As part of our mission to inspire passion for the needle arts through education and the celebration of its heritage, today we are featuring the work of EGA member, Gabriela Wolfson. Gabriela is a member-at-large from Nicholasville, Kentucky.
Here’s what Gabriela has to say about her love for needle arts and how she incorporates it into her sculpted dolls:
I have been embroidering in some capacity for more than twenty-five years, but about eight years ago I began sculpting one-of-a-kind dolls mostly with the intent of creating and displaying my love of needle art; to date nearly all of my dolls incorporate some form of embroidery. I love all forms of creating with needle and fiber, and very much enjoy all the opportunities EGA has to offer this diverse art, through the website, Facebook, Needle Arts Magazine and more. Today I am pleased to present some of my work.
This is Mathilde, she is my latest doll. I believe this doll in particular has brought together some of my favorite embroidery methods along with my relatively new found love of sculpting in clay. She is eleven inches tall without her display music box. I sculpted her head, lower arms, and lower legs in Living Doll clay; her torso and upper arms/legs are cloth, which makes her much lighter to accommodate her heavily embroidered costume. I embroidered her dress in Stumpwork and ribbon embroidery; her shoes I stitched in needlepoint on 40 count silk gauze (they measure just over one and a quarter inches long). Many Swarovski crystals and beads accent her flowers, insects, hair and skirt. The trim along the bottom is from a piece of embroidered Sari from India. She stands on a music box I made, which houses an antique Reuge musical movement and upon which she rotates. While unusual, this piece took me about three years to complete, working intermittently.
To see more of Gabriela’s work you can visit her website ponderingdragonflies.com
If you are an EGA member and would like to share some of your experiences with needle arts and your projects as an EGA member, contact news@egausa.org, we’d love to hear from you.
