Gentle Spiders,
My Lace (the quartely publication of the Lace Guild, UK) arrived today
(is it late or am I off a month in my expectations?) I've only skimmed
through it so far -- it's twice the size of the IOLI Bulletin, at 64
pages -- but, even so, noticed some familiar names, like Jean Nathan on
the cover with her Jack of Diamonds variations; congratulations, Jean
N! And another of Janice Blair's "cute confections"-- this time an
Easter Bunny "sprouting" from the bottom half of a (very spring-like)
Easter egg, perky moustache, bowtie an'all.
But what really got my pulses racing was a pair of articles -- one from
an Arachnean Jean Leader -- on reconstruction. Jean's article
illustrates the reconstruction of 3 pieces of Freehand lace, from photo
(or sample) through sketch, to new lace (and diagrams of tricky spots).
Very informative, especially since I believe that Freehand lace
techniques are particularly closely related to those of the earliest
plaited laces. Thanks, Jean L!
The second article -- by Gil Dye -- reconstructs an early plaited lace,
from a 1585 portait. Reconstructing from a painting has, to me, always
bordered on a miracle. How on earth does one determine what kind of
action to take (a windmill crossing? a partial crossing? all pairs
through all pairs in cloth?), based only on a painting? No matter how
close you can get to the source, no matter how good your magnifying
glass... your guesses will be only as good as the painter's skill had
been, and, since the painter wasn't a lacemaker, pitfalls yawn wide...
It's much more dicey, IMO, than using a woodcut as a pricking :)
What's even more interesting to me personally is the *timing*...
Here I've been, for a couple of months, discussing old laces in the Met
with Devon and a few others and thinking about -- *maybe* -- trying my
hand at reproducing some of the simpler ones. Which led me to getting
Burkhard's "Faszinierendes Klöppeln" as a second (after the laser
printer/copier/scanner) Christmas gift to myself (the book was *that*
expensive, what with the shipping from Belgium :) But I think it was
the only copy available for purchase at this late date and I'm
eternally obliged to Arachne for helping me locate it).
I was still at the stage of "digesting" Burkhard, at a leisurely pace
(had other things on the front burner), when Orla mentioned sewings
"all over the place" in a *plaited* Le Pompe pattern, and it didn't
sound right. So, all of a sudden, I've pushed everything else to the
back burner and have been working on that pattern ever since (one
repeat done, but looks like dog's dinner. Hopefully, with my own
semi-diagrams, the second repeat will be neater, since there'll be less
guesswork and more uniformity). And, all that time, Lace was on its way
to me, with two articles on the same or related subject...
Deborah Robinson (the Editor of Lace) once called such sudden
"erruption" of a subject, propelled by forces from different
directions, "morphic resonance". Others call it "synchronicity". Call
it what you will, I find it freaky-scary :)
--
Tamara P Duvall http://t-n-lace.net/
Lexington, Virginia, USA (Formerly of Warsaw, Poland)
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