Many of the shapes I love in repeat patterns are rooted in traditional patchwork, along with the the arrangement of variations into grids. They’re big influences in what I often do.

These two pieces of overlaid sheer fabric shapes with machine overstitching in metallic threads are now finished and mounted on 20cm artist canvases, ready for either framing or hanging on the the wall as is…. And yes, they are available for sale – contact me directly.

I keep saying I’ve been doing these ‘while waiting for my large floor standing frame to enable me to hand stitch or quilt larger pieces’, actually I do now have that frame, and it’s great; but I’m not yet ready to start that large piece. I am still fairly absorbed in experimenting with surface textures just now, and as I plan to use paint on the background of the work but the weather’s still a bit cold to paint outside, I’ll continue with my experimental Very Small Pieces series in recent posts, some of which are also on my instagram page https://www.instagram.com/schwabealison/

The following little piece pattern came from sprayed paint, not fused sheer fabric. Both these little pieces reflect my interest in ‘holes’, one of my Pinterest collection themes. Not all those pins are of actual holes; some are a shorthand way of saying ‘this is an interesting possibility for using holes in my work’.

On October 25th 2013, I wrote “I’ve just realized that I’ve had a love of ‘holes’ for some time, and of course they are the essence of ‘lace’ which I see as patterns of holes, though others might see ‘lace’ as patterns of threads.