Eynhallow, disappearing island

 

"Eynhallow, disappearing island"

Size: 170 x 76cm (67" x 30")

Materials: cotton, linen, rayon and wool. Woven at 8 warps per inch on cotton warp. 

 

 

Handwoven tapestry based on an acrylic painting in my sketchbook (size 20.5 x 9.5cm) of the view looking across to the uninhabited island of Eynhallow from Aikerness beach in Evie, Orkney. 

Eynhallow, also known as Holy Island, is known within local folklore as a disappearing island due to the surrounding turbulent tides. It was also the summer home of the mythical "Finfolk": fearsome, amphibious, human-formed creatures with webbed fingers and toes and scaley skin. They were known to be great swimmers and equally at home on land or under the sea.

A selection of detail photographs below:

cutting down

I finished my tapestry and cut it off the loom last week. It was an exciting day.

I don't think I was prepared for just how tired I'd feel after finishing, I felt like I'd completed a marathon! Granted it is my biggest piece to date and I put in a huge effort over the last month as I was determined to be finished by the end of July. Post-completion mental and physical fatigue was therefore inevitable. I'll be back with "finished" photos and more coherent sentences soon.

Trimming all the long end on the back. There were a lot of colour blends, therefore a lot of ends!

Ta-da!

blending

I'm on the home straight, just lots of subtle colour blending until I reach the top.

I say "just", but obviously creating a seamless, subtle blend has its own difficulties, but at least I'm not weaving lots of interconnecting shapes whilst blending, like the lower half of the tapestry.

This tapestry is proving to be a classic example of why it's difficult to answer the often asked question, "how long does it take to weave a tapestry?" I managed to weave 1ft last week (1ft x 30" wide) whereas a similar sized area in the lower half of this tapestry took around a month to complete. It really does depend on the complexity of the composition/drawing and how you're choosing to weave it.

I'll be finished next week. Watch this space!

 Photograph taken this time last week. I am now less than 3 inches away from the top.

over the horizon

Wayhey, I'm finally in the sky section of my tapestry! After reaching the half way point last month, the horizon, I had a big tidy up in my studio and put away colours and bobbins that were no longer needed. I think I felt smug for half a day before remembering that the second half is almost like starting a new tapestry as it requires a completely new set of colours. I also made things more difficult for myself as I no longer wanted to weave the sky section the way I had drawn it on my big sketch/cartoon (which is tied behind the loom) as it would look too different and disconnected from the sea section, so I'm now working between the original painting, reference photographs and the cartoon. 

I had a couple of days of head scratching and finding new colour blends but now that I've got the new section established I'm fully on the move again. It has grown a fair bit in the last couple of weeks. It won't be long before I need to stand on a scaffolding platform!

deluded

"It'll get easier when I reach the bright turquoise-blue near the horizon" she told herself, naively.

Ha ha ha.

approaching half way

Two whole months since my last update, time is flying this year. It appears the further into the tapestry I go the less I remember to photograph any progress. The section I've been working on over the last couple of months has been very complicated: lots of fiddly shapes and subtle colour blends and tonal shifts. However the tapestry is really starting to push on now. I'm excited to approach the bright blue horizon...

easing into the flow

I thought it was about time I updated the blog since a month has passed since my last post. Progress on my latest tapestry has been fairly steady as I've been working on it most days.

The lower half of the composition is the most complicated in terms of weaving so at least I know it should get easier the more it grows. I'm 1ft up now so starting to get a good feel for the piece and all the colours. Onwards and upwards.