During 2017, a colleague and I have been working on a fabric art book inspired in part by Louise Bourgeois's work. Bourgeois is probably best known for her giant metal spider sculptures, but she also did a series of fabric books. There is a beautifully executed children's picture book called Cloth Lullaby: The Woven Life of Louise Bourgeois by Amy Novesky which discusses Bourgeois's childhood and her mother's influence as a tapestry weaver.
After reading this book, seeing an exhibit of her work, and seeing some handspun red silk I had made, we drew all of this inspiration together for a collaborative project.
Below are photos of pages we've put together this year. We've used an range of techniques, from simple to difficult, pushing to use as all of our combined experience. Some of the pieces are deceptively simple. The final photo, light blue striped fabric with machine stitching, is a great example. It is more than 10 layers of fabric. Each slit in the fabric opens to a different fabric pattern. The machine stitching used handspun, lumpy-bumpy yarn... through a sewing machine.
We've chosen to use a limited color palette of red, blue, and black/grey.
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Cloth Lullaby: The Woven Life of Louise Bourgeois by Amy Novesky
