I wanted to continue working with the idea of a type of screen hiding detail behind it. There is, for me, a magic when one only sees part of a story and it can be tantalising not having the full story. I started by looking at Japanese prints and photographed a few flowers. I then looked at petal formation, Fibonacci and Divine proportion… In the end I sketched out some concentric circles and constructed my own flower petals!

I decided to try sun-printing, the second attempt was more successful,  I used a product called Solar Fast, and printed on to some of the old sheeting I bought in the summer. I gathered the leaves from the garden and some grass which took really well. The prints  were then machine quilted, the grass just outlined in a yellow mix while the leaves had added veins in a pale green mix.

The flower is made of mulberry paper which I colour washed with fabric paint. I then outline machined the petals on to the sun print and cut away the excess. To finish the edges I use an acrylic wax with a little coloured wax to add highlights. The edge is bound with  simple flowery fabric to be in harmony with the centre.

Mulberry fabric is very fragile but lovely to work with, I now realise that I should have painted the paper outwards from the centre but because it was so fragile and I didn’t want heavy colouration I was working fast and didn’t stop to think!