FROM THE RAG BAG

Evening Star, Issue 22276, 29 February 1936, Page 25

FROM THE RAG BAG

PICTURES WITH PATCHES If anybody caii get out of a rag bag an adventurous sense of working with a purpose, yet with an exciting uncertainty as to what the ultimate achievement will' be, it is surely Mrs Alice Armstrong an American woman, who was interviewed by the ‘ Christian Science Monitor,’ when -she takes needle, scissors, and a bundle of scraps. The dash and humour which she brings to her patchwork pictures gives them a peculiar liveliness, originality, and ingenious charm. There is, of course, nothing novel in patchwork. But the needlecraft practised by our grandmothers is not Mrs Armstrong’s kind of patchwork. Hers is swift, daring, experimental. She will have slapped a mountain range or half a dozen cypresses into place, and fastened them there, while the maker of an old-fasliioned piece is still stitching at a, single square. Not, however, that Mrs Armstrong lacks patience or capa-

city for fine stitcHery. Her first excursions into fabric picture making were in needlework, far removed in type from her present style. The first of these silk-embroidered pictures is a small oval, delicately worked, which she was inspired _ to make, many years ago, after having seen a little framed picture of silken needlework in an old curiosity shop. From this she proceeded and made seascapes, landscapes, figure groups of various sizes, and finally a large, gay wall hanging, representing an Old World village street, which she took a full year to complete. It was after finishing this embroidered picture that Mrs Armstrong began to realise that she could get the effects she wanted equally well by laying on pieces of stuff as by the lengthy process of filling in large areas with stitchery. And so it was that she started on Her first patchwork picture.. Swift Work* How swift the new method is she proves by doing what she calls a “ small ” picture, measuring perhaps 2ft by lift, in a day. A large village scene, measuring about Iyd by IJyds

took her but a week. This village piece is a genuine patchwork picture, and is one of her favourites among her own works. There are snow mountains at the back, ranges of hills against them ; cypress trees ; and a village square in the foreground wit!; little people walking -about it in the most engaging way. In this piece Mrs Armstrong’s simple and ingenious technique—which somewhat resembles that found in the appliqued cotton designs produced by modern Egyptian workers —is clearly exemplified. The groundwork is a sheet which she herself dyed a dull blue for the sky. Upon this she began to lay her pieces, one mountain rising against another. After them came the lower hills and distant cypresses; then towers, roofs, houses, doors, windows, figures, each in turn cut from this fabric or that and pinned, then sewn in place. The curios part of it is that Mrs Armstrong declares, and her family supports the assertion, that she cannot draw at all. With a pencil she is helpless, yet, starting with no definite design, she can slash or snip out her pieces of stuff and adjust them in such a way as to make a picture, which literally takes shape under her hands. Near her as she works she has a large bag of scraps, into which she dives a foraging hand and pulls out bits; and from the bit pulled out. its colour and fabric, she often gets the idea _ which carries her on the next step in her design. A reddish-brown piece, for instance, may suggest a ploughed Hillside: a scrap of black felt, a cat to set in the window-sill ; a bit of lively green, a grass plot or a nice green door. Method Described. Mrs Armstrong’s method with the small lively figures who people her pic-

tures is amusing. “ First,” says she, indicating a little man loitering pi the village street, t£ 1 cut his trousers. Those are easy and set a kind of proportion to go by. Then 1 add the shoes below and the shirt above and set a head on top and all comes nice and shapely and proportioned.” So also with the women; skirts are cut first, then feet, shawl, or bodice, and lastly beads. Beginning with the head, Mrs Armstrong declares, she gets all the proportions, wrong, “ like that little deformity there ” and she points out a rather fantastically formed boy disporting himself in the village street. “ I began with his bead,” she explains regretfully, “ and got him art wrong.’’ As for materials, all the old bits from domestic sources and family clothing go into Mrs Armstrong’s capacious bag, and, as she shows her finished pictures, she explains genially that “ this grey hill came from my old skirt and that purple one from a blouse of Norah’s,” while the cypress spires came from an old felt ironing blanket which she herself dyed green. Dull bits, she explains, are admirable for backgrounds or shadows. White pieces of felt or sheeting she dyes as she wants themand in the shops, especially at sales, she keeps her eyes open for remnants and scraps of good tints, and nice firm felty bits with a firm weave, which don’t fray out and can be sewn right on without needing to bo turned in.

One of the pleasant things about this patch-picture making is that Mrs Armstrong so thoroughly enjoys herself at her work. It is all fun to her, and, established in the spacious rooms of an old Florentine palace, she pursues her chosen pastime with humour, vivacity, and zest. If she could draw she might, it is true, produce something more sophisticated, but it would probably lack just that lively touch which comes from her unschooled and instinctive method. It is all quick, amusing, decorative, and—seemingly—so easy. Of course, one must have a flair, a sense of form and colour, even if no drawing, to be able to achieve such good results. But doubtless many women possess enough of these qualities to produce from their piecebags some patchwork pictures for nursery or playroom, porch or other place where broad, quaint effects would be in keeping. Or even set the children themselves to this novel kind of handiwork.