A New Textile: "Blue Ribbon"

Blue Ribbon, hand dyed wool on linen, 8 x 25 in.

Blue Ribbon is the fourth and last in a series of "ribbon" pieces, illusionistic renderings in hooked wool of curved strips of cloth. You can see blog posts about previous pieces here and here. They are quite complex to make, since I have to dye the wool in a range of values by dipping it into a pot, then arrange it clearly from light to dark. It's a lot easier with paint, that's for sure, but with a textile there's almost a sculptural presence, like a low relief, even with its relative crudeness.

The piece is completely flat, even though at times even I see it as three dimensional. This is especially true in this area where the overlapping form seems to truly come in front of the form behind. A combination of value and of the direction of the hooking––the horizontal outline emphasizes this––enhances the illusion. It's fun.

Here are two other ribbon pieces, along with another textile and a painting. The textile, Four Cylinders,  also has volumetric form, but it's interesting to see how a work escaping from a rectangle adds so much to its sense of real form.