The Textile Cuisine

Sometimes things are simply overwhelming... I can only guess that keeping balance for this little hen is quite a challenge. But she keeps her face straight. The amount of dishes is truly impressive. To dive or not to dive? Maybe just looking will do the job? But the water seems so joyful and friendly... So maybe, just maybe, all the troubles will turn out to be manageable? Courage, little hen!

With the sun going higher and the days getting longer gotta look for the signs of spring in the kitchen. Little birds say that "Spring is coming to the kitchen" is my newest kitchen portrait in stitches. It is 46 x 57 cm big and contains all kinds of spring surprises. Fresh milk and eggs with the promise of new life accompanied by colorful morning chorus. Clean plates are blooming and fresh water brings much needed vital energy. First greens appear everywhere slowly taking the kitchen space of. Even the old wooden floor can't resist as if trying to connect with sweet blooming memories... So good to see you back, dear Spring! Make yourself at home and stay as long as you wish.

Ever wondered what the restaurant's backstage at wedding party looks like? I did. So here is my textile vision of such a place. Many tasteful dishes impatiently waiting for their turn, all dressed appropriately and a bit excited. The pans could easily recognize it is a wedding time by the special lighting turned on. Big chandelier spreads the golden light on everything for the bright prospect of newly-wed's life. Even the floor keeps tidy, arranging accidental rubbish into lace patterns... Let's not forget the wedding cake! I know it is just my fantasy and reality may be less charming. But... my art is to inspire and to beautify. So imagine my incredible joy when for my birthday this year I got this: With all the edible details instead of glass beads. "Dancing on many weddings" is 20.5 x 21.5 in, ready to hang on the wall. And the real cake? Well, I don't remember the size because it didn't last long enough!

Here is my newest textile work with a cooking theme. I finished it some months earlier but much to my surprise I had to revisit it and make some changes. The idea came from an older piece where I visualized the beginning of spring as a big pot boiling with first blooms. "Summer cooking" was made in the summer and I thought it was done although it looked differently from what you see now. I liked it and the response from viewers was great but it dawned on me that people see something different from what I wanted to show. At first it didn't bother me (everything in the eye of beholder of course) but finally I decided to give it another try. Long, autumnal evenings came handy for adding more embroidery stitches here and there. The whole piece remains the same but the small additions make the difference. The sun got some new golden touches too: And the blue leaves appeared: Now you can compare both versions yourself. Hope you prefer "after" th...

Not the newest of my kitchens but the one that took the longest to complete for sure! It started in 2015 ( HERE )and was meant to be done fast. Oh well... Yes, it was the amount of handwork involved that took so long. And I don't mean stitching daily for all those years but rather the breaks much needed after stitching every utensil by hand. Landscape in the background was like a fresh breeze - open space with spots of greenery here and there. And I learned a lot along the way. Not so about the stitching but definitely about history and cooking the Italian way. I love to read on the subject of my project in progress. It is like building an environment, accumulating all the facts and feelings to transform them later into stitches. Then the magic happens - you see the picture that evokes emotions and you are able to feel the atmosphere by yourself. Welcome to my world of Italian cuisine!

Feeling like a "Good wife" (pictured above) presenting her clean and tidy kingdom. Well, not all my kitchens are clean and tidy. Some are seriously touched by decay, like this "Abandoned kitchen": I'm not sure if birds are a good addition to the place where we cook but... licentia poetica works in textile art too. They say that kitchen is the heart of a home. I agree but I also love to see them as spaces with their own personalities. Sometimes bright and cheerful: Sometimes more dramatic: I can see late night shows going in the kitchen while the rest of house sleeps: And we love it when the cooking is like music, don't we? The most recent kitchen you saw in the previous POST but I want to show you the one that took the longest to complete - "My Italian kitchen" (started HERE ): The pile of ideas for more is growing up. Captured this recently and I can see a magic city with lots of pinnacles... in the kitchen, of course!