Elizabeth Dary
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I am a very tactile person. Very easily influenced and also very easily amused. Combining these three things along with an off hand suggestion brought about my passion for felting. Felting is one of the earliest forms of textile processing. Felting happens because wool fleece like human hair is covered by microscopic scales.
The primary mechanism of felting is agitation, the individual 'hairs' are rubbed together in hot water and the scales catch on each other. The global effect is that the whole thing shrinks in an irreversible way to make a mat that can't be separated. When an item is knitted with wool and processed with hot water, soap and agitation - Fulling occurs. The same process applied to non-woven items are felted and woven or knit items are fulled. The transformation of the fibers from one form to another amazes me every time.
My mother has always given me the confidence to try new things and never allowed my hands to be still when growing up. Today, being surrounded by excellent people influences the work that I do. As I am working on an item, I will think of people that I know and somehow parts of them become intertwined in the finished piece. Many of my handbags have taken on the names of characters from books that I have read or listened to during the countless hours of knitting. Everyday object are now susceptible to being felted. From soaps to tennis balls. I make wall hangings that are needlefelted. Needle felting is a process that uses a barbed tool to imbeds unspun wool into an existing wool background. By doing this I am able to 'paint' with fibers. My goal is to capture the essence of wonderful people and places and wrap in them in wool.
