Lasers and cycles - story of a commission

19 September 2018

It all began in January.

A lovely lady sent me an email asking if I ever did commissions. She explained that her partner, who had bought several of my pieces at last year's Hampshire Open Studios, really liked my work and had a 'big' birthday approaching and that she would like to commission a new work from me. Would I do a special piece for him?

Now this was a first for me, and in truth I did hesitate - but it was only for a moment. Yes, I said, of course. I would be delighted.

So she sent me the brief.

His favourite colours were yellow and blue
He loves sailing his laser dinghy
He loves riding his bike - the Colnago C60

Could I work with that?

Yes, I said, I could - and then the muse left me!

I don't know if it was the pressure or the colours and subject matter ( well out of my comfort zone) but I found it a real struggle to envisage this piece.

But then, on holiday in Denmark, I saw a laser dinghy in the sea just near 'that Bridge', and it all began to come together.

So first of all I played with a simple print block made from foam sheet.

I liked the results - but .....

Meanwhile I auditioned background papers.

Coloured tissue above, stock yellow paper below.

I also went to the Laser dinghy website to look at the specification of the boat. I love the shape of the sail.

I also think the hull is very elegant, and of course you cannot see this below the waterline.

More printing experiments, this time on tissue, but now I wasn't so sure about this print block or quite where it was going.

Meanwhile, I had made a decision on the tissue paper and began to add more detail to the background. Remember the bicycle was also in the specification, so I used circles referencing the bike wheels to add texture to the background paper.

At this point a new idea struck. I would use the shape of the silhouette of the laser. So I cut out a few shapes. Some were from painted papers and some from an A-Z of Gosport, the home of the customer.

Now, I really liked where this was going. But it still needed more depth.

I rummaged through the painted papers stash.

These looked promising.

Placing and experimenting.

I'd got the laser all worked out, but how could I fit that bike in?

Meanwhile, more experimentation and beginning to incorporate a few place names. ('The Solent' for example).

Confident enough to stick them down.

And a brainwave with the bike! Tiny ribbons of coloured tissue. You have to look really hard, it doesn't detract from the design but I think it really works, tucked in there.

Ready for stitch!

Stitched! (below).

It is fully stitched but I used a variegated thread, blue running to yellow. I stitched around the boat profiles but I did stitch over the three background blocks to tie them in.

At this point I left well alone for a couple of days, just to let everything settle down.

And then added some additional blue hand colouring .

It still needed a little extra so back to the stash.

Free motion stitched ribbon using organza and dissolvable film. I'm introducing another colour here, a little bit of pink, so again this was not a rushed decision but one that needed to be carefully considered.