We all enjoyed a fantastic presentation by botanical and embroidery artist Olga Prinku at Harrogate Creative Stitchers today. Olga brought along her beautiful embroidered hoops using dried flowers as the ‘thread’ on a delicate tulle background and explained how her interest in this media has evolved in recent years. Olga’s work has gained a lot of interest as she pushes the boundaries in using these raw materials to create her designs and patterns, working with companies such as Anthropologie and 3.Paradis and exhibiting work at Crafts Council’s Collect 2023 exhibition. She is also author of "Dried Flower Embroidery".
Originally from Moldova, Olga now lives in Yarm, North Yorkshire from which the landscape, flora and fauna inspire her work. She forages her own plant material; flowers, berries, foliage, grasses and seed heads; dries them out and incorporates in her work but she also likes to use already dried plant materials from other sources to increase the range of colour and texture in her work. A central theme of her practice is nature connection and our relationship with nature and she is interested in the patterns of nature and seasonality providing inspiration for her designs. She is literally using the plant material as her thread, weaving them into the tulle background. Originally using meshes such as sieves to contain her work she came across tulle fabric which she now uses in most pieces, acting as an invisible canvas and allowing a beautiful shadow to be cast through the netting from the design. Although most of her designs use a traditional circular hoop, she also likes to explore different sized and shaped frames to hold her work.
Olga took us through the evolution of her work, the first designs mainly being 'moon hoops', crescent shaped designs around the perimeter of the hoop. She then went on to fill the whole hoop using flowers, stems and berries to create new flower shapes and branches, giving an folkloric look. With a background in graphic design, she went onto explore typography, experimenting with letter forms and using them as outlines and free-styling inside the shape, usually outlined in a delicate running stitch and removed at the end of the process. Olga also talked about her bird shaped designs and tapestries using couching for the first time and then went onto to show her first pattern called "Turkish Tulips" which was pre-sketched and then transferred to the hoop. This used yarrow, glixia, rice flowers, lxodia and broom bloom, created for the 'Making Paradise' exhibition in London.
"Autumn Roses" is an Islamic inspired pattern repeating around a central point, symmetrical and geometric and incorporates beech leaves held down by chain stitch in gold metallic thread. Her work continually evolves to explore new ways of showcasing her work such as objects (lamps, mirrors, clocks) and fashion (bags & collars) and in doing so gained interest from the likes of Anthropologie and 3.Paradis. She recently showcased her largest scale work to date 'Connections' at the Craft Council's Collect 2023 exhibition in London. This triptych incorporated foraged birch twigs and rice flowers creating a delicate design over 2.4 metres long and each panel taking 300 hours to create!
Finally she showed more beautiful designs: "Ode to Trees", a mandala with a nod to her Moldovan heritage displayed at the Aga Khan Gallery exhibition; "Under the Blossom", a 70cm diameter hoop of silver birch twigs and Australian Daisy; The "Woven Landscape Series", a densely populated hoop of flowers and stems mounted vertically; "Human Nature", an incredible design of the human skull infilled with dandelion clock heads and is a visual metaphor exploring our connection to nature.
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