Introduction 6Materials & equipment 10Inspiration 22Developing ideas 36Colour 48Composition & perspective 58Texture & embellishment 62- Mark making 64Felting techniques 78- Choosing your colours 70- How to card? 71- Carding colour charts 74- Wet felting 76- Needle felting 85- Freehand or Free-motion embroidery 88- Hand stitching & embroidery 92- Finishing 94Projects- Landscape Loch Lomond 88- Animals Highland Cow 94- Still life Vase of Flowers 108- Architecture Doorway 122A final word 158Index 160
Since graduating from the Glasgow School of Art in 1990 with a degree in Design specialising in printed textiles, Moy Mackay has gone on to develop an innovative felting style. Using merino fleece fibres in the same way that a painter uses brushstrokes, she then embellishes them with machine and hand embroidery. She has exhibited her work at numerous venues throughout the UK and also in the US, and she has built up a steadily increasing fan base. Moy works from her studio in the Tweed Valley, Scotland, UK and runs The Moy Mackay Gallery in Peebles. Since her first book Art in Felt & Stitch was published in 2012, followed by Flowers in Felt & Stitch in 2014, Moy’s work has gained international exposure and she now teaches classes worldwide. In 2013 Moy won Silver in the category of Textiles and Needlecraft, judged by Kaffe Fassett at the British Craft&Design Selected Awards, and in 2016 was a contestant on Sky Arts: Landscape Artist of the Year where she was shortlisted to the final three in her heat. Visit her website www.moymackaygallery.com.
Following her two previous successful books, this latest title from
Moy explores some new ideas for combining felt and stitch and is
bursting with examples of Moy’s colourful and inspiring felt works,
depicting many beautiful Scottish scenes, and other subjects.
Suggestions are given for the fibres that can be used in felting
and the wet-felting process is shown with clarity. Moy demonstrates
how the detail is then added using extra fibres and threads, with
hand or machine embroidery, to give perspective and dimension to
each piece. There are four projects, with step-by-step
instructions, for the reader to try, and a gallery for additional
inspiration. This is a beautiful book for those who already love
felting, or for anyone wishing to try something different, as, such
is the nature of the technique, each piece of work produced will be
as unusual and unique as the maker. Highly recommended.
*East Kent Embroiderers’ Guild*
I have always enjoyed using different media in my artwork to create
sumptuous texture in my paintings. In this book, the artist offers
up all of her knowledge and experience of using different fibres
and stitch to create texture and depth. I hadn’t heard of feltings
before reading this book. They are the use of fibres to create a
painting, a felt painting. The artist takes you clearly through
materials and equipment to start with. Lots of pictures accompany
some of the unfamiliar bits of equipment, which was very helpful in
the beginning. I found lots of new ideas to try and plenty of
inspiration for projects in the dedicated chapter which included
lovely quotes and picture showing the steps in the creation of a
project. Felting techniques are covered extensively and the artist
takes a very practical approach which I found easy to follow. The
final part of the book sets out step by step several different
projects to try yourself, all of which would produce a stunning
result.
*Alex Scott*
Moy Mackay is a true master of her craft. Her generosity in sharing
her skill, and encouraging others to tap into their creativity
through this book/guide, is a testament to Moy's role as champion
of this very distinct art form that she has made wholly her own.
Moy Mackay can rest assured that she has shown the world that fibre
and felting, in her hands, rightly deserve a place at the high
table of art
*Kathleen Soriano, Independent curator and Sky Arts Portrait Artist
of the Year Judge*
The book buyer at the Hutt Public Library must be a textile artist
– there are a whole lot of new and yummy titles on the shelves at
the moment. The cover of this gorgeous book caught my eye, even
though my felting prowess leaves something to be desired. Moy
Mackay is a Scottish artist and the work in this book is what she
calls ‘painted’ felt pictures. The painting is not on the felt but
she uses a palette of coloured wools, silks, and embellishments to
create landscape pictures. This could be twee, but Moy’s skill with
colour makes them atmospheric and startling. The examples she makes
use of in the book are relatively small (mostly less than an A4
size) so the process is manageable for a kitchen or small studio.
The process of wet felting supplemented with needle-felting,
machine, and hand sewing, is described well, with a good
description of equipment (and workarounds if you don’t have the
best). There are several projects that are worked through
step-by-step. Even if you are not a felter – and wet-felting is not
for everyone – there is a lot of good material here about colour
and working with samples to perfect your composition, tips on
perspective, selection of colours to reflect a mood, mixing threads
to achieve the colours, and presentation. Her work reflects the
often sombre moods of the Scottish highlands with dramatic Prussian
blue skies, scarlet and orange sunsets, and purple hills. It
probably won’t appeal as much to those who like pastels, but it was
glorious eye candy for a wet week.
*Thread Magazine*
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