2003... the basics
The year 2003 will be made of many Mic & Mac
The first years I let myself be carried away by intuition and personal desires to express a culture. I was coming out of ten years of total immersion in a theme called The Matter of Brittany which includes everything that was born in these territories of Great Britain and Little Britain with a background of Celtic mythology from the Middle Ages to us.
The need to share is immense.
At that time, embroidery was as much a pretext, a way to share this culture as a passion for cross-stitching.
I think that’s also what contributed to the success of Nimuë, namely that I wasn’t surfing on a fashion linked to the Harry Potter tidal wave but that it was a deep culture. That said, I would like to thank JK Rowling for having made my task easier by opening minds to this fantasy theme.
I wasn't riding a fad
Back to embroidery…
A – The year 2003 is going to be made up of a lot of Mics & Macs.
How many ?
EIGHT Mic & Mac! You don’t even remember some because they haven’t been shown for a long time.
1-After the first 4 , presented in the previous article , come Mic & Mac 3. Our friends are now available horizontally… just add the reversed Mac 1 and here we are with a trio. As I told you in the previous article, this idea comes from you!!!!
2-Arrives a third Acupuncture which brings together in an embroidery our two friends in a very different posture since they are needles stuck in Mac’s buttocks and Mic tries to plant or remove ????
3- Two other Mic & Mac not connected by wires will appear at the end of the year on the theme of writing, Mic & Mac 4. But it is always those connected by the rope that are acclaimed.
It is always the Mic & Mac connected by the cord that are acclaimed.
A request comes:
A haberdashery, very active with my collection, and therefore who knows it well, said to me: You should make blue Mic & Mac.
4-I frown at first because I always start like this and then my creativity takes over and I come up with ideas with blue Mic & Mac.
It will be Mic & Mac at the Beach! Mics & Macs in swimwear!
The idea finally seems nice even if it becomes purely food we agree.
Failure, failure, failure… almost no one wants it.
This will be a lesson for me.
I must always rely on my deep intuition and not try to respond to outside influences that take me down a path that does not affect me. It seems innocuous said like that but it is absolutely crucial. In an artistic profession, our job is to create emotion, to touch something universal in everyone, or to let oneself be influenced is to get out of your inner space and break the rhythm of what is right.
You will tell me that there are plenty of artists who create to order and even before the 20th century there was only that, or almost. It’s true. And I admire them for that. But the buyer’s membership is already acquired and is only for one person. My personal path will prove to me that if I’m not exactly where it’s right for me, it doesn’t work. Almost every time I let myself be influenced: I lost the battle.
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The style takes hold
B -During this year 2003 I wanted to propose embroidery charts for different skill levels. After La Clef and Ritournel it seemed urgent to offer simpler things because a little music was starting to come up saying: Nimue is too complicated .
Today that seems rather exaggerated to us, but 20 years ago the majority of embroiderers chose monochrome subjects (red!) or geometric subjects (samplers!), that was the hit! There wasn’t really room for things off the beaten path yet.
5-Thus, at the beginning of 2003, I proposed two subjects created on aïda linen fabrics, with simple graphics , playing on a fairly limited range of colors since they are browns/beiges and greens: Mélisange and Luthiel.run
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C – There are three subjects that will count a lot not only for the aura of Nimuë but also for the installation of a certain range of colors that I will use on many occasions.
6-Return to Breton culture with a subject that will mark the history of Nimuë: Mamm Gozh.
This funny Breton Grandma scares away ghosts by pointing a needle at them, causing them to immediately disappear in smoke. Coming from the Halloween Book published in 1997 by Au Bord des Continents, Erlé Ferronnière offers us a grandmother (Mamm Gozh) typical of our country, with her black velvet costume and her hood (headdress), who playfully overcomes undesirables. Not even afraid !
She comforts us with her good rosy cheeks and passes off this ghost story as a little daily annoyance. With a Grandma like that, nothing can happen to us! And since we all have needles… on ghosts…
We are not yet in the Halloween theme but we feel the aroma.
7-Uilleann Pipe and Clover Violinist. Hello Ireland and its Leprechauns.
As simple as Mamm Gozh was, these two subjects require a bit of dexterity. It’s time for 3/4 points! Yes for the fingers, playing on musical instruments requires precision. The cross stitch is « coarse » it is necessary to crop some crosses to adapt to the subjects. These are embroideries of which I am very proud because they are very beautiful creations, very successful, whereas it had only been a few months since I started. It was a great promise for the future and personal happiness.
With these three subjects Mamm Gozh, Uilleann Pipe and Violinist, I made up my main palette. The beiges and pinks for the skin and those gorgeous greens that I was beginning to tame.
I remember a crucial discovery during the creation of The Violinist. I had to add an « aberrant » green, that is to say not at all in the shades, so that a little light and volume settled in the right way. This will lead me in other subjects not to hesitate to go out of logic to bring the touch that whips and creates magic.
Other subjects were born in this period, but we are only halfway through the year, perhaps the most prolific, but at that time I still had… time .
See you for more: History of Creations Episode 3…
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