I Learned Tablet Weaving!

Tablet weaving is a very old craft. It's been known since the Middle Ages, and it's thought to have been around since the Iron Age. That's nearly three thousand years ago! It was a favourite craft of the Vikings, and was quite common throughout Europe, Northern Africa and Western Asia. This great (and short) video shows a demonstration of a traditional pattern being woven at an Iron Age reconstruction farm in Norway.

But what is tablet weaving? It's a form of weaving that uses tablets or cards to weave a narrow band. The finished work is usually used for belts, straps, or decorative edgings for garments. The cards allow for coloured patterns to be created relatively easily, in just about any number of colours. Here's one of the finer examples I've seen; it's a set of bookmarks showing some of the different patterns achievable using the same set-up:

Picture source.
I've known about tablet weaving for years, but when I first saw pictures of the process, it seemed so complicated and intimidating that my brain shut down straight away. I never even gave it a second thought. Then a couple of weeks ago, Youtube recommended a video to me at random, and the comments underneath complimented it as the clearest and easiest-to-understand video on tablet weaving that they'd ever seen, so I thought, there's no harm in watching it. Here's the link. And actually, they were right! The video isn't even in English, and I got it straight away. I was so excited that I thought, I have to try this!

I got out my old embroidery frame and ripped off the sad, stained cross stitch piece that had been on it since I was a teenager, and converted it into a weaving loom. I found some wool in vaguely old-timey colours and went for it!

So, are you ready to see my janky first piece? Here it is!:

Hoo boy, is it janky! But I learned a lot from making this piece. I mean, A LOT. Firstly, don't use acrylic wool! It's too stretchy and fuzzy. You need a yarn that's smooth and shows up the pattern crisply. Also, I must have threaded the cards wrong because it was supposed to be a diamond pattern, not a weird wave and dot pattern. So be extra careful on which colours to put in which holes in the beginning. Also, you need to pull quite tight or it ends up rather cushy. Which is good for something like a blanket or a cushion, but not a bag strap or a belt.

But you know what? I'm really proud of it! It's been probably twenty years since I made something this crap and been so proud of it, not since I was a kid. It was actually quite a good feeling.

This guide was also incredibly useful to get me started. It has some simple patterns, and also diagrams which show how the mechanics of tablet weaving work very clearly. My second one was a bit better:

I started to experiment more with things like different patterns (chequerboard vs stripe), flipping the cards so the stitches slant one way or the other, and added a nice plaited loop to each end. I read somewhere that there has yet to be an example found of a historical tablet-woven piece in which the pattern was consistent throughout the entire length (at least, in the earlier period before it became institutionalised). That is, the maker changed up the pattern as they went along, usually several times. So that made me feel a lot better about experimenting! Here's a close-up:

I also learned that handedness is a thing. Yes, left handers are discriminated against even in weaving! (Sort of.) Basically it means that the cards have to be facing the way (i.e. left or right) that the designer specifies when you're setting the piece up. Which is almost always to the right, of course. In fact, most designers don't even bother to specify it because it's so common. If the cards aren't facing the correct way, the pattern appears underneath, and you're seeing the 'back' of the band as it's facing you. It's not the end of the world, but I have to keep flipping the loom over to check that the pattern is going well. (And to admire my handiwork, if I do say so myself.) I forgot about it for my third band, so again I'm having the same problem.

Here are some photos of it in progress, anyway. Firstly is cutting the threads and threading the cards according to the pattern. This is honestly the most complicated part and takes up a lot of the time in creating a band.

This photo shows the weaving project after I've started to get a good length going. I use the big pin to stop the cards from slipping backwards/forwards or just getting jumbled when I'm not working on the piece. For some reason I'm having a lot more problems with tension than the previous band, even though I set it up on the loom exactly the same.

Note it's slightly wider than the last one, and I added a third colour with a border on each side! Because of the handedness issue I mentioned before, you're seeing the back of the band in the above photo, so here's one with the loom flipped over so you can see the proper pattern:

And here's a close-up because it's just kind of cool. It's not perfect -- the edges are a bit untidy and sometimes there's a kind of double-long stitch where the direction of turning changes and I have no idea why -- but I like it!

I made my tablets out of thin cardboard (from a pasta box), but they don't last for too long unfortunately. They eventually get mashed up from all the handling. The first set was already ruined after only the second band. Yet you don't want to use thicker cardboard because it has to be smooth so the threads don't get caught when you turn them. It's a bit of a catch-22. I want to upgrade to wood once I'm able to order things from overseas again. Here's a good video on how to make your own tablets. I would recommend rounding off the corners -- you can use scissors or a corner punch.

The variety of patterns that can be made is almost endless -- abstract shapes, words, florals, and the typical Viking dragons. Apparently there are double-faced patterns where it's the same on each side so I wouldn't have to worry about handedness, but they're very complicated and I'm not ready for that yet. Perhaps one day!

Now I just have to figure out how to use all of these strips of weaving!

Highlights (and Lowlights?) of 2019

2019 was a pretty low-key year for me. It seems fashionable these days to say that the year just past was a rubbish fire, and I was tempted to say that too. I had some setbacks, especially health-wise. But then I looked back through my blog and Instagram and realised that I actually did quite a lot this year. It just wasn't in the categories of what I used to do in the past, or what people 'should' do. There's nothing wrong with that, though.


LIFE & HEALTH THINGS
I only worked for 2 months this year. I secured a two-month contract in March-April, then decided to take a month off to concentrate on my exhibition (more details about that below!). Not long after that was finished, I developed some new health issues and some existing ones got worse. I developed a severe pain in my knee and could barely walk for about a month, something I hadn't experienced before. The doctor seemed to think it was arthritis, but I'm still not sure. Thankfully that got better, but I wasn't able to follow up on it because then I caught a virus which made me nauseous and dizzy for several weeks. Then my Adenomyosis treatment failed catastrophically and I was unable to leave the house again for some time, even just to try and seek treatment. I eventually ended up having a hysterectomy at the start of December, and I'm currently recovering from that. I was also dealing with my Ulcerative Colitis (my 'usual' chronic illness) all during this time. I don't normally go into this much detail on the blog, but I just wanted to acknowledge how much I managed to do this year, even despite all of these restrictions.

So what DID I do?


ART
✽ I held my first solo exhibition! (May) -- this was actually a pretty massive achievement!!

✽ I made a lot of art! (all year)

✽ I was accepted into and had a piece in Fat Feminism exhibition! (October)
✽ I joined a collective: Lucy Goosey Women's Art Collective! (November)
✽ I went to my first life drawing class! (October)

✽ I had a piece in NOIR Darkroom's Kris Kringle art swap! (And got an awesome piece of art in return!) (December)
✽ I made a flatlay! (October)

CRAFT
✽ I finished my first blanket! (Sure, I had to make it for my exhibition, but it still counts, I think!) (May)

✽ I tried a new craft: Lucet braiding! (April)

✽ I made some plushie monsters! (May-September)

✽ I joined the #makenine challenge ... and only made one item! ... It was my blanket that I keep mentioning. (all year)


HOME & GARDEN
✽ I grew potatoes! (January-February)

✽ Husband and I built a garden bed! (November-December)

READING & WRITING
✽ I set myself several reading challenges and read lots of books! (44 books and 39 short stories, novellas, plays, etc) -- this is double what I normally read! (all year)
✽ I re-read The Lord of the Rings and wrote a blog post about it! (August)
✽ I set myself a challenge to write short stories and I wrote 12! (June ; November)


OTHER THINGS
✽ I achieved many victories over my social anxiety!
✽ I went with Husband and my foodie friend on a road trip to the Geelong Show! (October)

✽ I started making videos!
✽ I ate a lot of food at a lot of places! (all year)
✽ I changed my fringe-style!

Whether you did a lot or a little in 2019, it doesn't matter. I had a few experiences which made me remember that I'm lucky just to be here. And I'm looking ahead to 2020!

My April & May

I didn't post an update for April, because it wasn't very varied -- I spent the first half working, and the second half crocheting! I finished up my job just before Easter and put all my efforts into finishing the art piece for my exhibition. I wrote about that a few posts ago, so I won't go into a lot of detail here.

The exhibition came, and the exhibition went. I'm talking like it just happened, but I made it happen! I did all the work. (Lately I'm trying to be more aware of when I'm downplaying myself, and give myself more credit when it's due!) Perhaps I'll write more about the whole experience later. After the installation, I concentrated on other art projects, which I talked about in this post.

Yeah, I did that! And it's in a window in front of an art gallery!!!

What I've been trying ...
I tried Lucet braiding for the first time -- and I made it into a video! Lucet braiding is an ancient craft, known to be practiced by the Vikings and is probably even older. The fork-shaped tool creates a braid that's strong and slightly springy. Watch the video to see if I master the craft or not!
(The answer is, um, not really!)

What I've been reading ...
After waiting months, I finally began reading Lord of the Rings. It's on my 101 Things in 1,001 Days list to re-read this classic, and I was waiting until Winter (or late Autumn at the very least) to begin. I read The Hobbit first, of course, and I'm currently about to begin the Council of Elrond section, if you're familiar with the story. When I first began reading, I became completely obsessed with Hobbit foods and collected a large treasury of recipes. But that's a post for another time!

What I've been playing ...
I've been absolutely obsessed with a site called Chicken Smoothie since I discovered it at the start of May. It's just one of those sites where you collect things (pets in this case) and hang around on the forums. The average player seems to be quite a bit less than half my age, but I don't care, I'm enjoying it! It's run by a couple from New Zealand, and the pets and other elements are all designed by independent artists, so I feel like I'm not only having fun, but supporting a small business. I collected my first Unicorn yesterday!


Pet's name: Bunilla
Adopt virtual pets at Chicken Smoothie!
What I've been eating ...
I went to brunch at a French restaurant called Bon Ap' in Fitzroy. It was a simple spread, with bread, cheese and ham, but every element was such high quality and it came together into a memorable feast. Words can’t describe how wonderful it was.

Selections from Instagram
It seems my cat has started watching Youtube....

2018 in Review

Firstly, I'd like to make a small announcement. My blog used to be hosted on a different site (Live Journal), but over the course of this year I've been transferring all of the posts over to this site. You can now see my entire blog right from the beginning, in one spot! Just go to the 'Archives' section in the right-hand sidebar. There are over 700 posts going back to 2004, so it's quite an achievement. And yes, here is the obligatory link to the first post, though I doubt it will make any sense to anyone!

Now, on to my review of 2018!

There were a few firsts -- and seconds -- this year. I finished my first magazine-style zine, Intensely Introverted #1, and took it to the Festival of the Photocopier Zine Fair.

I've written zines before, but this was the first one that I want to turn into a series, like a magazine. Work has started on Intensely Introverted #2, but you know what, I'm not sure that I'll return to the zine fair. The amount of anxiety and stress I experienced before and during the Fair wasn't really worth it. I just can't be in a room that full of people for that long. Or perhaps I'll skip a year and only do it every second year.


I went in three (!) art exhibitions, all at NOIR Darkroom: their first anniversary exhibition, Stay Safe, and A Very NOIR Christmas. I feel incredibly lucky to have had these opportunities, and I hope I'll have more in 2019!

(Mine is the one at the top.)Also at NOIR Darkroom, I did two workshops: Painting with Bob Ross and Screenprinting. Both are highly recommended! Since then, Husband and I have started watching Bob Ross' The Joy of Painting on Netflix when we want to relax. Though we now know that creating those paintings isn't quite as easy as he makes it seem!

Early in the year, Husband and I became re-acquainted with a foodie friend, and we decided to have a monthly lunch date together. I've been to many places that I wouldn't have gone to otherwise, and had a chance to dress up (Or even just get dressed at all quite frankly. Leaving the house voluntarily isn't really my thing!)

In June, I finished my first 101 Things in 1,001 Days cycle and started my second one. I did NaNoWriMo, went to the Melbourne Planner Market, and spent much more time outside.

Last but not least, in April I got to wear the Birthday Hat:

Now for the customary stats (last year's stat in brackets):

Books finished:
full-length: 19 (19) . . . . It's not a typo, they're the same!
short & manga: 16 (13)
currently reading as of today: 10 (14)

Blog posts: 46 (57)
Instagram posts: 285 (284) . . . . There may be more this evening!

Craft items started: 2 (2) . . . . (It seems like I never do any craft, but I've been working on my blanket a lot!)
Craft items finished: 4 (4)
Craft projects in progress as of today: 42 (42)

Zines started: 0 (1)
Zines finished: 2 (1) . . . . (if mini zines count! harhar)
Zines in progress as of today: 1 (1)

I hope everyone had a good 2018 and will have an even better 2019! I'll be back soon with my plans for the coming year!

Cyanotyping Workshop

Last weekend I went to a cyanotyping workshop, and it was brilliant!

The workshop was held at NOIR Darkroom, a new space dedicated to analogue photography and all arts with an emphasis on community participation. Husband and I were the only participants as the other person was unable to attend, so we had the full attention of our host Jess.

Cyanotype is a very early form of photography invented in the 1840s. It uses a combination of two chemicals: potassium ferricyanide and ferric ammonium citrate. When mixed, these create a light-sensitive solution. Despite their scary-sounding names, the chemicals involved are relatively safe, and that makes the process suitable for children as well as adults. We mixed our chemicals together, after first preparing our paper. We were given several types of watercolour paper with different textures and shades, so we could see the results from each. Preparing the paper just involved tearing it into any sizes and shapes we liked.

Next, we painted the solution onto the paper. At this stage it was a light greenish-yellow colour. This should be done in a fairly low-light environment and the paper turned upside down straight away, to protect it from being exposed to sunlight too soon.

While we waited for our paper to dry, we played with some sheets that Jess had prepared earlier. There was a table of items of different shapes and textures to choose from, both natural and man-made. We arranged items onto clear acetate and laid the paper down on top, then a layer of thick cardboard. It's important for a clear image for the items to be touching the paper, so we used bulldog clips to keep everything as flat as possible.

We laid out our creations outside in the alleyway behind the building. Unfortunately it was a cloudy day, and the photograms took much longer to develop than they would if it was a sunny day. Images are also clearer and more detailed on sunny days as the shadows are sharper. Here you can see prints in different stages of development. The solution turns from a light yellow to dark greenish blue quite quickly. In some there were shades of grey or red as well.

To develop the prints, we washed them in a tray of ordinary water. During the washing, the prints magically turned from greenish-grey to a spectacular blue within about one minute. The shapes often looked quite different after washing, too, so we never knew what we were going to get until the end.

After trying out several of the items from the table, we went for an art walk to find things in the neighbourhood to work with. We took a few sheets with us in envelopes made of black paper, and a couple of sheets of acetate and cardboard backers. Cyanotype is a very portable medium!

We used found items to make more prints, and Jess showed us how to attach sheets to things like a chain-link fence to take imprints of them. It was a lot of fun searching and looking at our environment in a new way. When we returned to the workshop space, we developed them in water and laid them out to dry.

At this point the prints are fixed and no more treatment is needed. Cyanotype is a very stable medium: many prints from over 150 years ago still exist. It can be done on almost any porous surface: fabric, yarn, dried leaves, walls. The possibilities are very exciting. I want to find ways to combine art and craft, so I'd love to try printing on something like a knitted or crocheted surface.

The workshop was a lot of fun as well as informative, and I would definitely return for more. Incidentally, NOIR Darkroom is also where the exhibition I'm involved in opens later this week, so you'll be seeing more of this venue in future posts.

A First...

This .... is my first painting on canvas!

I've been thinking about taking this step for about 6 months. One day at work, a communique went around that a senior executive was looking for one or more artworks to decorate her office with. Did we paint? Or know anyone that paints? Well, I paint! But only in art journals, and that isn't the kind of thing you can hang on a wall. If I ever want to share my art with others, then it has to come out of the journal and onto something displayable. "What???" the voice in my head says, "share it with others? Are you crazy! The first time anyone criticises it, you'll be completely crushed and crawl back into your hole and never create again!"

Enough of that, voice!

In the end the painting came about because of the fortuitous convergence of my Mum's 60th birthday, and a 50% off sale on canvases at Riot Art & Craft stores. I wanted to make something special for my Mum, and seeing the sale in my email gave me the idea to do it. I tried to choose colours that she would like, and they're colours I like too, so the painting is actually very similar to what I create in my art journals (except I actually finished it!). There's luscious colour, patterns, mark-making and collage bits. And -- the bit that's been missing from my art journal pages -- there are a couple of my creatures. I dreamed of them once, they've been appearing in my sketches for a while, and now they appear here. This particular painting shows two, emerging from a hole in the ground. Are they mother and daughter? Probably. Are they me and my Mum? Possibly. Is the 'hole' a womb, or an emergence from the 'Stuff' we both struggle with in our lives? Who knows?

I made the two figures the same size because we are both adults now: sometimes she leads me, and other times I lead her. Or they might not be us at all. I deliberately made it ambiguous. The only sure thing is that they are moving up towards the rainbow-coloured light above the canopy of the forest.

When I gave Mum the painting she said, "Wow! You've come a long way!" Later, when we were saying good bye, she said, "thanks for my painting!" I did notice however, that she didn't actually say she liked it. I had a slight crisis of confidence, thinking that if even my own mum doesn't like my art, then who will??! Thankfully it passed fairly quickly with the help of some sketching in my journals, and I'm ready to try another one.