The last couple days, I’ve shown the beautiful goldwork & pearl and beadwork frames embroidered by Larissa Borodich. Well, for the fun of it, today, let’s look at the artwork she framed.

Yep, I thought they were paintings or prints. Didn’t you? And surrounded by the sumptuous embroidered matting, I didn’t look that closely at the images themselves. Did you?

But when I started cropping the photos in Photoshop, I zoomed in on one of them. I couldn’t tell for sure what I was looking at: was the picture just slightly grainy? And then it occurred to me! So I whipped off an e-mail and got a response, with a few more photos. Here they are:

Yesterday, I showed you some stunning beadwork embroidery worked by Larissa Borodich, and today, I’ll show you another gorgeous piece she did, worked with gold threads and natural freshwater pearls. I’ll also tell you a little bit about Larissa’s technique.

And then…. and then…. later on, I’ll tell you something else. Something incredible about the pieces that I’m showing you… but I want to see if you can guess the last detail!

Continue reading “Gold Threads and Pearl Embroidery”

Today, I’m going to share with you some photos that were sent to me by Anna at Talliaferro, who just knew that I would love seeing these pieces.

Prepare to be inspired!

Thumbing through the latest issue of Needle Arts Magazine (the EGA’s official quarterly publication), I fell into a reverie on all sorts of subjects related to the needleworker’s dedication to the pursuit of All Things Needle.

The cover started me off:

Last week, after reviewing Autopsy of the Montenegrin Stitch: Exhumed by Amy Mitten, we had a little give-away for the book, and today, the winner is announced!

In ecclesiastical embroidery – both historical and contemporary – it’s fairly easy to find representations of the Holy Ghost in most collections. The Holy Ghost is symbolically represented as a dove, from Christ’s baptism in Luke 3:22: “And the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape, as a dove upon him.” As a symbol, the dove evokes certain images – it is gentle, pure, peaceful. Within larger images on historical vestments, you might look at the whole picture and completely miss the dove, but if you look hard enough in Christian figure embroidery on vestments, sure enough, you’ll often find a little dove figured into the needlepainting somewhere.

Lately, I’ve been in touch with several embroiderers out there who have been working on different pieces of ecclesiastical embroidery for Pentecost. A couple sent photos, so I’d like to share them, and I’ll also show you some photos of historical pieces with the Holy Ghost discreetly figured into the embroidery.

Tricia Nguyen over on Thistle Threads is doing it again – she’s selling a special little “needlework nibble” to help a cause. For each $18 Tulip Slip Needlework Nibble kit she sells, $10 will be donated to Winterthur Museum to support their textile and needlework exhibition budget. They’ll be running an exhibit called With Cunning Needle: Four Centuries of Embroidery, from September 3, 2011 through January 8, 2012. The more funds they raise to support the exhibit, the more items they will be able to exhibit. RIght now, they’re $5,000 short of their needed budget.