babymakers - moving on

the cage structure is almost complete - it has been my go-to piece of work for a few weeks now and i am almost reluctant to call it finished - i thought it would take me longer to reach this stage

selecting the materials for the fills took a while as i had quite a lot to choose from - restricting myself to lightweight fabric, of the sort which might have been worn by women in the subtropical climate of Mauritius helped - i also wanted the fills to be perforated or translucent to echo the lightness of the structure - a few other fills used needle-lace and mesh-like materials

at one stage i considered using some monochrome prints of relevant Mauritian inages, but after printing som on cotton organza they seemed clunky - but i stitched outline of a traditional Mauritian home from a drawing by a local artist*

adding the textile fills was the most demanding part so far, as the shape meant some of the stitching was fiddly - finding ways to finish without leaving threads dangling or overly visible was the most challenging part 

interestingly, i noticed that the shape of the cage altered a little as i added fills, it was being drawn in at the middle, like a loosely laced corset or stays - it seems appropriate and it is too tricky to correct so i continued to work with it that way

i had decided fairly early that i did not want to coat the fills with wax (as learned during my course with Priscilla Edwards) - i did not need the added rigidity this offers, and i did want the texture or colour altered by a wax coating  

when  i tried adding some wire ornamentation to bridge the gaps i realised that i had enough fills - more would have felt wrong, so all of a sudden i had reached the finishing off stage of attaching the wire ornaments - but i still have a few more touches to add once these are done………

*L’ile Maurice a la Plume - ill. J.Clifford Bolton  pub 2001