still playing with dolls

Posted on May 29, 2016 by Salley Mavor

Some things never change. Like the urge to play with dolls. I’d venture to guess that there are a lot of grownups like me who still find themselves drawn to creating little worlds, just like they were in their youth. I feel honored to share my passion (perhaps even obsession?) for the wee world with you through my books and this blog.

I recently got out some props I’d made a few years ago for a video project that my husband Rob and I were planning, but didn’t undertake. It was pure play, as I set up one of the houses out in the yard and made this video with my phone camera.

Our original idea was to make a short stop motion animation of one of my favorite nursery rhymes, Wee Willie Winkie. The easy part was constructing the characters, houses, trees and a clock. Finding the time and space to work on the incredibly tedious task of animating the story turned out to be too much of a challenge. We figured that it would take several months of concentrated effort to make even a 5 min. video that we would be proud of. We’re still intrigued by the prospect of putting together a film and who knows, we may do it eventually. But for now, I will soon embark on a new project that will keep me busy for a few years. More about that later…

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Here’s the clock for the scene, “Are the children in their beds, for now it’s 8 o’clock?”

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In the meantime, the various props have not been hidden away. They’ve been used as backdrops for other photos, including shots of Polly and A Buggy Picnic, which is available as a card.

To keep up with new posts, please subscribe to this blog (top right column on the home page). Your contact info will not be sold or shared. If you’d like to see more frequent photos tracking the projects in my studio, please follow me on Facebook and/or Instagram

wee folk sprouting up all over

Posted on May 22, 2016 by Salley Mavor

I can’t remember a more glorious spring here on Cape Cod! The days are clear and warm, but not too hot, with zero humidity. And the yard is full of perfectly scaled vegetation and flowers for wee folk to ramble through, including bugle weed, forget-me-nots and buttercups. Here’s a selection of characters who escaped from my studio into the outdoors, some from my how-to book, Felt Wee Folk – New Adventures.

How about a lattice topped pie in an acorn cap?

Poppies are ready to pop.

Little Red Riding Hood makes her way across the bugle weed forest…

And a fairy bride and groom dance through a field of buttercups!

Cover Up (part 5)

Posted on April 17, 2016 by Salley Mavor

This is the final part in a series of posts about my new embroidered bas-relief piece Cover Up. In Part 1 and Part 2, the collection of “covered” women are introduced and discussed. Part 3 shows how I made the pieced felt background and Part 4 is about the felt covered wire border.

Before sewing all of the heads in place, I added squares of 1/4″ thick felt in between the holes. That way, the pieced felt background would lay flatter. I then stitched the heads so that they peeked out of the holes and covered the entire back with a piece of neutral colored fabric.

I pinned the heads inside the openings and shuffled them around quite a bit to get an arrangement that balanced color and contrast. It just took a few stiches at the hole rim to attach the portraits.

My husband Rob took photos of the finished piece downstairs. I hope that you have enjoyed this series of posts.

12 x 17 posters featuring of a selected group of portraits from Cover Up are available in my Etsy Shop here. Information about entering the Giveaway is at the end of this post.

Cover Up is part of a series that includes Face Time and Whiskers, which focus on bringing to life different people from around the world, using themes of history, style and cultural identity. In each piece, head and shoulder busts peek out of “cameo” framed holes. Their faces are painted 20mm wooden beads, with wigs and adornments, similar to the doll heads in my how-to book Felt Wee Folk – New Adventures.

Read the other parts in the Cover Up Series: Part 1), (Part 2) and (Part 3) and (Part 4).

To keep up with new posts, please subscribe to this blog Your contact info will not be sold or shared. If you’d like to see more frequent photos tracking the projects in my studio, please follow me on Facebook and/or Instagram.

Cover Up (part 2)

Posted on March 27, 2016 by Salley Mavor

This is the 2nd part in a series of posts about my new piece Cover Up (24″ x 30″), which features 45 individual characters who represent women from particular times or places. They all wear some form of head covering, adornment, makeup or mask that serve as markers, whether they are forms of self-expression or dictated by religious or cultural tradition. There’s a wide array, from exaggerated fashions to veils that hide women from sight.

UPDATED series of posts with photos and commentary about making Cover Up:
Cover Up (part 1), Cover Up (part 2), Cover Up (part 3 and video), Cover Up (part 4), Cover Up (part 5).

Some depictions are identifiable by their national costumes, tribal markings or regional headdresses and others are less distinguishable and open to interpretation, but they are all distinct individuals who fit into a collective portrait of women through history.

I tried to personify a variety of ethnic groups with accuracy and sensitivity. I didn’t want them to look like those plastic international souvenir dolls (shown on right), with generic features molded in different pigment shades. And I hope that Cover Up has more depth than a fashion show or a Unicef card. My intention was to show portraits of real imagined people, with their own personalities and spirits, who live or have lived with the pressure imposed by their society’s ideas about being female. Even the Geisha has an identity underneath her white pancake makeup and the Afghan woman has a unique self inside her blue burqa.

I used Google Images to find reference material and practiced painting likenesses on 20mm wooden bead heads with tiny brush strokes. As I watched the crowd of characters grow, I realized that each one had a story to tell. So, I photographed them all separately before sewing them onto the larger piece. Looking at the women individually may be a way to appreciate their distinct styles, but the relationship between them is missing. When viewed alone, there is no context for comparison, whereas the whole piece creates a juxtaposition that I find more thought provoking.

The following images are a collection of portraits of women who depict cultural, national, and religious forms of head coverings and tribal markings that reflect notions of female modesty, fashion, status and conformity from different times and places. The originals have 20mm wooden bead heads and these photos are enlarged so you can see the details.

Instead of making a key that lists each character’s source, I’ve decided to resist the tendency to label them and let their humanity speak instead. I hope you enjoy meeting the women!

12 x 17 posters featuring of a selected group are available in my Etsy Shop here.

Cover Up is part of a series (that includes Face Time and Whiskers), which focuses on bringing to life different people from around the world, using themes of history, style and cultural identity. In each piece, head and shoulder busts peek out of “cameo” framed holes. Their faces are painted 20mm wooden beads, with wigs and adornments, similar to the doll heads in my how-to book Felt Wee Folk – New Adventures.

The next post (part 3 & video) shows the process of making the pieced felt background for Cover Up. Read Cover Up (part 1) here.

Cover Up (part 1)

Posted on March 20, 2016 by Salley Mavor

This is the first in a multi-part series of posts about my new fabric relief piece, Cover Up. It’s the female counterpart to Whiskers, my previous exploration of men’s facial hair styles. Cover Up focuses on women’s head coverings that serve as identifying markers imposed by the conventions of a particular time and place throughout history. I wanted the 45 characters to invite comparison and point out contrasts and similarities between different societies, whether they are open or restrictive in tolerating self-expression and individuality.

I loved the research phase of the project and spent many days hunting down images of women from around the world, each wearing a form of covering that reveals something about the culture they come from. I’ve depicted individuals with all sorts of veils, scarves, hats, makeup and facial markings that reflect different notions of female modesty, attractiveness, fashion, status and conformity.

UPDATED series of posts with photos and commentary about making Cover Up:
Cover Up (part 2), Cover Up (part 3 and video), Cover Up (part 4), Cover Up (part 5).

While searching through the images, I considered this question, “At what point does a bold, new fashion statement evolve into just another form of conformity that brands a group identity?” I also reflected on being a part of our diverse American society that is made up of immigrants and how this experience may influence one’s perception of “the other”.

The possibilities were endless and I could have kept making new heads for a long time, but I had to narrow it down and chose styles that I thought would best represent a variety of cultures. In a lot of cases it came down to choosing depictions that had characteristics I found personally intriguing.

After finishing the portraits and before making the background field to put them in, I took separate photos of each one and shared them on Instagram and Facebook. I invite you to follow me on these other social media sites for more frequent postings and notices, which include behind the scenes pictures.

The response to the photos was so enthusiastic that I decided to print a poster which shows enlargements (200%) of a selected collection of these portraits. The 12 x 17 poster (shown left) is available in my Etsy Shop here.

Please stay tuned for more posts about making Cover Up. Coming up are more photos of the portraits and how the felt background was made. My husband Rob is even working on a short video with material he filmed while I was stitching the piece. Read (part 2) and (part 3 & video).

Whiskers (part 3)

Posted on March 2, 2016 by Salley Mavor

Whiskersblog In this 3rd and final post about Whiskers, there are lots of close up photos, including individual shots of all the bearded and mustached guys. I can’t tell you how refreshing it was to take a detour from making sweet faced wee folk characters and delve into the world of hairy men! The styles range from handle bars to goatees to hipster beards. There’s more about Whiskers in Part 1 and Part 2.

Last summer, when I started making the piece, I posted a photo on Facebook of my work table full of bearded heads. Someone asked if there would be women as well. I answered that this piece was about facial hair and that only bearded ladies could be included! Don’t fret, a crowd of women (with head coverings, not beards) are featured in my next piece Cover Up, which I’ll write about in the future.

Whiskers, Cover Up and more new large (24″ x 30″) works will be included in my upcoming show, Intertwined – Needle Art of Salley Mavor at the Bristol Art Museum in Bristol, RI this fall, Sept. 16 – Oct. 30.

I pinned the head and shoulder portraits in their peep holes before sewing them in place. At this angle, don’t the guys look like they’re floating in swimming pool lanes?

After consulting with my artistically perceptive son Ian, it was clear that the piece needed another element to help finish it off. At the last minute, just before it was scheduled to be professionally photographed, I decided to add a red thread zigzag to the border.

The collection of heads have doll wigs similar to the ones in the new edition of my how-to book, Felt Wee Folk. Some whiskers are painted, but the glasses and embroidered felt beards are a new development, since the book was written. So, here are the fellas…

I had a blast researching and making the bearded guys and I hope that you enjoyed meeting them! It’ll be the women’s turn next, when I show another new piece, Cover Up in future posts. You can get a preview on Facebook here and Instagram here.

Whiskers, Face Time, Cover Up, Birds of Beebe Woods, Self Portrait: A Personal History of Fashion and more will be included in my exhibit, Intertwined – Needle Art of Salley Mavor at the Bristol Art Museum, Bristol, Rhode Island, Sept. 16 – Oct. 30, 2016.

Whiskers (part 1)

Posted on February 19, 2016 by Salley Mavor

Ok, it’s been awhile since I’ve checked in. My only excuse is that it’s winter – my favorite time to hunker down and go full throttle on a project. There’s no way I’m going to some place warm! I know that some of you are of like mind, but we happy hibernators generally don’t get much agreement out there. I’m happy to say that I just finished a piece I’ve been working on since fall. Cover Up depicts cultural and national forms of head coverings and tribal markings that reflect notions of female modesty, fashion, status and conformity from different times and places.

For now, let’s play catch up with a series of posts about a 24″ x 30″ piece I finished last summer. Whiskers focuses on beards and mustaches, showing an array of male characters from different cultures and historic periods.

Little men peek out and display themselves like an unlikely collection of international souvenir dolls. Their painted wooden heads appear in vertical lines, within a large man’s beard, which acts as a holding place. The bulk of the large beard is comprised of small pieces of felt that are patched together by hand with embroidery stitches. The large man’s bas relief face and beard are defined with lengths of wire covered with felt or wrapped with thread. Whiskers explores diverse societies and their origins, using needle and thread to signify the unraveling and mending of human cultures throughout history.

I made the heads like the wee folk dolls in my how-to book, Felt Wee Folk – New Adventures. Some beards are painted on the wooden bead head. I also tried something new, by gluing embroidered felt beards to their faces.

I had a blast researching beard styles for the collection of characters. This piece is a continuation of a new series that explores history and fashion. Face Time (shown below) is a previous piece showing cameo portraits from early civilizations to the present day. See Whiskers Part 2 here.

To keep up with new posts, please subscribe to this blog. Your contact info will not be sold or shared. If you’d like to see more frequent photos tracking the projects in my studio, please follow me on Facebook, Instagram and BlueSky.

Scotland, Oct. 2015 ~ Rosie & Polly

Posted on October 25, 2015 by Salley Mavor

Remember when Polly went missing and I had to come up with a replacement traveler? Well, Rosie was a great sport to fill in and she ended up having a great trip. But low and behold, who did she find in Scotland but Polly! After she got over the shock of seeing her bedraggled cousin in the heather, Rosie listened to Polly’s story. Polly told the harrowing tale of how she stowed away in a backpack, making it through airport security and the trans Atlantic flight. She barely survived being crammed inside a pocket with a pair of sun glasses and a bottle of aspirin. But, she was glad to not be left behind! From then on, Polly and Rosie were inseparable. They climbed stone walls at Urquhart Castle…

visited Melrose Abbey…

traipsed through moss at The Falls of Bruar…

petted Greenfriar’s Bobby and walked the street of Edinburgh.

They hiked through magical woods…

and visited the site of the Battle of Culloden. Polly and Rosie made it home safely and will rest a bit before their next adventure!

Scotland, Oct. 2015 ~ Rosie

Posted on October 18, 2015 by Salley Mavor

Rosie’s trip to Scotland began with a dramatic encounter with a local bear at a road side pub between Glasgow and Oban. With a combination of perseverance and ingenuity, she was able to excuse herself after lunch and continued on her journey.

She took a boat to the Island of Iona, where she said hello to some sweet cows and drank heather ale.

She loved visiting Sir Walter Scott’s magnificent home, Abbotsford…

and Eilean Donan castle.

She met a piper…

and posed with sets of armor and a stained glass window at Edinburgh castle. Stay tuned for future posts ~ Rosie’s travels will continue here, with an exciting discovery!

Fiona – new ltd. edition fairy

Posted on October 14, 2015 by Salley Mavor

Even though I’ve said that I don’t sell them, every once in a while I offer a ltd. edition of dolls similar to the ones in my how-to book, Felt Wee Folk. You see, I only work on them while traveling, so it’s an ongoing project that takes time. This year I made a set of 25 fairy dolls while waiting in airports, flying in planes and riding in trains. I like to keep my hands busy, so this is a way of producing something, as well as keeping contented while sitting.

Update 10/17/15 ~ The fairy dolls sold out very quickly. Thank you to all of you who were ready at 10 am, logged into my Etsy Shop. Will there be more opportunities to buy dolls in the future? Perhaps, but it depends on how much time I spend traveling.

Some of the finish work that’s not as portable, I do in my studio. I have to limit the time I spend working on these because otherwise I would spend all of my time in fairy land, constructing dolls, night and day. That isn’t such a bad thing, but then, I would never take on making new, more involved pieces.

In an effort to be fair to everyone, I am announcing on this blog and Facebook that 25 “Fiona” fairies will be for sale in my Etsy Shop on Saturday, Oct. 17th at 10am, eastern US time. That gives more people a chance to read about it in advance, so they can plan on being ready to shop. Last year’s dolls sold out very quickly, so if you really want one, act fast! Sorry, no reservations ahead of time. The dolls will be sold on a first come first served basis. Update 10/17/15 2:00pm ~ The Fiona fairies are all sold.