Images below are details of A Step into the Unknown – photos by Pitcher Design
Images below are details of A Step into the Unknown – photos by Pitcher Design
Category Archives: Art
Images below are details of A Step into the Unknown – photos by Pitcher Design
Made in Grimsby 2021
Made in Grimsby • The documenting of a small lifestyle clothing brand called Anywear. 1975 • in an Edwardian shop premises, womenswear was designed & made in Grimsby from cloth that travelled from far and wide. During the lifespan of the business the need to become more commercial had replaced the ‘one off’ designs. By 2002 the designer had had enough of designing other people’s clothes and Anywear closed its doors.
Materials :linen and recycled clothing fabrics, cotton and linen threads
Techniques: hand and machine stitch, appliqué, piecing, drawing
Size: 139 x 87.5 x 2.5 cms
Photos by Pitcher Design
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New Article on Textileartist.org
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I’m really excited to be teaching again for TextileArtist.org Stitch Club next week. It’s a textile story telling workshop and this week they have published a new article about my New York travel story pieces. Check it out here.
Brooklyn Recollections detail 1 
Brooklyn recollections detail 2 
Brooklyn Recollections detail 3 
Sue Stone Brooklyn Recollection, Return and Repartee photo Pitcher Design 
From Grimsby to Greenpoint & Beyond 
Detail of From Grimsby to Greenpoint & Beyond – photo Yeshen Venema
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Girls in a Doorway
a new iPad drawing for work to be made in 2021.
Which Way Now? (below) aka A Self Portrait in Turmoil is perhaps an indication of my frame of mind during lockdown.
size:132 x 59 cms
mixed media
The Girls who made the Suits version 2 (below) is an experiment in texture and pattern
3 new self portraits (below) for the ongoing self portraits now numbering 67. 2 are replacements for portraits that have gone to new homes numbers 26 and 27 and a new one number 67.
A Book Before Bedtime (below) was a commission for the Grimsby Fishing heritage Centre – GFHC in a Box project supported by Arts council England
Made in 2020
Size: 54.5 x 40 cms
Materials: Acrylic gouache, pencil crayon, cotton and wool threads on cotton calico
Techniques: Hand embroidery, painting
A domestic scene from the 1950s when every night my Mum would read me a book at bedtime. We would sit on the settee with me ready for bed in my pyjamas. Our 1950s living room had heavy, dark utility furniture, a patterned carpet, patterned cushions, antimacassars on the settee, and faded patterned wallpaper with plaster ducks flying across the wall. Always a handbag, letters to post, and a favourite photo of my older sister on the side board and always a pair of shoes underneath the sideboard. The wireless set (radio) has a particular significance in capturing the atmosphere of the times. It was via the wireless that we would hear the news, both good and bad, of triumph and of loss. On the wall a picture of my Dad, Fred Stone working on the old pontoon on Grimsby docks in the 1950s with his brother, my Uncle Harry.
I am very proud of my Grimsby heritage and the close ties my family had with the Grimsby fishing industry in the 1950s is often reflected in the artwork I make. I was born in 1952 and as a child I spent a lot of time ‘down dock’ with my Dad, a Grimsby fish merchant. ‘Down Dock’ was a community within a community.
The passing on of knowledge has always been an important part of my artistic practice so when the chance to be involved with this project arose I was honoured to be able to take the opportunity to revisit my roots and make a piece of work for the Fishing Heritage Centre Collection and I welcome the chance for my work to reach a new audience through the loans boxes.
This Life Matters (below)
Work size w 190 cms x 35 cms
Portrait sizes 2 x 17 x 21 cms, 2 x 18.5 x 23.5 cms, 3 x 21 x 26 cms
Recycled linen clothing fabrics, cotton cambric, acrylic film, stranded cotton threads, cotton machine threads, industrial felt mat
Hand stitch, machine stitch, appliqué
‘This Life Matters’ is a series of 7 small portraits which focus on the inequality spotlighted by the Covid 19 pandemic. Each representative of the global community wears the same white t shirt with a slogan ‘This Life Matters’, a nod to Katherine Hamnett’s ‘Choose Life’ slogan t-shirts of the 1980s, Each has their own word embroidered at their side which indicates their circumstances or mindset: Displaced, disenfranchised, disconsolate, dispossessed, dispirited, disabled, and lastly disappearing. Each life is as important as the next.
A series of new teaching samples (Below) made in 2020
Narrative, Strip Weaving & Portrait – hand stitch & mixed media
Portrait of Anne Morrell (below)
hand stitch 26 x 30 cms
A commissioned work to accompany the article Roots in Two continents by Brinda Gill for Issue 95 (July /August) of Selvedge magazine
Brooklyn: Recollection, Return and Repartee (below)
Completed January 2020
Materials: linen & cotton fabrics, cotton & linen threads, acrylic paint
Size 100 x 77 x 2 cms
Techniques: hand stitch, machine stitch, appliqué, painting
Part of a series of work called From Grimsby* to Greenpoint & Beyond this piece Brooklyn: Recollection, Return, and Repartee recounts the artist’s memories of return visit to Brooklyn in March 2019. The viewer is taken on a journey during which flashbacks and glimpses of everyday life, are encapsulated in the ‘mind’s eye’ of the artist; attempting to capture of the essence of a specific New York borough and recalling the brogue of Brooklyn in the form of sights, experiences and written word.
Meandering lines plot our paths and the conversations twist and turn; from small talk on the subway to bantering with tall statues in Banker St, taking in gibberish and graffiti in Greenpoint, a powwow at Prospect Park, books at the Brooklyn public library and the buzz of Brooklyn Museum on the way.
The references in this piece include a homage to the street artist ESPO aka Stephen Powers & artist Deborah Kass
*Grimsby is the artist’s hometown in the UK.
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Which Way Now?
Detail of ‘Which Way Now?’ 132 x 59 cms
‘Which Way Now?’ aka ‘A Self Portrait in Turmoil’ is perhaps an indication of my frame of mind during lockdown.
At first I couldn’t make any work at all and then I became a little obsessed with ideas that I had to get out of my system whatever the result.
I have worked in my studio most days on both large and smaller work and my larger work seems to have become more free and experimental.
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Textileartist.org Stitch Club
I recently taught an online workshop called ‘ The Power of 3’ for the Textileartist.org Stitch Club.
This workshop explores the power of positive limitations ; as a design tool, to create colour schemes, or to audition fabrics and threads for your next piece of work. Use fabric strip weaving and hand stitching to embrace the power of 3 as a starting point; 3 different coloured fabrics, 3 different coloured threads, and 3 stitches.
This simple exercise provides easy way to get rid of the blank page and give a ‘quick start’ to a piece of work. Work with the limitations to achieve a cohesive result and use the grid made by the strip weaving to add pattern, texture or even include a simple line drawing.
The members of Stitch Club produced some amazing work. Here’s a small selection.
work by Diane Goodson Baker 
work by Deborah New 
work by Barbara Ann Stewart 
work by Ann Richards 
work by Mieke Lockefeer 
work by Petra baker 
work by Richard Tremelling 
work by Ali Maclaurin 
work by Marie Haas 
work by Hilary Kimber 
work by Shirley McCann: http://www.shirleyjmccann.com 
work by Esther Collins (@esthercollins5679) • Instagram photos and videos
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This Life Matters
‘This Life Matters’ is a series of 7 small portraits which focus on the inequalities spotlighted by the Covid 19 pandemic. Each representative of the global community wears the same white t shirt with a slogan ‘This Life Matters’, a nod to Katherine Hamnett’s ‘Choose Life’ slogan t-shirts of the 1980s, Each has their own word embroidered at their side which indicates their circumstances or mindset: Displaced, disenfranchised, disconsolate, dispossessed, dispirited, disabled, and lastly disappearing. Each life is as important as the next.
Reference Shakespeare ; 7 ages of man.
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Retrospective – An Archive of Work from 2019
Re-Tellings – a major solo exhibition by Grimsby based artist Sue Stone whose work is inspired by people, place and time. Hand embroidery plays a big part in Sue’s work sometimes mixed with machine stitch and/or paint and there are also some digital prints and new iPad drawings.
The pieces in this exhibition are part of an ongoing series of narratives inspired by memories; both the artist’s own and those of others. Members of the public were invited to take part by sharing memories of themselves and their relationships in the form of anecdotes, and images and Sue has now collected stories from all over the world.
The common link in this particular selection of work is that of family and friendship. Many of the stories focus on relationships between family members; the bonds between siblings and cousins, mothers and daughters, grandparents and grandchildren. But there are also tales of imagined journeys and that illusive dream of a Desert Island.
A selection of smaller works for Re-Tellings
Podding Peas with Gran 
A Visit From Grandma 
Remembering Gran 
Study for A Family’s Life 
Study 2 for a Family’s life 
Study 2 for From Grimsby to Greenpoint 
The exhibition also provided another outing for the epic chronicle of the artist’s own life story told in a series of self-portraits one for each year of the artist’s life so far. 66 in total . The 3 new self-portraits below made in 2019 bring the installation up to date.
A Series of iPad drawings made for the Re-Tellings Exhibition 2019.
A Special Commission 2019 – Portrait of Jonah, Felix and Reuben
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Featured in Embroidery – the Textile Art magazine
Re-Tellings Exhibition and a review of my online course in conjunction with Textileartist.org Exploring texture & Pattern
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Featured in Selvedge Magazine
I am delighted that my work will be featured in the January issue of Selvedge magazine.
A detail of my work From Grimsby to Greenpoint & Beyond is part of the article Text-ile Messaging by Doctor Nicola Donovan.
The magazine is due to be published on December 14th.
Buy your copy here
If you’d rather see it ‘in the flesh’ then head off to Sleaford for the 62 Group Ctrl/Shift exhibition where it will be shown in the main gallery at the National Centre for Craft & Design from 2 February to 22 April 2019.
Inspired by a visit to Greenpoint, Brooklyn the emphasis in this piece shifts slightly away from people, and towards place and contains a multitude of references from a specific place, New York and a specific time period 21/12/16 to 3/01/17.
A new approach and a move away from control in the design process meant the work evolved and had several incarnations during the making process rather than being pre-planned.
womanwithafish 