all the other babbling banksias, but I wanted to show variation on one subject matter.


More olive tree variations- these pieces were touched so many times that Ineke van Unen  my QenB neighbour kindly lent me some of her red hand don't touch signs- but it still did not stop the pawing.
And my hand stitched babbling banksias hanging side by side. Had a terrific four  days at Quilts en Beaujolais, catching up with old friends and making new ones and as always the  cameraderie amongst artist was lovely! Then it was up early on Sunday morning to catch the train to Milan to meet my daughter ( I had thought trains would run earlyish on Sunday morning from Villefranche Sur Saonne to Lyon- but unfortunately no so had to take a very expensive cab ride to get my TGV to Milan on time) We stayed in a hotel  towards  the  peripherique that runs around the old part of Milan and quickly learnt to negotiate the public transport. We were also blessed to be, 20 metres from a wonderful cafe Cinema Teatro Trieste which we treated like home for 3 days. it has great food , live music and wifi and was open early in the morning until late at night- the staff were really welcoming and friendly- we loved it.


Of course we visited the Duomo- with all its lacey decorations and the Duomo museum was well worth a visit. Below is a detail of a tapestry and  a stained glass angel.


We took the train to Stresa for a day to visit Lago Maggiore and Isola Bella- and  caught a water bus for 5 euros each which took  us around all three Borromean Islands and a glorious sunny day. The view below is looking towards Isola Bella.
  And then to my great delight there was a William Kentridge exhibition showing at Galleria La Rumma. Loved the scale and multifaceted aspect of the exhibition. You walked into a darkened space- set up with screens around the space to create a panorama which was animated by  film of a drawn landscape and printed  images as well as actual performing artists enacting the unfolding scenario- with music especially written to accompany the animation-absolutely fabulous! Then on the other two floors of the Gallery there were works used in the film and  several tapestries and printed works and sculptures used for the film. And from a fan I have turned into a devotee!



And to end on an Italian note- there is a small roman bridge near le Triadou- you can still walk across it 2000 years after it was built- my goodness they built things to last!




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