Certain pieces of artwork speak to me. When I saw bananakin‘s original CLASSROOM VOLUNTEER it screamed at me. Maybe it was that adorable little grin and giant hand? Or maybe it took me back to school? You know, the fun years, when I was constantly raising my hand to volunteer to pass back graded tests to fellow students. Or stay after class to help and organize.
I’m kind of the same way now, but way more selective when asking people if they need help. Either way, after months of asking and trying to figure out how it may work, I set out to recreate CLASSROOM VOLUNTEER. I gathered a little fabric stash and thought out ways to make the new piece unique while keeping the style.
One of my original ideas was to incorporate movement. After testing fraying, I decided to tuck that one away. I had sticky, gluey fingers and I wasn’t willing to risk this special-to-me fabric.
Why is it special? Because I dyed it! The background fabric is tie-dyed and very thick. All of those tiny blue stitches provided lots of finger pokes trying to find out where the needle was about to pop out.
Thick fabric and I are now in an embroidery stand-off.
The main features – face and hands – are also hand-dyed. That fabric truly provided an amazing shade that I didn’t know I needed when I made it, which was a stunning surprise.
Combining the two was magic. Seeing him bring it all together and include both of our work will never get old. Now, when it came to naming it…I struggled. There were a couple of reasons. He uses ALL CAPS on titles, while I decided lowercase was what I wanted for mine. [Side note: as a transcriber is a very difficult habit to take on.]
So, I kept it simple.
Classroom Volunteer includes a bananakin animation that features my physical hoop for the original collector + five profile pictures that can illustrate your emotional state. 😉
