She-wolf.

This girl. I struggled creating this one. Not because I wasn't inspired or into it, but because I wanted to do her justice. The last few years I've really been exploring accepting all aspects of my personality and that led to the creation of a couple of art pieces inspired by the Rumi quote on the piece. This is the second textile piece I've made with this concept as the inspiration. I love strong animal images and knew I wanted to use a wolf to represent the "wild" part of this girl. Wild can mean so many things and I think all of those different meanings would be correct. As I thought about how to capture this duality of peaceful and wild and how we aren't one or the other, but a combination of the two, I thought about this inner beast we all have. In her case, this she-wolf. Fierce and fearless, protective and brave, loyal and strong. I wanted this wolf to be as much a part of her as the sweet, loving, gentle, tame side. I drew a couple of sketches. The first is on the left and showed her engulfed in the wolf, eyes peeking out from under the wolf's defiant snarl. As much as I liked the sketch, I felt like I'd seen similar ideas and I wanted her to mesh into the wolf more seamlessly without such a defined line. I redrew it, split more down the vertical center, and then shifted a few things so that it flowed into the girl instead of having a hard divide. It's hard to visualize a completed piece with a sketch that is so void of all the bold colors and patterns of the batiks, but I am a very visual person and can solidify (at least in my mind) to a large degree, how it will look with the right layout and the crazy colors.

The first step was to lay out the background. I wanted to keep a vertical feel to the background so I laid out strips and rectangles 0f batiks to create that long, tall feel. I felt the darker night sky colors would give her a more strong, bold look. Once the background was in place, I could start piecing together the she-wolf. I wanted her to have long flowing hair and feminine features in juxtaposition to the choppiness of the smaller fur pieces and the fierceness of the snarling wolf image. The contrast enhances the concept of the quote.

I also thought she needed the second ear, not present in the sketch. Something about the way the image flowed called for that ear to be there.

After the fabric pieces were in place, it was time for lots and lots of stitching! Here's where I struggled a little bit. Faces are always tough because you're trying to capture a personality--a soul--not just a face or lips or a nose. All my stitching is freehanded so I was nervous to just jump in a start drawing not only one face, but two faces that were part of the same person but had different types of features. Wolf facial features are very different from that of a human girl, and I wanted to make sure I didn't confuse them at all. Plus, I wanted to capture the defiant snarl versus the calm, peaceful acceptance and that proved to be a little tricky. But doable.

The last photos are of the finished work, complete with Swarovski crystals spilling through her hair. I wanted the human girl to have the bling and the wolf to be the more natural creature, like she's headed to a rock concert and the she-wolf is defending her cubs. Except, of course, for the one large red Swarovski crystal lighting up the wolf's eye. I felt like that tied the two parts of her together in such a simple but powerful way.

This piece was amazing and intimating and bold and powerful. Just the way I wanted it. Just the way that I want to be.

Process and detail photos:

The Business of Selling Out.

How it All Began.