Fool the Eye: Illusions in Textile Art

Three Early American quilt designs

What are "optical illusions"? They are patterns that fool the eye into seeing things that are not really there. These include 3-dimensional objects that appear to extend out from the canvas, “hollow” spaces in the canvas showing depth, textured surfaces, and interwoven areas where sections appear to pass over and under each other. Some optical illusions can be traced back to Early American quilt blocks.

When European settlers came to America, for a long time they were dependent upon supplies of cloth shipped in from Europe.  Therefore, everything needed to be made to last as long as possible. When a garment was no longer wearable, any usable pieces were cut out and saved. When a new garment was made, all fabric scraps were saved. When enough scraps were accumulated, they were sewn together to make woolen quilts like the ones seen here.

A popular pattern was the one shown in blocks on the first quilt in this trio, which was called the "Nine Patch". If you look closely, you will see that each block is made up of nine small squares.  It is an easy beginners' pattern. With the instruction of a patient and loving grandmother, I learned to sew a simple seam and made a little Nine Patch quit for my doll when I was about four years old — and I have been sewing ever since. The second quilt is also composed of small squares, arranged in larger squares which are placed in a diamond configuration. This pattern was commonly called "Sunshine and Shadows". As quilters became more assured (and more competitive) they began to use more complex pieces and designs, like the third quilt shown here, made with sharp diamond-shaped pieces. This is one of many "Star" designs.

Tumbling blocks

Well, these are very pretty, but they don't "fool the eye". This one, called "Tumbling Blocks" does. It forms an illusion still used broadly today.

It appears that you are looking at a surface that is further away than the surface of the canvas. Your eye moves back and forth from blocks that appear to be pointing upwards and acting like stepping stones to blocks that appear to be pointing downwards and coming out of the surface toward you. The effect is achieved by using a bright yarn, a dark yarn, and a light yarn of the same color. The sample was done in longstitch (upright Gobelin) on a #7 mesh canvas. The edges are so sharp that back-stitching is optional. The finer the mesh this is done on, the more distinct the illusion will be.

A tumbling block design in longstitch

The next example shows the illusion of depth. It appears that you are looking down at a surface that is farther away than the surface of the canvas. The pattern starts with a network of light-colored diamond shapes. One of these has been filled in with successively shorter rows of successively darker shades of the yellow color. The darkest shade forms a solid diamond that our eyes tell us is the bottom of a 3-dimensional space. The more layers of color that are used, the deeper that the "box" or "room" appears to be.

Another needlepoint illusion

This illusion is made by making rows of zig-zag pointed patterns which meet only at their highest and lowest points, which are staggered from one row to the next. This leaves small blocks of canvas in between the rows. Since the rows are off-set slightly, the empty blocks are not diamond-shaped as one might expect. These parallelogram-shaped parts of the pattern are sometimes called "lozenges". These are used frequently in bargello patterns.  The odd numbered rows are identical to each other. The even-numbered rows are identical to each other, but slightly different from the odd-numbered rows. This causes the "lozenges" to point to the lower right in one row and to the lower left in the other.  Would such a construction be possible in three dimensions — say using shoeboxes?

The illusion below appears to show two flat striped ribbons twisted around each other.  Notice that the bottom edge of each ribbon is slightly lighter than the matching top edge.  The sample is done in long, straight stitches. It would be a bit more difficult to chart and work in tent stitch, but the illusion would probably be more distinct.

Follded ribbons in longstitch

Bachelor's puzzle construction steps

Here is a step-by-step series of diagrams for an illusion I know only as "Bachelor's Puzzle".  It is derived from a quilt block. Below is a small framed picture of it done in needlepoint.  A collection of several pictures like these is nice for a narrow wall space next to a door or between windows.

Bachelor's puzzle needlepoint

This time we are going to adapt two designs and combine them to make a framed "op art" picture. I started with a pattern I know as "Ring Around the Star".  (Many patterns have multiple names.) I don't know the origin of the pattern, but I suspect it is 18th Century American.  However, I believe it may be derived from a much older English pattern called "King's Cross". The center of the "King" pattern is just to the left below. The center of the "Ring" pattern is next. The last two diagrams are sketches I made to decide which shading gave the effect that I wanted.  I chose the one on the right.

Ring-Around-a-Star development sketches

The two pictures below show the shading I did for the color stitching. You will find a photo of the framed picture at the end of this article.

King's Cross in a rectangle

Square frames are harder to find than rectangular ones, so I have modified the "King's Cross" design to fit a rectangular frame.  I did this pattern for a 5-inch X 7-inch frame (13 X 18 centimeters), but I can show you how to adapt it for any rectangular frame. Turn the frame upside-down on your canvas and draw around the opening with a pencil. Remove the frame. (If necessary, use a ruler or straight-edge to square the corners and make the sides straight.) Leave extra canvas around the rectangle so that you can tape the edges. Find the center of the rectangle and mark it with a dot (O on the diagram), continuing to use a pencil. Find the centers of the top and bottom — the short sides — and mark them with dots (A). Find the centers of the long sides and mark them (B). Mark the four corners (C). Mark the centers of the lines between the A's and the center O (D). Mark the centers between the B's and the O (E). Mark the centers between the C's and the A's (F) and the centers between the C's and the B's (G). Now connect the dots as follows:

1. A-O-A
2. B-O-B
3. Both C-O-C's
4. Both E's on the top and bottom with the nearest D
5. Both G's on the sides with the nearest E. You may then erase the A-D and the B-E lines if you wish to do so.

Now you are ready to begin stitching.

King's Cross sketch

This sketch will work with any three-color combination as long as the white sections are in the lightest color, the pencil-shaded sections are a darker shade of the same or a similar color, and the inked-in triangles are in a very dark color. You will notice that the pairs of triangles are not quite the same. Also, the shapes that were parallelograms in the original pattern are now polygons. These are large areas, so use a heavier yarn than usual or double your regular yarn to cover the canvas completely. Once again, I recommend doing the triangles in basket-weave, starting at the center points and working outward this time. Any irregularities where two colors of yarn join, or at the edges, may be covered by back-stitching if you choose.


Once, as I worked on the design for a 6-way bargello pattern, I told J.D. that I could see an optical illusion forming in one of the designs. He said he could see one, too, but that he would have to erase some of the lines in the design to make it. I suggested that we each draw the design we imagined, to see if we had different illusions in mind. When we compared our results, we had indeed seen different illusions. We were delighted. This “game” continued for some time. Below are two of the more interesting ones, for the benefit of those of you who have taken up this pursuit. You can use black, white, and grays for your shading or you can use various tones and shades of a single color. If you use different colors, you may achieve an interesting design, but lose much or all of the illusion.

Hexagon grid

Working with a hexagonal shape requires us to adjust our thinking just a bit. We are used to thinking in terms of a base of 90 degrees (0 degrees, 90 degrees, 180 degrees, 270 degrees, 360 degrees).  A hexagon, however, is based on 60 degree angles (0 degrees, 60 degrees, 120 degrees, 180 degrees, 240 degrees, 300 degrees, 360 degrees). The design is constructed along each axis from the degree mark to the center. Although the hexagon is basically two overlapping triangles, it seems more balanced than any triangle.  On the other hand, it is more versatile and less static than a square or a rectangle. Try starting with a hexagonal outline and building shapes inside it.

In the first example, two overlapping 3-dimensional squares have been fused together to make an angular figure-8 shape.  The most shadowed areas are shaded in black. The intermediate shading is done in a medium green.  The most illuminated areas are done in a light blue. The background is the white of the drawing paper. Once the figure is complete, the little construction lines can be erased, along with the unnecessary bits of the hexagonal outline.

The second figure is made up of small cubes.  You would need to put the construction lines in very lightly because many of them would have to be erased in order to achieve the final illusion. The same three colors have been used to show the amount of light reflected from the surfaces. Once again the white of the paper is the background, but you could put in another very light color if you wished. Study the construction diagram on the top right to determine how the figure was constructed. The finished illusion is shown on the bottom right with the construction lines and unnecessary hexagonal lines erased.

Now that you are familiar with hexagons, you might want to try constructing a six-pointed star pattern.  Here is a hint:  connect 0 degrees (which is also 360 degrees) to both 120 degrees and 340 degrees; connect180 degrees to both 60 degrees and 300 degrees. Two more straight lines will complete the star.

Finally, here is a photo of the finished and framed project that we promised you earlier in this post.

If you enjoyed this article, watch for a new post on the subject this Fall.

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‘Growing’ Geometric Designs

First draft of a new geometric design, future project

You readers have been so responsive and enthusiastic about the new 8-way design that we published last month. Thank you so much for your interest and supportive remarks. A number of you have asked for more information on expanding patterns. That is a subject that I have touched on several times over the years we have been doing these posts, but I am always happy to return to it. This article is going to focus more on design, rather than on specific projects. In our January 1st post of this year, we showed how to rotate a simple one-and-a-half inch pattern on quarter-inch graph paper to make a symmetrical three-inch design which could be repeated over and over again to make it as large as you wished — up to the size of a patchwork quilt top, for instance. Each of the little squares in the design could represent a single stitch on canvas or even-weave fabric, a much larger square of fabric, or even a floor tile. Let's revisit one of those designs. Instead of taking one of the little squares as the basis of our design, this time let's consider the entire three-inch square as a single, repeatable part of our design.

Central square from the 8-way needlepoint

Alphabet chart for the design

If you are going to follow along with me directly, you will need quarter-inch graph paper, a sharp pencil, an eraser (preferably a kneadable one, to get into the small squares), a straight-edged ruler or triangle, and a selection of colored pencils that can be erased. You can use pens or crayons, but they will not correct easily and can make the process frustrating. Or you can use an alphabet letter for each color written in plain pencil and fill the colors in later.

Central square in light blue, turquoise, and deep violet

The first thing I did was to center the design on my graph paper so I could work around it in all directions. The next thing I did was to change the color scheme of the design, leaving out the white, which is not a color. (You may want to use black, white, or gray in your design.) I chose to make this design in analogous colors (colors next to each other on the color wheel) because I wanted to make some points about color combinations. Analogous colors reflect wavelengths of colored light that are closely related.  Since these colors are closely related, we are pretty well assured of a pleasant design. I chose blue-green, blue, and blue-violet for my color combination, but you need not use those colors if you want to try others. For a trio of warm, bright colors, you might choose red-orange/orange/yellow-orange (the exact opposite of the three I chose), for example.  For more about color combinations, see our "Pigments and Palettes" article. A word of caution about colors. What I see on my screen in the office is not necessarily what J.D. sees on his screen in the workshop or what you will see on your device. And if you are printing something out, there are even more possible differences. That is why I identify the color range that I am using each time.

Central square in royal blue, medium violet, and aqua

Notice that I have used one light color, one medium color, and one dark color (a tint, a tone, and a shade) in each design. I do this to make it easier to place each color when I begin ‘growing’ the design. Each color is in the same set of squares on all three versions of the design; only the intensity of the colors changes. As you can see, which color is emphasized most does alter the design — a fact you will need to consider not only when growing your design, but also before choosing the yarns, fabrics, paints or other materials for your final project. Changing the positions of the colors as well as the intensity will give you even more varied results. I ‘grew’ all three of the blue-green/blue/blue-violet designs. You can see illustrations of the set at the end of this article.

Central square in aquamarine, medium blue, and lilac

Now that you have chosen both your color combination and your plan of light/medium/dark placement, you are ready to 'grow' the design. The simplest way to grow this design is to treat it the same way we did the little 6×6 square to get the 12×12 one we have now. If you want to proceed in this fashion, you may want to cut out your chosen 12×12 square and place it at the lower right-hand corner of a new sheet of graph paper. You can copy the pattern from your screen or print it as many times as you need it. You can then reproduce it immediately to the left, directly above right, and diagonally to the left of your original design. From there you can expand the design in any direction you desire.

Here is an outline pattern of the design to download.

Click here to download

Detail of mosaic from Ur, circa 2500 BCE

This design technique is called tiling. It is an ancient art process used primarily for creating inlays and mosaics. It was used in Mediterranean civilizations long before those of the Greeks and Romans. The earliest known mosaics were made in Mesopotamia before 2,000 BC (BCE)  Just last month there was news of a remarkable mosaic discovered in the ancient city of Hippo.

J.D. preferred the sample design with the light blue/turquoise/dark violet combination, so I tiled it first. Once I had a completely correct 4-part design, I reproduced it in colored pen for J.D. to photograph. I went through the same process with the other two samples. Somewhere in the midst of all this, he slipped up behind me and snapped this picture of my worktable, with the designs in progress. (He says he wanted to show you how much work I do before I publish anything for my readers. I think he just wanted to show what a mess my worktable usually is!)

Annake at work, designing

Expanded center square, stage 1

Now I turned my attention to the original black-line design to see how it would work as a 4-way or 8-way bargello design. Once again I placed the 12×12 pattern with the empty squares in the center of my graph paper and began to expand the design. I did this in plain pencil so I could erase any lines I didn't like. I worked strictly with lines and shapes at this point. (Although I planned to use some of the analogous colors in my final design, I intended to incorporate a variety of warm-color contrasts to the design, and I didn't want to be influenced by colors at this stage.) Since the top, bottom, and sides of the design were flat, I decided to begin there. I extended the lines that formed the sides of the squares outward in a stepped pyramid pattern of varying lengths. Once satisfied with one side of the design, I repeated it on the other three sides.

Outline of completed design

Then I turned my attention to the corners. Instead of closing the corner to make it the center of a design like those already completed, I opened it out with a stem-like addition and spread the arrowhead-like ends.  I returned to the north/east/south/west areas of the design and repeated and capped the pyramids with a small motif that I had used around the original center..Then I looked for ways to connect the corner designs to the expanded side designs. I decided not to connect them completely, but to leave areas where the background color could fill in around the shapes. The small center shape of the design was used in a detached fashion and repeated around the entire pattern in places where groupings seemed too empty.

Once the pattern was complete,  I went about filling in the colors.  I used many of the blue-green, blue, and blue-violet colors again that I had used in the trio of original designs — but sparingly. The feeling of the new design was rather heraldic for me, so I decided to incorporate reds and golds liberally in the final version. You can see the result at the top of this post. I left the background white so that the color details would be clear. I have saved an electronic copy of the design, however, and am planning to 'flood' the background with other colors later in order to compare the results. I also have some ideas for varying the central design. I haven't decided yet on what form of needlework I will make with this design. The design will probably change somewhat as I translate it for the medium in which it will finally appear. I'm already considering using a metallic thread, floss, or yarn in some areas — an antique gold or perhaps a copper tone. I will show the more interesting of these experiments in future posts.

I hope you have found this demonstration and discussion useful, and that it has encouraged you to experiment with designs of your own.  If you would like us to feature your design or designs on this blog, you can e-mail them to us at annakes_garden@yahoo.com .

As always, have fun!

Tiled versions of the analogous color design squares above

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Back to Blackwork

Blackwork Owl on  checked gingham

On February 13^th of this year we began the 6^th year of this blog. Welcome, viewers from new countries that joined us this past year: Angola, Algeria, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Brunei, Gabon, Guadeloupe, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Macau, Panama, Paraguay, Serbia, Swaziland, Trinidad & Tobago, Tunisia, and Yemen. We have put symbols for each of those countries on our big wall map. We also want to send our sympathy and best wishes to those areas of the world where natural disasters did so much damage during that time.

We are delighted by the response to the Art Forms in Needlework series and plan to add to it each month for the rest of the year. Along with those posts, we will re-visit some techniques from past posts which got the most attention from viewers, like folk embroidery, geometric designs, optical illusions, and needleweaving. The first of these is the subject of the article below, blackwork embroidery. This topic will return later this year as new patterns are developed.

Various pastel ginghams

During the first two years of this blog I wrote several posts about Spanish blackwork and related folk art styles like Russian redwork, Scandinavian whitework, and multicolored Holbein embroidery. One of the projects I started was a series of whimsical blackwork animal patterns appropriate for children. About this time last year, I decided to revisit those patterns and make them into something useful. I consulted our quiltmaker for the Annake’s Garden shop. (You can see our interview with her on the August 16, 2013 post.) She liked the designs and suggested a child’s quilt or puffy comforter. If I could do all of the patterns on pastel quarter-inch gingham, she said, they could be set together with white, since it appears in all the ginghams.

Holbein embroidery lion

She considered that I would need at least eight large blocks, but that 12 would be even better. I was not sure I could find 12 different pastel ginghams, so I planned to do two panels in each of six colors. I had completed a cat, a snail, and the owl seen above, and had the pattern drawn for a fish. I had also made a lion in multicolored Holbein embroidery in a pattern that could easily be converted to blackwork. She encouraged me by pointing out that I was nearly half-way to my dozen patterns already, and we discussed subjects like a turtle, a frog, and a butterfly, as well as several other mammals to go with the cat and the lion.

Chart for Blackwork Owl

So I started working on new sketches and converting them into blackwork patterns like this one for the owl.

But just a few weeks later, our wonderful friend died suddenly after a shockingly brief illness. We were devastated. I folded the ginghams and put them and the patterns away in a drawer, not really expecting to ever look at them again.

Iron-on transfer of fish drawing to gingham

But recently I began to realize that she would have been disappointed that I didn’t go ahead with the project. She would have scolded me for quitting in the middle of it. I got everything out of the drawer and spread it out on my worktable. I made a hot-iron transfer for the outline of the fish (see the directions for making hot-iron transfer on the post for October 6, 2013) and ironed it onto aqua gingham.

I have done many butterfly designs for different kinds of needlework. I looked for one that I could modify for blackwork. I chose this pillow pattern, done in “stained-glass stitchery” (directions on the post for March 8, 2015) on a needlepoint background, and made a very simplified black line design for it. Then I made an iron-on transfer from the black line design. I debated doing a different blackwork design in each section, but decided that would break up the butterfly design too much, so I will do the same blackwork designs on the corresponding parts of both wings, reversing their directions where it is possible to do so.

Butterfly pillow and line drawing

Chart for Blackwork Lion

I have “converted” the lion from Holbein embroidery and made a pattern for him in blackwork. I had previously made a transfer pattern of his outline to iron on the background for the multicolored design. I considered just “refreshing” that pattern, but decided to do a new one instead. I have had some success in re-using iron-on patterns, but they are seldom as sharply drawn as the originals. I wanted this one to be crisp and fresh.

Completing this project will take some time. I will include pictures and patterns throughout the summer as the work progresses. Look for them in our Spring and Summer Questions and Answers posts, as well as in the regular posts. I have a rhinoceros in mind that may require a post all his own! Watch for him to appear in at least two different kinds of needlework.

More stitch patterns

All of the outline drawings and blackwork patterns that you have seen in this post are available for downloading (links at the end of this post*). You can click on the photographs to get an enlarged version of each one. Any of the blackwork patterns can be done in counted cross-stitch by simply substituting an X — or as much of one as possible — for the symbol in each square of the pattern. Equally, they can be done in conventional tent stitch by using a slanted stitch ( / ) to represent each square of the pattern. The little lion can be converted back into Holbein embroidery by simply stitching him in colors. There are some differences in the specific stitch patterns used for the lion, so I suggest that you view the enlarged Holbein embroidery before deciding which stitch patterns you prefer. Or make up your own patterns. Additional pattern segments are shown on the posts for October 6, 2013; February 27, 2014; August 20, 2014 and November 16, 2014.

Same stitch design on different fabrics

The sizes for your designs will vary, depending upon the sizes of the stitches that can be done on various types of canvas, Aida cloth, monks’ cloth, or other evenweave fabrics. I recommend that you try a small amount of pattern (as least a square inch) on a scrap of the background fabric you plan to use. That way you can figure out how large your completed pattern will be and how much fabric you will need. You don’t want to do a lot of work on a design and then find out that there will not be enough space to finish it. I learned that lesson many years ago!

If you are going to do the design in multi-color, I recommend that you color your chart before you choose the yarns or flosses you plan to use. Purchase a little more than you think that you will need of each color. You can always use the leftovers in another project, but you may not always be able to match a color exactly once you have run out of it.

As for the quilt, comforter, playpen pad, or wherever the blocks are eventually used —

someone else will set the blocks together and do the quilting, but it just won’t be the same.

This project is for you, Judy. We miss you so much.

Some of our friend Judy's many beautiful quilts

*To download drawings and patterns, click the following links:
owl chart; butterfly line drawing; lion chart; stitch patterns.

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Four-way Designs from Hawaiian Quilts

Orange & yellow tulips in Annake's garden

Not long ago, we had an interesting question on one of our Question and Answer posts. The question was, “Do four way designs have to be geometric?” (To date most of the four-way designs we have discussed have been for needlepoint, particularly bargello (May 11, 2014, December 22, 2014, August 22, 2016). I replied that the short answer was, “Certainly not!” I went on to say the long answer would require one or more complete posts on the subject. This is the first of those posts. I thought back to a time some years ago when three classes of 5^th grade students had been studying about the tropics, particularly the state of Hawaii. I wanted them to do an art project related to the subject to complete the unit.

I have never asked my students to do a project — from kindergarten drawings to junior college term papers — that I did not do right along with them, so I did some research. I came across some materials about traditional Hawaiian quilts. These were done on square blocks in two colors, one for the cut-out silhouette and one for the background. The subjects were usually native plants as represented by flowers, fruit, and leaves. I did some practicing with colored construction paper.

Annake's pink orchid design on grey paper

Tulip design, cut from a quarter-folded sheet

The next class day, I showed the classes how to cut a piece of rectangular paper to make it square. Then we folded each square into quarters. I drew a simple flower and leaf design on one of the small squares, beginning at the central corner. I cut out the design, unfolded the paper, and turned it over so that the drawing did not show. Pressing the paper flat on a square of a different color produced a design very similar to the Hawaiian quilt designs. I did a different design for each of the three classes and displayed them so they could be studied. Instead of the unfamiliar tropical flowers, I used familiar garden flowers from our town gardens, such as crocuses, tulips, daffodils and irises. I did, however, display photographs of tropical flowers to give them a choice.

Four-way tulip design, unfolded

The assignment was to produce “quilt blocks” of their own. The first task was to produce a corner design that they thought was attractive. Since the drawings would not show on the finished cut-out, each student could do as many as four practice drawings. During the next session, each student chose the best drawing and cut it out of the folded paper (after being cautioned not to cut the four sections apart). Then each student chose a background square in a contrasting color and glued his or her pattern to it, carefully centering it on the background. They were allowed to add additional decoration if they desired.

 

Later all the projects were displayed on a wall of the school cafeteria. Most of the students then took their designs home, but a few wrote notes to me on the backs of their projects and gave them to me, a gesture that pleased me greatly. I want to show you three of these. (Yes, I kept them.) Remember that these were 10-year-old and 11-year-old children. The first one is typical of the designs. It combined a leaf cut-out with drawings of flowers and detailed drawing of the veins in the leaves. The second one is a very carefully and skillfully done cut-out with butterflies added in the corners, facing inward rather than outward. The last one is by a rule-breaker. (Those of you who have been reading these posts for the last four years know that I am a rule-breaker myself, and therefore probably more tolerant of rule-breaking than most people.) While the swans do hold together nicely, they are not connected at the center. It was then necessary for the young artist to place a patch of blue and white “waves” in the hole in the center of the design.

Student "quilt blocks"

Now you may be asking yourself, “What does this have to do with me and my art or needlework?” That's a fair question. I expect, however, that the quilters among you have already started envisioning designs of your own. These might involve silhouettes of animals or toys for a baby's or child's quilt or vehicles or sports equipment for a man's pillow. The possibilities are endless. For those of you who want to further explore Hawaiian quilt designs, and who have a Pinterest® account (www.pinterest.com), there are enough ideas in their archives to keep you busy for years!

But let's return to the simple tulip design. You may wonder why I didn't make all the tulip leaves form “hearts”. That is easy enough to do. Try it for yourself. The answer is that I wanted a design that could be manipulated to fit a rectangle as well as a square. Since I had the pattern made, I cut it out of a couple of papers with patterned designs. Then I tried them in various combinations: plain-on-plain, plain-on-patterned, patterned-on-plain, patterned-on-patterned. Some of the most unlikely color and pattern combinations worked rather well, as you can see below.

Four-way square paterns with different paper combinations

Tip: If you are a beginning quilter, you may find it useful to collect a variety of papers in various colors and patterns. Paint and wallpaper stores and decorator's shops often discard wallpaper pattern books. If you ask them to save those for you, many will do so, especially if you are doing projects with school children, Scouts, senior citizens, etc. It doesn't hurt to ask. Then you can take a pleasing paper pattern with you to a fabric store and look for fabrics in the colors and with similar scale patterns to your paper sample.

On our next post on the subject of four-way designs (later this year), we will discuss multi-colored four-way designs in painting, collage, crewel, tent stitch, reverse applique, etc. In the meantime...

Use your imaginations,

More tulips from Annake's Garden

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