Murder Ballad Monday--Cruel Sister (fabric art)

Hello and welcome to part 21 of Murder Ballad Monday. After finding 20 different versions of the ballad the Twa Sisters, I was inspired to create my one version of this ballad in fabric collage.

The idea came to me in the dreamtime (as so many of my ideas do) and so I woke up and sketched out the first four "pages" of the ballad. I wasn't sure how it was going to work. Would it be a quilt? Would it be a book? Time would tell.  I decided to look through my stash of fabric and bits and bobs and see what ideas inspired me.

I took a trip to our local craft shop Community Crafts.  This little shop has been in business for 40 years, and they always have the things I need. I spoke to the friendly ladies who work there, and they helped me find some special fabric to resemble water as well as some other speciality notions.

In the end, I decided to turn it into a book as it was more practical for storage. Also, it is a story so a book format seemed appropriate. I decided to add a caption for each panel. The caption was a line or a couplet from the ballad. I did not choose just one source material, I simply used the best line from several sources.

It took me several months to complete it, but it was worth it. It is a combination of hand sewing and machine sewing and I think it is gorgeous (if I do say so myself!) I am supremely proud of it.

You can click on any picture to enlarge it, if you want to see it in more detail.

the cover

close up

close up

close up

                                   

close up

close up

                   

close up

I am so pleased with it. I feel I was able to capture their facial expressions and I used a variety of textures in the fabrics (which really doesn't show up in the photos, but trust me they are there). I felt like Holman Hunt-- Victorian painter and founding member of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood --who liked to have a large catalogue printed with every painting detailing the symbolism of every colour choice and minute detail. I really did think about each colour, each fabric, each texture and was about to create a catalogue to go with my booklet, but felt it was a bit of overkill. But I could go on (at length!) if you ask me about it. Spiderman would advise you not to do so to save your sanity. 

But that is the end of my reflections on the ballad the Twa Sisters. For the next ten weeks I will be looking at variations, not in music, but in story form of this theme. I will be looking at traditional/fairy tales from around the world with the theme The Singing Bones.