Emma Vining Hand Knitting: Projects

Tulipa Rococo, May 2016

Over the past year, as a member of a design group that is led by the inspirational tutor, John Allen, I have been working on a "flower study". John asked his design groups to look closely at flower heads of our choice and to work with the details, including form, structure and colour. My study began with an unexpected gift of a large bunch of beautiful Rococo Parrot Tulips! Parrot Tulips have very large flower heads that are full of colour and the individual petals have feathered edges which are frequently curled and twisted.

My Original Tulipa Rococo
Photo by Emma Vining

Paying close attention to my tulips over a period of several weeks revealed stunning changes in colour and form as the flowers slowly decayed. I photographed the tulips extensively every day and from the hundreds of images that I took, I selected twelve that best represented the changes I had observed.

Tulipa Rococo: Twelve Stages of Beauty by Emma Vining

Each stage of decay was beautiful in it's own right and I looked for a way to represent each image equally. Using paper folding techniques and image manipulation, such as overlaying and distorting the images to reflect the decay occurring in the flower heads, proved the best way to achieve this. In the final pieces, although the tulip flower heads are immediately recognisable, the distortion is also evident. My series of nine three-dimensional and flat works is entitled Tulipa Rococo after the original flower that inspired me.

Tulipa Rococo by Emma Vining

Close up of 3D Tulipa Rococo by Emma Vining

Dazzle Book, May 2015

In response to the the wonderful 14-18 Now Dazzle Ships in London and Liverpool, I created a Dazzle Book. Dazzle is a form of camouflage that aims to confuse the view of an object rather than hide it.

The pages of my Dazzle book are hand cut paper illustrations that represent the different views of a ship as you walk around it. Turning the pages allows the viewer to see more than one view of the ship at the same time. You can read more about Dazzle Ships here and view my stop motion animation on YouTube.

Dazzle Book Animation by Emma Vining

How my visit to the British Museum unfolded, May 2014

During a project to investigate folding techniques, I looked at ways to represent the exterior and interior of the British Museum at the same time. I used a combination of photo montage, paper folding and stop motion animation to record my visit to the Museum. You can view the final animation of my visit below.