2016 Second Place, The Exemplary Challenge; The Muses’ Kiss (The Peg Laflam Award)

Cabaret is designed to meet two criteria. One is to meet the NAN 2016 challenge to design a piece using a single shape. The other is a special personal interest to create a piece where components of the design can be moved and yet retain a balanced composition.

I was particular influenced to choose a shape that allows for ease and flexibility of moving aspects of the design, thus my choice of a four sided shape with parallel sides of equal length. In some cases this is represented as a square, in others as a rectangle, sometimes so narrow that it could be considered a line. All the stitches and stitch patterns meet this criteria as well although the shape may be partial where it meets a design line.

Limiting the palette seemed the solution to allow for moving parts. I chose red, white and black just for fun and which I normally don’t use as a challenge to explore colors outside my normal box.

Another challenge is mounting parts so as not to see the finishing which might interrupt the composition. My solution is creating a base composition with separate pieces that can be placed and moved on top of the base. The base is an 8” by 10” magnetic board to which the pieces can be attached with small magnets positioned to avoid the beads in the base.

The finished piece mirrors the chosen shape. It can be displayed in any of the four directions with the top parts moved in a variety of positions.