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Marla Kay Shelton - Merlin’s Book of Spells
Category: Sculpture.
The base of the cover was loom woven, the snake head and tail are done in peyote stitch. The words are couched beads, and there is additional embroidery upon the cover.
Merlin has always been very special to me and when I read about the challenge I thought what better myth or folktale than Merlin? A lot of mental pictures went through my mind such as the ruins of Tintagle, Merlin’s cave underneath and the Tor at Glastonbury but then I focused more on Merlin himself. I decided he must have had a Book of Spells at some point and being 1500 years old it probably wouldn’t be in the best of condition but it would still be wonderful!
I started as a bead and button "Accumulator" at a very early age. My mother was a great inspiration. We traveled a great deal when I was young and my folks were always attending glitzy affairs. I've also always loved Native American and Victorian beaded clothing and accessories and my Barbies were the height of fashion in their beaded gowns and jewelry. Then of course came the Hippie era and love beads, Jean Paul Gautier, Judith Lieber and later Virginia Blakelock and Joyce Scott and all the other influences. I turned into a "Glitz Junkie"
A few years ago Virginia Blakelock and Carol Pernoud came to the Michigan League of Handweavers conference. Three days of intense beadwork. It put me over the edge! I was a little late finding out about the 2nd Challenge and had only about a month and a half to come up with the completed project. I had also just started my own business of textile restoration and at the other end of the spectrum, doing prototype wiring and PCB's. Time was definitely a premium. "Merlin's Book of Spells" came through my love of Arthurian England and of books. My challenge to myself was to see if I could do a convincing mixed media piece using beads and paper that would be good enough to be accepted in a bead competition. The outer cover was woven on a bead loom and "Merlin" was encrusted with additional beads while still on the loom. The pages are handmade paper dipped on a gauze backing to stabilize the stitched beads used for the words of the spells. I was getting a little "punchy" by the end and some of the spells aren't quite Arthurian. But then Merlin was a man of the future. The "convincing" part came after I had done the construction and binding. When I stood back to look at my "masterpiece" I was so disappointed I almost gave up. With the deadline looming, the book looked brand new and not like something that had been around 1500 years! I tried a lot of different things to make it look old but to no avail. As a last ditch effort to salvage the project sprayed it down with water, put it in a plastic bag and proceeded to smash it against my work bench, the floor and anything else in my way. I think it was still damp when I sent it off. It did, however, look a little more worn. Since it has come home I've taken a good hard look at it with another artist friend and made some slight changes and find it much more pleasing. I replaced the snake with one done in a net stitch, which was my original plan but ran out of time, and cut down the copper binding rods and removed the charms.
So far I have not found another venue for it yet but will keep trying. I am currently working on three-dimensional goddess figures using silk fabrics and specialty beads. I'm hoping to get them properly photographed soon so I can present them as a group to some galleries in the area I can be reached at imesd@hotmail.no.spam.com and would welcome any feed back.