Freddie

This is for the Ripley's Believe It Or Not Unconventional Art Contest.

I chose sewing for this entry and wanted to create a portrait using a method I have never used before. I love sewing and I love portraiture, so I combined the two.

This is free motion embroidery onto Solvy , a plastic-like film which dissolves when immersed in water, leaving only the sewing thread behind.

I used a quilting foot allowed me to literally "draw" with the thread, which is very therapeautic and fun to do. Sewing directly onto Solvy is a little more difficult though!

The more layers I built up, the denser the embroidery became and was more likely to stay together once the backing film was washed away.

My partner and I really got to know each other through the music scene, and Queen is his favourite band of all time. Music is a very important part of people's lives and I chose a music icon to represent a united love that we all share.

Here is my process showing how I built up the stitch layers on the machine with my embroidery hoop before removing it and submersing it into water.

The embroidery itself is around 6 inches high, and took around 3 hours to complete.