I finally finished my Raven and Skull bag. It's one of what I call my book reports, which is to say I read a book and then after mulling it over for a bit, I design a piece of beadwork about the story. The book in this case is " A Raven Named Grip" by Marilyn Singer. The story goes that Charles Dickens had a raven ( actually several ), Grip who could speak. He made him a character in his book "Barnaby Rudge". When Dickens went to America from England, he met with Edgar Allen Poe who had read the book and he saw a portrait of Dickens children with Grip. This stuck with Poe and later he was inspired to write the poem " The Raven". So in this piece of beadwork I was trying to capture a mood, a bit victorian, a bit spooky. The challenge on the beadwork was all the black. I put the leaves behind the raven beak to keep the dark colors from running together. Contrast is always the name of the game. Ofcourse, ravens and skulls are some of my favorite subject matters and I do love to combined them with bright red roses.
