Ali George Artist

There's so much pre-work and thinking I need to do before a single  piece of fabric gets cut. Weeks, and sometimes months. Moments here and there. Snatched time in between the myriad of other things that require love and attention.  These are initial experiments with a large scale tree - achieving different values in tone as well as challenging the notion of colour. There is still the thing about light, and the way the Moreton Bay Ash casts off the old skin for new bark each year. It's getting close to autumn and the evening light is softening - clear, fresh yet gentle after the ferocity of summer and scorched plants. The result of this testing and resolving a whole lots of textile and artistic tensions will be at A Sense of Place exhibition in late 2024 at the Warwick Regional Art Gallery.

  One of my favourite plants, this begonia contains the universe in its patterned leaves and I always imagine that each cell contains a solar system - all I have to do is fall into the space in between. I've photographed the patterns, expanded them to unrecognisable states of pixilation, drawn their exquisite shape in different scales and pondered the whys and wherefores of such a beautiful plant. Just because is the only answer I find. Just because.

  More experimentation using curved piecing (thanks for demystifying this Brenda Gael Smith) then stepping it up with pieced inner sections - trees and all sorts of odd configurations. I can see a larger scale version of this in our exhibition "Sense of Place" towards the end of the year at the Warwick Regional Art Gallery. 

  This pre-treated watercolour paper boiled away in a bundle of other papers for several hours - using an iron based bath - and produced some delightful prints. These have then been marked up, using a Micron pigment pen to delineate tonal and other changes within the leaf shapes. Some parts brought to life, with others left as is. Some thread, also dyed in the same pot, was then sewn into needle-point stab holes around the leaf shapes. A series of these will become my 2024 Christmas and Special Day cards.

  This wonderful book, sadly out of print, inspired the growth of hundreds of marigolds, the collection of what seemed like a million cobblers' pegs seed heads, and the planting of several banksias in the new gardens at Kalbar. The day temperatures recently hit the early 40s - definitely no time to plant anything. However weeds and seeds abound in the new estate and Judith Hallett's experimentation and wisdom have blessed me with some gorgeous silks and protein-treated cottons / linen prints. 

Experimenting with curves and abstract trees and branches. Part of a new quilt for my exhibition with Rebecca Staunton Coffey later in 2024. Lots of hand printed and hand dyed fabrics that, when cut into slivers, made really great trunks and branches - textural and lifted the otherwise flat appearance of each block.  

For years I've been dyeing and hand printing most of the fabrics I use in my practice. Each piece has been unique and, to an extent, difficult to replicate. I wanted to bring my drawings, prints and doodles to life and this is the first. I really like the feel of Spoonflower's Petal Signature Cotton, although the background would have been better as pure white - this piece has a blue-ish tone. I'm going to love putting this piece under the needle.