Ghost Ship

Description

Ghost Ship was a work in progress for a long time. I had created the bay, with its framework of flowers and shrubbery, the beach, the water itself from a multi-colored fabric with its interesting texture. Still, it did not feel complete. It seemed to call for a ship, and I traced the three-masted schooner from a dark seascape painting.  This is as far as it went for a number of months.

Finally I placed the tracing over the bay and sewed the main lines of the ship directly onto the fabric. I rather liked the look of the semi-transparent paper, but knew it would not stay in place. I used diluted ink to color in the sails and the body of the ship, with a bit of foil applied to glint off the sails.  The foil also added a coppery-gold tone to the sides of the ship, and another bit of the brown ink for a faint reflection in the water.  Now it was done!

The finishing process of all my work is mounting the fabric on foam core, and actually stitching through that backing around the edges of the fabric pieces. This gives a bit of dimension which may not show up so well in a photograph, but is noticeable when you see the work in front of you.