In this case the only requirement was that there needed to be a duck.  Yes, a duck.  I was stumped for a while about the angle, but then I thought of two things — my love of Cattails and how they could easily be shaped to look like the letter shin, and that there is a bit of Torah about birds and nests.

Deuteronomy 22:6 says that you can’t take the eggs from a nest a mother bird is on or near (mitzvah of shiluach ha-kan) in the wild.   It’s one of the positive commandments towards compassion, so I call this one “Model of Compassion.”  The cattails form a subtle letter Shin.  In my design the mother bird isn’t sitting on her nest, but she is carefully watching over it.

The second design is a keyhole based on an antique escutcheon I found on Ebay.  I’m so much happier with how this one turned out.  The first one was just too bulky.  I really slimmed down the design here, almost too small for the scroll, which you can see peaking out over the top.  I didn’t cut out the inside of the keyhole this time.  I felt with the small and delicate size it would be better served without that.  Okay, and I was on a deadline and afraid of screwing it up.

Both are pretty tiny, with the Compassion Mezuzah being just slightly larger at approximately 1.5″x4″ and the Keyhole at approximately 1.25″ x 3.25″.  I say approximately because I forgot to measure them before I shipped them off to their owner!  Both are also stitched on my favorite linen with silk floss.  The Keyhole is a pretty heavy satin stitch, which I used a laying tool to get a nice dimensional texture.

Oh, and yes, I know one of the pictures has the mezuzah posed the in the wrong direction.  Do you know which one? 

Size: 5″ Diameter
Fabric: Linen
Floss: Pima cotton in “Stick & Stones” from Caron Collection Watercolours
Stitches: Chain stitch, stem stitch

“New Moon” is inspired by the cycles of the moon. When the first crescent appears the new month begins in Jewish tradition. This is the first piece of this theme I’ve done.

“New Moon” is permanently framed in a wooden embroidery hoop that has been sanded and then finished with traditional shellac. It has a custom made hanger of silk embroidery floss that matches the color of the frame. The piece is signed in ink with my cipher, a pomegranate and the Hebrew letter kuf.

Available in my Etsy shop.

I read about a call for entries the Mizel Museum was having for Mezuzahs to accompany their upcoming “4,000 Year Road Trip: Gathering Sparks” exhibit.  Apparently, they are going to have a lot of doorways and wanted mezuzahs for all of them.

It’s been quite a while since I’ve created a mezuzah, and I don’t really know why I stopped making them.  I figured this was just the kick I needed.

When I started playing with ideas for a new mezuzah design, I thought it might be really amazing to make it a keyhole design, both from a symbolic perspective and from a design perspective.  I often think of a mezuzah as the spiritual lock on a Jewish home.

The keyhole design also offered an opportunity for a little cutwork,which I had never done before.  This way, you can see the scroll (there’s not one in there right now).

This design is based on a keyhole cover from 1855.  There’s all kinds of symbolism in the color and design choices, but I’ll let you interpret this as you choose!

Wish me luck.  I sent it off to the museum, and hopefully it will be selected for the exhibition!  I plan on doing more based on this design in the future.  There’s some other stitching variations I want to try.  If you are interested in ordering one, convo me on Etsy or just leave a comment below!

Song of Songs, a collection in progress

I recently posted about this collection, but this new addition I thought was worth sharing.  Up until now, the basis of each piece in the collection has been the “Empress Woo” fabric.  That’s the fabric with the, well, wooing lovers like in the piece on the right.  I had been planning for some time to start working in the text of Song of Songs, and then I remembered that a while back I had been playing with ink-jet transferring of text onto silk.  One of the samples I had done at the time, included the text of Song of Songs 1:2 onto a piece of pink dupioni silk.

Needless to say, I realized how well this might go in this collection.  I used the same basic style of embroidery, and the same fiber choices (DMC Pearl Cotton & Caron Collection “Watercolours” Pima Cotton).  This time instead of the embroidery enhancing the story of the two lovers, I’m using it to frame the words.  For those not so familiar with Song of Songs, or unable to make out the Hebrew (like 99% of the world), the translation per the JPS 1917 Edition is:

Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth–for thy love is better than wine.

That last word at the bottom (מִיָּיִן), means “wine.”  I shifted from the variegated floss to the DMC Pearl Cotton there to bring the dark pink of the wine in.  Not sure it really reads, but I like the effect.  I’m really happy with the overall result.  The way I framed it, also gave it some extra depth.  I think for silk pieces, at least, I’ll use the same system again.

I am happy with this, so look for more of these in the future.

You can buy this piece and see the whole collection currently available on Etsy.com.  There’s also more pictures of the collection on Flickr.

Song of Songs, a fiber art collection in progress.

This cluster shows Song of Songs pieces #4-7.  Numbers 5-7 are the newest additions to the collections and feature a slightly different style and different fiber choices than the previous pieces.

It’s all beauty, love and seduction. The message of this series is simple: Love, Sensuality, Senses, Beauty.

Each piece in the “Song of Songs” collection starts with just the gorgeous “Empress Woo” fabric, which I don’t think you can find any more. Then I draw a design on it and stitch. Each is unique and works as a stand-alone piece, but they are gorgeous when clustered together in groups.

See the whole collection on Etsy.com.

Dimensions: 2.5″ x3.5″
Fabric: Muslin
Flosses: silk, cotton, rayon
Stitches: stem, satin, whipped running, detached blanket, blanket, straight, painting

I made this ACEO as part of the Phat Quarter “Comics” swap. The requirement was that the piece have images and text. I thought, being a bit of a comic book geek that I’d find some iconic image in one my comic books and just embroider that. I blogged about the process earlier, and you can see my original sketch on the post.

I couldn’t find anything I liked.

Then I started thinking I could do something interesting that was more inline with my normal “embroidered prayers” artwork. During morning prayers one morning, I had an idea. One of my morning prayers includes this bit of text:

The water conceived and gave birth to darkness
The fire conceived and gave birth to light
The wind conceived and gave birth to wisdom
The fire conceived and gave birth to light
(Adapted from the Talmud by R’Jill Hammer, from the Kohenet Siddur)

Needless to say, that’s what inspired this piece. If you read my main blog, you know I’ve been working a lot with the elements lately — so this was a great chance to begin exploring them through my art.

Generally I’m very particular about my stitches, but this time I was focused on getting the sketched look I had in my actual sketch.  The feel that came through in the sketch and especially the final design just really worked for me.  I really liked all the shading and texture of it.   I decided to experiment with a more “thread painting” technique, although in this case I would say “thread sketching.”  Thread painting tends to have a polish and perfection to it that I wasn’t looking for here.   For the floss I used a variety of choices.  Much of it variegated Kreinik silks that I’ve had forever, but never enough left to do a large piece.  Since this is a very small piece it gave me a chance to use it all again. Where ever I had a silk I could use I opted for that.  The rest is done in DMC cotton floss, and a little bit of sparkly DMC rayon silver for the wind.

The most difficult design element to work out was the fire.  While we weren’t required to use the ACEO format, I thought it would be a good challenge for me.  My preference for sometime has been round pieces that I hoop frame.  I’m very comfortable there.  A rectangular design would push me to try something new. All the types of fire I tried to draw, just weren’t working.  I even tried several different layouts.  Finally I had the idea of the lightening bolt as the fire!  That seemed to work out well, and I’m pretty happy with it.  I was able to bring the traditional fire colors in with the word “light” using a great variegated red silk floss.

The edging is what I’m least happy with.  You never finish a piece with technique you haven’t practiced!  I have so many pieces that sit in a drawer for months, if not years, because I’m afraid to screw them up in the finishing.  Here I took a risk, since it wasn’t a piece that amounted to months of work.  Just a one month from concept to finish (per the swap rules).  Needless to say, I did manage to screw up the edging — but I think the overall effect is fine.  It’s a mostly detached blanket stitch, which I chose to give a solid “frame.”

I always like to see the back of things like this, so here is the back of this piece.

Mizrach Sunrise, Cropped Detail

Size: 9″x12″, not including tassels
Stitch: chain, twisted chain, net stitch
Materials: Linen, DMC perle cotton

According to my blog, I started this piece somewhere around February 2008. The artwork was finished at least 6 months ago, but it sat in a drawer waiting for me to be motivated/inspired to do the “finishing” work. I’m a notorious procrastinator about doing finishing work. Usually it’s fear related. I’m so afraid of making a mistake and ruining a piece that’s taken months of work to complete.

Mizrach Sunrise, Full Piece View

After all the worrying about the finishing work, I ended up just backing it with simple muslin. I didn’t add any batting between the two pieces of fabric, which created a lovely natural airspace. It adds an additional level of dimension and texture to the piece.

I’m also planning on keeping this one for myself instead of selling it or giving it as a gift. This piece represents a huge artistic break through for me, and I want to keep it as a reminder of a big spiritual/artistic turning point and the friend who inspired it.

This piece was envisioned as a “mizrach,” an eastern wall marker and focal point for prayer. I leave it to you to decide if it should be on on the east wall as a sunrise or west wall as a sunset.

6″ on unbleached muslin framed in hoop
Stitches: back stitch, french knots, lazy-daisy (detatched chain), satin, outline
Private Collection

First in a new series of Hamsas I’m working on.  This one is already planned as a gift to a friend who collects hamsas.  The design is inspired by the henna work of a good friend who is a henna artist.

Also, this piece is the beginning of me using a new cipher to sign my work.  Names are really important to me,  and I realized that this is not the work of Carly Lesser anymore.  It really represents a shift and is part of the work of being Ketzirah.  The new cipher is a pomegranate with the Hebrew letter Kof (ק) in the center, for my Hebrew name Ketzirah.  Originally the Kof was a pictograph that symbolized a needle, which a is a super fun “coincidence.”  I can’t say that I think this is a coincidence at all, but to each her own.

I started working with round pieces recently too.  This is also a fairly intentional shift.  I’ve also taken on the moniker of Magelet, which means circle maker.  This is one way to express that part of my work in a very literal way.  The desire to work with round forms came before the concious realization of the connection.

[tags]hamsa, amulet, magelet, embroidery, henna, french knot, back stitch, chain stitch[/tags]

This has been finished for a while, but I didn’t have any good pictures of it.

The work is done in the Tambour Stitch style, but with a standard embroidery needle. I used DMC Perle Cotton for this, which gave it a really nice texture.

It’s available for purchase at my shop on Etsy.

[tags]embroidery, judaica, tambour stitch, original design, pomegranates, challah cover[/tags]

Besamin Container: Altered Altoids 1

Size: 2.25″ H X 3.5″L X .75″ D
Materials: Linen, Cotton, Modeling Compound, Altoids Tin
Stitches: Running, Colonial Knot, French Knot, Sheaf, Algerian Eyelet, Fly
Status: Available on Etsy

This is the first in my series of altered Altoids boxes. I’ve developed a bit of an addiction to the chocolate covered and sours, and decided I needed to do something with the boxes!

The Altoids tin is covered with a hand embroidered cover featuring an original design. The artwork on the cover is intended to represent the scent of the spices swirling through the air. The stitches include running stitch in bright blue, white, pink, and green; french & colonial knots, sheaf stitch, seed stitches, and fly stitches. The edging was created using a heated modeling compound with which I cut an “egg and dart” border.

The box is filled with my own blend of spices which includes bay leaves, rose hips, rose petals, cinnamon, cardamom, and citrus. The sweet and spicy scent is sure to return your soul to you after Shabbat!

Altoids is a registered trademark of Callard & Bowser.

[tags]