Healing threads

Oh, look what I found today when I was clearing out some of my work from past years. I had found this design in a magazine, Marie Claire Idées, probably from 2000. I can find the exact month since I have kept most of these magazines in my library. It was the year that I wasn't so well, healthwise and had to close the studio on Maguire in Sillery, Quebec, for a month to undergo some surgery.

Fully aware that I was not going to be able to do a lot of work, I was happy that I had this fun project at my fingertips. The colours suggested in the magazine was in a variegated blue cotton thread, but to be different, I chose one of the variegated pink colours that DMC offers. I worked it on natural coloured linen. One thread, automatic changing tones, different techniques. I could sit quietly and just enjoy the adventure in the stitches and the different textures created in the process without worrying about changing the thread for a change in colour.

I finished the project but I returned to the studio and the business of teaching and taking care of my clients' needs took over. This project just was washed and ironed and left in my storage box waiting to find its final destination. I wasn't sure if I would make it into a cushion or frame it. Here we are, more than 10 years later, rummaging around in my studio here in the forest and I rediscover the project in its box. I chose to frame it simply in a stainless steel frame with a white matting board, just to give it a support so that I can hang and enjoy it.

It is reminiscent of 'art naïf'. A playful design and just the mere activity of focusing on it during my convalescence made me feel better. Embroidery has that therapeutic effect and it certainly worked for me then and continues now as I can see it as I work on other things.