Grandma Moses Embroidered as well as.....
Lula
read books about their art and lives....Grandma Moses and William
Steig.
Seems all creative types don't care what medium to use as long they can
"draw or paint" with the materials to express their artistic visions.
I always wondered what came first, doing art with pen or pencil for
example or using another material such as yarns in needlework to create
art?
In my case it was doing art first and from reading these two
books....Grandma Moses did needlework painting first and then creating
art with oils and it looks like William Steig did his art first on paper
and then needlework as another medium to express his art.
Some interesting background notes about Grandma Moses, the famous
American folk art painter I discovered recently in reading a book on her
art.
The most fact to us stitchers is, Grandma Moses was an embroiderer
before she started painting and one of the reasons she gave for taking
up painting was she didn't want the moths to eat her worsted wool yarn
pictures!
Anna Mary Robinson, became known as the famous Grandma Moses later on in
life for her primitive or naive style of painting as she was a self
taught artist....before she started painting in oils, she was an
embroiderer, using worsted wools on fabric to "paint" her pictures which
were given as gifts to family and friends.
However, arthritis made it difficult to stitch, so she turned to oil
painting at the suggestion of a sister who at one time had taken art
lessons.
Grandma Moses, stitched and painted because she liked to make something
pretty and also (in her words)...."It kept me busy and out of mischief".
An interesting comment on how of Grandma Moses adapted her embroidery
technique to painting as noted in the book, Grandma Moses in the 21st
Century......."instead of blending pigments in the conventional manner,
Moses placed colors side by side, such as one would strands of different
-hued wool. This pseudo-Impressionistic method accounts for the richness
and subtlety of her landscape effects".
The embroidery stitches I could see in one of Grandma Moses' worsted
wool embroidered pictures featuring a barn, fields, fences, all sorts of
trees, flowers, leaves, grass.......a rural farm scene, used stitches
that looked like.....satin, long and short, loop stitch of some type,
French knots, outline and stem stitches......basic embroidery stitches
with a lot of impact in their use.
Grandma Moses created over 1600 paintings from the time she started
painting in her 70's until she died at 101.
The other artist I came across that did embroidery was William Steig,
the well known cartoonist, famous for his cartoons in the New Yorker as
well as being an illustrator especially of children's books, the most
famous being Sylvester and the Magic Pebble that won the highest award
in children's book illustration, the Caldecott Award.....Steig is also
the creator of that Disney character Shrek.
Steig used an all over type of stitch to fill in the entire fabric with
his figures and other decorative images. Looks like he used a single,
simple stitch.....in one piece it's done in a sort of circular or wavy
manner and another picture, he uses that single stitch in neat side by
side rows.
The funny thing is, the author (Lee Lorenz) who wrote this book, The
World of William Steig, also a noted artist wrote that Steig was
crocheting pastoral tapestries! He obviously didn't have any background
knowledge of needlework nor the editors of the book!
---
Lula
http://www.woolydream.com
Needlework Adventures
Tia Mary-remove nekoluvr to reply
>........ Grandma Moses created over 1600 paintings from the time she started
>painting in her 70's until she died at 101. ...........
I grew up in the Los Angeles area and spent many happy hours at Disneyland
and Knott's Betty Farm. I was fortunate enough, on one of my visits to
Knott's, to get to see Grandma Moses and some of her paintings. She was there
"performing" as it were. She was set up in front of one of the old "houses"
inside the front porch. It was wonderful to watch her paint. It was even more
wonderful that I was about 17 and old enough to be able to appreciate her and
to remember the joy I experienced while watching her paint. Now I wish I had
seen some of her embroidery!! CiaoMeow >^;;^<
.
PAX, Tia Mary >^;;^<
Angels can't show their wings on earth but nothing was ever said about their
WHISKERS!!
Nothing is complete without a few cat hairs!
Linda Wright
find this book to read. It is so nice to see that others do what I do
. . . .
Linda
Lula <wooly...@earthlink.net> wrote in message news:<3E71EE...@earthlink.net>...
Mirjam Bruck-Cohen
may i print that out ? to keep for me ?
By the way if you enjoy reading about Artists backgrounds,
you might enjoy reading "inventing Kindergarten " by Norman
Brosterman, Harry N. Abrams ,1997. It is about Friedrich Froebel and
how his eduactional system influenced people like Le Corbusier, Lloyd
Right , PUl klee and others ,
As to artists who embroidered , "Bloomsbury Needlepoint" By Melinda
Coss, Bullfinch press, Litle Brown & comp.1992.
mirjam
Dannielle Beitzell
things I can learn from rctn!
--
Dannielle
"Lula" <wooly...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:3E71EE...@earthlink.net...
Lula
In case you may want to find the book I read about Grandma Moses....it's
available from amazon.com.
Title: Grandma Moses in the 21st Century
Author: Jane Kallir, (with contributions by others)
Publisher: Art Services International, Alexandria, VA 2001 in
association with Yale University
The following is copied from the amazon site who quotes:
From Library Journal:
Grandma Moses, a self-taught artist from upstate New York who first came
to public attention at the age of 80, created 1600 works before her
death at the age of 101. Recognized as the foremost authority on Moses,
Kallir (Grandma Moses: 25 Masterworks) joined forces with other
contributors to produce this catalog for an exhibition that opened in
March at the National Museum of Women in the Arts (Washington, DC) and
will travel nationwide through 2002. For the exhibit, Kallir selected 87
works from both public and private collections. What results is not
merely a coffee-table book full of folksy paintings. Scholarly essays
detail the relationship between the regional landscape and the artist's
interpretation of the area, describe how memory and imagination merge in
the paintings, place Moses's art within the artistic and social
movements of the Forties and Fifties, and discuss the role of gender in
shaping the artist's reputation in the postwar years. This is the most
extensive book on Moses currently available, though several biographies
have been published for children. Recommended for fine and folk art
collections in large public and academic libraries. Judith Yankielun
Lind, Roseland Free P.L., NJ
Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
Lula
Thanks for the book recommendations! Among the many topics I like to
read are biographies......interesting to read as well as learning from
other's lives and experiences.
--
Lula
http://www.woolydream.com
Needlework Adventures
Lula
That's so interesting to read.....that you actually saw Grandma Moses
painting!
---
Lula
http://www.woolydream.com
Needlework Adventures
PaulaB
> The funny thing is, the author (Lee Lorenz) who wrote this book, The
> World of William Steig, also a noted artist wrote that Steig was
> crocheting pastoral tapestries! He obviously didn't have any background
> knowledge of needlework nor the editors of the book!
> ---
> Lula
> http://www.woolydream.com
> Needlework Adventures
Thanks for sharing again! I read a book about Grandma Moses a year or
so ago when the first and second graders in the classroom I was the
teacher aide in wanted to know more about her. She had a fascinating
life! I couldn't believe the sheer numbers of paintings she cranked
out...beginning at an age when most people think about slowing down.
You know, this sounds odd...crocheting tapestries. But years ago I
saw a book about knitting guilds and the things that were required for
membership in, say, the 13-1400's. Those men were required to knit
huge rugs with very detailed scenes (some of them reminded me of
Boston tent stitch pictures) or writing like illuminated manuscript on
them with dozens of colors. They were so complicated it just boggled
the mind! And they had a prescribed amount of time to complete one
for guild requirements and it wasn't very long - just a few months,
IIRC. I know this book came from our local university library so it
isn't readily accessible to me (have to talk the student at our house,
my 19 yo son, into going over there with me and then waiting while I
find what I want!) so I can't tell you the name or author, but it was
really fascinating. And I'm not even a knitter! But I have crocheted
in the past (haven't for a while.) So while I agree with you that this
sounds unlikely, it's not entirely impossible. Just a thought! I
would like to know what they *really* meant!
:-))) Paula B.
Lula
I've looked through either the same or similar book about the Medieval
knitting Guild that explained some of the requirements an aspiring
candidate had to accomplish in order to reach the highest level of this
craft.
In the book were a few samples of the huge knitted pieces you mention
and they are indeed detailed, looking very "tapestry" like.
Medieval knitting and sewing tools.....most likely cruder than the
lighter metal, quality controlled, precision made sewing and knitting
tools we use now.......then the lighting conditions......a limited
quantity dependent on seasons and weather.
Overall, it's a wonder how any of the fine masterpieces of art was
created in the past when we realize the conditions artists and craftsmen
had to work under.
Despite being an avid knitter for many years, don't have the skills to
ever attempt to knit anything as fine as those Medievalpieces! Not even
close!!
Know thinking about this, unlike the beautiful antique needlework
sampler reproductions done now, I've not heard of any modern day knitter
attempting to re-create any of these Medieval knitted pieces.....now
wondering if any knitter has ever done so?!
Thanks for the info Paula.
---
Lula
http://www.woolydream.com
Needlework Adventures
Lula wrote:
>
> The funny thing is, the author (Lee Lorenz) who wrote this book, The
> World of William Steig, also a noted artist wrote that Steig was
> crocheting pastoral tapestries! He obviously didn't have any background
> knowledge of needlework nor the editors of the book!
> ---
Kaye in Boone, NC
where I can buy pillow covers on which I want to start doing some
Christmas stitching. Any suggestions/recommendations, please?
Thanks!
Kaye in Boone, NC
Mirjam Bruck-Cohen
called
Grandma Moses , An American Original , By William C. Ketchum, jr.
Todtri , 1999.
book includes 3 embroidered works !!!
mirjam
PaulaB
Did you buy it??!!! Paula B.
Mirjam Bruck-Cohen
Guesss ???
*
*
*
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YES
mirjam