Here is another treatment of the ghost deer idea, which
involves overstitching the painted background of the piece with a repetitive
pattern of lines. I decided to combine the deer with another idea I’ve been
working on, trying to capture some of the luminous effects of autumn leaves.
The deer exists only as an outline, but the leaves are embroidered in several
shades of yellow, orange and red. The leaves are stitched over a painted background
of greens and browns, which does help give a bit of depth to the whole thing
Ghost deer, real tree
In spite of being just a test piece, this sold very quickly
at the exhibition, and I’m encouraged to carry on with the idea. The leaves
should be a bit larger, I think, and next time I’ll add a pale gold halo
painted around the outside of the leaves, just to make the tree a bit more luminous