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Friday, January 31, 2014

Sur le cou-de-pied

I started by analyzing Balance, and several ideas sprang to life, but one settled. When I was younger, classical ballet was a great part of my life. And the most important part of ballet is balance. In every movement you have to find the balance of your body.
Next, I had to find how to express this, my first thought was to use an image of my old battered shoes hanging on the wall. But they did not express much balance. But this position, "Sur le cou-de-pied", pins the body to the ground when it is in balance.
I decided to go for stenciling this time, and made two stencils out of freezer-paper, one of the feet and one of the shoes. I used acrylic paint with textile medium. Then I added shadow with Paint-sticks, quilted the shoes and filled the background with ballet-terms. I finished it all with some hand-stitching to suggest the floor.


 And some close ups:



10 comments:

  1. Beautiful work, Greta! The free motion quilting in the background is intriguing - is it writing?

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  2. A very elegant design. The plainness of the feet and shoes is very well balanced by the complexity of the background. I really like the subtle way that you indicated the floor.

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  3. So simple, so elegant a statement of this theme. Lovely!

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  4. You have captured the ethereal quality of the dancer's balance, with the wonderful texture and stitching in the background.

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  5. How totally cool that classical ballet is in your past. Yes, being on pointe requires exceptional balance (mental and physical)! My youngest daughter loves being on pointe and I'm going to share your lovely quilt with her. Great idea to stitch different ballet terms in the background to lend complexity to your composition.

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  6. What an impressive image. So simple yet captures everything it should. Love the colours, too.

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  7. hi Greta, this image is beautifully presented. I really enjoy the contrast n colour as well as the subtle hand work that you have included.

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  8. This is beautiful, after sitting through many hours as a ballet mom, seeing something so beautiful captures that end point where practise meets performance in perfection

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  9. You really have succeeded to interpret "Balance" in a very successful way. I think this is the essence of balance. Lovely choice of colors and exquisite hand quilting.

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