Gondwanaland 1985

This piece was woven in 1985. It is a weft faced twill weave, representing the progress of stages of Continental Drift. It is mounted on perspex. 

Reckitts Blue 2008-09

Reckitts Blue 2008-09.

The Challenge.

Tapestry Blues

Project - Weave a tapestry using the colour blue in it. The whole tapestry does not have to be blue, but you may like to weave the tapestry completely in blues.

Theme - Tapestry Blues

Tapestry Size - Any shape up to 20cm x 20cm.

Reckitts Blue source http://adrianwinter.co.uk/logbooks/204Logbook/pages/reckitts.htm

Warp - Cotton. Weft - Cotton Embroidery Floss

Seeking a like-minded support community to help nurture my practice I joined the New Zealand Tapestry Exchange Network, which organised annual projects. This work is my response to one of those projects.

(Held in Private Collection)

Landscape 1984

Slit weave exercise undertaken at The Ontario College of Art, Toronto. Hand dyed silk thread on cotton warp, frame loom. 

Made in Canada

On starting my studies at The Ontario College of Art, Toronto, Canada, this was the first piece I completed under Helen francis Gregor's instruction. The white ground is silk and the leaf is assorted fine wools. This piece triggered the decision to use only silk for fine work which I did for years. The hairiness of the wool bothered me in the end product.
I lacked the ability to maintain a true set of parallel edge pairs at this stage but I also knew already that I was not really a straight line person per se.
I did learn, in this piece, how to stitch in all the warps so they are secure and tidy and this is a technique I still use for my finishing. 

Opening - overviews of Lysaght Watt Gallery

These two images are of one half of the gallery space I installed my retrospective show in.
In this area I have Been able to put the sequence of very fine miniature tapestries up in order and all together. These were done 1987-1988 using silk sewing thread as both the warp and the weft.
They show on the lower image along the RH wall.
On the opposite wall are the 'Windows' series that I completed on graduation from OCA and then in the window and down the wall are some of the damasks. On the nearby plinth is 'My Street'
Looking the other way are a mixture of pieces, reading down the LH wall of the upper photo there are Captured Loyalties 2002, Reckitt's Blue 2008-9, Volatus Avium 2010, with 'Joy Germs, I found them in my garden.' 2008 on the back wall.
 The damask on the stand is called 'Trellis'. On the RH wall is the series 'Curves of Life' 2006. On the plinth is Treble Clef 2006-7.
As yet there are no clear photos of the other half of the gallery.

Artist statement for Lysaght Watt Gallery Exhibition - Handwoven Tapestries and Damasks.

Artist Statement

Viv Davy June 2014

TAPESTRY

For the greater part of my life I have been obsessed with manipulating thread into woven forms. These have ranged from conventional woven yardages and rugs through to more abstract expressions as seen in my tapestry work.

I am drawn back repeatedly to working in tapestry which is an ancient, timeless, technically strict and rigid medium, to convey highly abstracted and organic expressions. I try with every piece I create to challenge the conventional boundaries not only of tapestry as a physical medium, but also an emotional expression.

Historically tapestry has been used to narrate stories or fables about communities, to record events and to replicate pictorial images. For me, tapestry is a way to uncover my soul to the world. My pieces talk about my emotional voyage as a woman - a sister, a mother a wife, a daughter, a lover, a sole person, an immigrant, an emigrant, a traveller. My joys and pains, my insights are recorded here in thread, in a tangible form for all to see.

My ideas are developed on paper, then slowly, thread by thread, are woven into their forms as tapestry. The way the colours can be controlled by various placement and blending techniques fascinates me as well as the creation of texture by thread.

Over the years the straight-edged, rectangular shapes of traditional tapestry have had to become organic and flowing to allow my emotional content the appropriate form. This has seen my technical focus concentrate on shaping and moulding techniques with inclusions.

What starts as a very 2-dimensional image enlarges as it becomes a tapestry image into something with far more depth and this enhances the emotive impact.

The making of the tapestry is a slow, gentle, thoughtful process and I feel this creates a gravitas around the final work.

"An Old Friend" (2013)

Gallery Statement From the joint Exhibition "Homeworks" 2014, Puke Ariki, New Plymouth:
The mechanisation of laundry tasks freed up many hours for the average housewife. Viv Davy's tapestry of an old wringer washing machine - rendered in incredible detail - might evoke nostalgia for the good old days. But her "old friend" also brings with it an air of menace. Looming large on a black background, the rusty metallic form appears almost alive, a sinister figure about to eat your fingers. The bone-crushing reality of the wringer washing machine reminds us that is pays to keep nostalgia in perspective.

This tapestry uses a wide range of fibers - wool, silk, cotton, acrylic, linen. The design is an enlargement of an old photographic image.  The scale has been inflated so the machine stands taller that myself, which is taller than the actual machine would have been. There is also a slight horizontal distortion to the image probably due to the restrictions of photography at the time the original photo was taken.

This piece is in the permanent collection of Puke Ariki, New Plymouth, New Zealand.



"An Old Friend" being woven. The image was "cartooned" horizontally, with the photographic enlargement placed behind the warp on the frame loom.

Weaving in Progress

"An Old Friend"