Step 2: Secure the two 'frames' with tape onto cardboard and place them at the right distance from each other.
Step 3 + 4: Repeat the same steps as in experiment #2 to weave an 'image' in the place of the negative.
Step 3 +4: Set up 'warp' of negative strips and secure them to cardboard for stability. Use the needle to alternately lift one strip and weave another strip in between the warp negatives.
Layering can be seen as another sort of 'weaving' that can be achieved with images without actually weaving them together.
Layering woven structures on top of images doesn't lead to any interesting conclusions about the materiality of either the negative, the image, or the cloth.
Step 4: Pick another colour and carefully use a needle to weave over and under the warp, change colours spontaneously, and let patterns reveal themselves to you.
By scanning, I re-applied photography to the weaving experiments I had made.
The scans (/the light/the photograph) reveal the structure of the textile experiments, like an X-ray. They also reveal the structure of the cut-up negative strips.
Scanning brings a different kind of examining structure: it focuses on the visual aspect (revealing the pieces of images on the negatives) rather than on the feeling/materiality of a structure (which would be the focus of experiment #1; testing how the structure created from weaving negative strips together feels/behaves).
material properties <-> visual properties?
Can I use the 'frame' of negatives as a 'weaving loom'? -> Yes, anyhting can be used as a 'loom' as long as there's a top and a bottom that can hold the warp threads (or any other material you're weaving with).
No other conclusions to be derived from this experiment.
Elements needed for a successful weave:
- tension to hold the 'loom' (in this case, negative frames)
- patience
- steady hands
Textile is structure; weaving creates structure. => attempt to recreate structure with light and shadow (or colours) in photography.
Here, the structure is created through weaving, not through photographic composition and the blank negatives all look the same (see later scan experiments).
Attempt to alternate light and shadow failed?
Observations on the 'magical' moment in which flimsiness turns into steadiness, nervousness into calm, nothing into something, breath into cloth. The moment when single threads start to form a structure, holding each other together, becoming independent of an external force (in this case, me or the tape holding it to the cardboard base.)
Weaving has a calming and almost therapeutic effect on my mind, foregrounding rest, patience, and care. Qualities that often get lost in my daily life.
