NTAQ Challenge for August

Petals, 27"w x 12"h, © 2018
The NTAQ masterpiece challenge for August was a bit of a poser.  For me, anyway.  We were given an art style, Art Nouveau, and asked to choose any piece by any artist to use as our inspiration piece.

Art Nouveau.  Not my favorite style of art.  When I think of Art Nouveau I think of the paintings of pale slender mournful women by Dante Gabriel Rossetti or the intricately patterned wallpaper of William Morris or the elaborate stained glass of Louis Comfort Tiffany or the intensely detailed paintings of Gustav Klimt.  I don't dislike them, but I am not drawn to them.

I know, there is more to the style than that.  Much more.  I do like the architecture of Antoni Gaudi, the paintings of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and the furniture of Charles Rennie Mackintosh.

So I decided to look into the work of Charles Rennie Mackintosh.  He was a Scottish architect, artist, and furniture designer.  He also was known for his stained glass designs.

After a bit of research I found a stained glass panel that sparked a few ideas.  I decided to recreate the stained glass rose in fabric, surrounded by golden yellows.  It would give me a great chance to use some of the reds and golds I dyed last week.


The piece I found was a stained glass panel designed by Mackintosh and found in the House of an Art Lover in Bellahouston, Glasgow.
I started with a wedge of red, intending it to be the center of the rose.  But after sewing thin pieces of black on three sides of the wedge, something started to stir in the back of my mind.  I cut a few more red wedges and sewed black around them.  Hmmmm.  I was starting to get interested.  I sewed another round of red and pink, and then another round of black.  At some point I started pinning the little wedgy things on the design wall and playing with placement.

So I ended up with Petals, seen above.  Doesn't scream Art Nouveau.  I guess for me that's a good thing....

I'm linking this post with Nina-Marie's Off the Wall Friday and Confessions of a Fiber Addict.  Go see all the wonderful work there!

Comments

Vera Holmgren said…
Thank you for sharing the story behind.
Norma Schlager said…
I thought I had left a comment before, but I guess it didn't go thru. Anyway, I love the way you have interpreted the art. Your color sense is always perfect and it certainly is in this one.