First I poured boiling water into a cup filled with half a cup of black tea leaves. I brought it to my studio to steep. It’s still steeping. Tomorrow I’ll use it to tea stain the face of Owl Woman.
Then I stitched her eye. Two different browns, orange, metallic gold thread, and black marker for the pupil.
I woke up thinking about her. From 6:15 to 7 am, still half asleep, I pictured how I would stitch her eye and the color thread I’d use. Then the idea of using the same twisted pink yarn I outlined my “Cloud Is A Whisper” tree in, came to me. I imagined how I would sew it down, by hand. I saw her tea-stained face, darker than the tea staining I used on the woman in “Shield of Words“.
After that, in my mind, I tried a few different ways of applying the pieces of applique, that I had removed from the quilt to her dress. By the time I got up, I knew I would be sewing them down, using my free motions machine. I’d create a simplified feather design, leaving the edges untethered to give it a little extra dimension.
But by this afternoon, once I had actually sewed the feathers on, I moved onto the beak and owl eyes/breasts.
There was no question for me what the color of the beak should be. I saw it immediately.
I had a piece of fabric just the right balance of orange/yellow, but then found a piece of one of the collages I’d made earlier. It was the same color except it had some collage layering and I liked the weight and texture of it better than the fabric.
It’s on a piece of canvas with a layer of matt medium over it. I wanted to stitch it down with embroidery thread, but it was so thick I had to poke holes in it.
You can’t see it in this photo, but the blue fabric I used for the eyes/breasts is iridescent. I still have to sew the beads on at the centers, but I’m not completely sure about them yet.
This is what she looked like when I left my studio today. I don’t have any concrete idea how I’ll deal with her arms, legs, and feet yet. But I do know how to make her hair, so I’ll probably work on that next.
