Five years ago, when I saw a photo of my four-month-old grandson, I considered trying to embroider his image using vibrant colors and my favorite stitch: the French knot. I began hesitantly with the eyes, knowing that the final result would only reveal itself once the entire portrait was finished. It turned out beautifully—and I was hooked!
Since then, I have created quite a few small portraits, each one taking at least 40 hours to complete.
My desire to keep learning is ever present, so I searched for online courses to explore new techniques. That’s when I discovered the work of Nneka Jones, who shares her expertise on Domestika.
Helder became my next model. This time, the portrait would be larger and monochrome, in shades of blue—his favorite color. The main challenge was deciding the direction of the stitches. I planned to use long and short stitches, but determining their flow was difficult. I eventually decided to print an image of the facial muscles and let the stitches follow the natural direction of the muscles.
At the beginning, I wasn’t sure it would turn out well. I even considered stopping altogether, but my husband encouraged me to continue. I’m very glad I did.
For this piece, I used Anchor six-strand embroidery threads (reference) instead of the DMC Retors 4 tapestry threads I usually work with.
After many, many hours of stitching—while listening to audiobooks or embroidering in the car during visits to my mother or daughter—the portrait slowly came to life.
Once the color-blocked areas were finished, I was extremely happy with the result. I decided to stop there and not blend the colors further.
The work reminded me of the book I received last Christmas, Painting Portraits in Acrylics by Hashim Akib, whose portraits are beautifully executed using a color-blocking technique
And so, Helder has been immortalized in his embroidered portrait.
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