The next project I have titeld "KHUMBA PUJA". It is a large piece (1.3m x 1.1m) made up of 16 seperate panels, mounted either suspended in layers or possible on some contoured frame. It's already on the loom and I have done 3 panels.
Some time ago I was watching a Puja ceremony at Everest base camp and the backdrop of the Khumba glacier and the coloured flags in the wind stuck in my head. Gail is a 5-element acupunct
urist, the flags represent the 5-elements, (earth, fire wood, metal, wind) and my first love is trekking in the mountains so it immediately struck a chord. I will use some tapestry weaving techniques, on the loom, to get the textures I want for the ice, rock and snow. It will comprise panels, probably placed foreground, mid and background with the coloured flags on wires....but not sure about that yet as I may mount them on tubes, like a wind chime or on wire mesh.The panels will be woven entirely in wool and I have loads of carded, unspun alpaca and some merino in various shades of 'snow' and natural wool shades that will be woven in, with a 4ply as the weft. The warp is natural jute. I will vary the weave structure across the panels, but the basis will be a broken twill and a basket weave as they will give the structure and versatitlity I want; allowing me to easily vary the amount of warp showing across all the blocks and the degree to which the loose fibres are either trapped or free above the warp/weft. The unspun fibre weaves beautifully into these too giving a varied loft depending on the tie-up......but there is also the wedding this month :-))
The actual picture I am using as a basis for the design is the second one.
