Susan was taught how to sew, knit and embroider by her Scottish Mother, Aunt and Grandmothers.
Educated in Yorkshire, Susan D’souza is an American born Textile Artist and experienced Textiles Lecturer. Susan’s artwork has a focus on nature, transience and seasonal shifts in texture and colour. Starting with observation and photography from large scale landscapes or small scale natural fragments, images are selected and translated through mixed media textiles, appliqué, paper collage machine and hand stitch. Often the work takes the form of a series or sequential set of images showing change over time. Batik and natural dyes are a feature of more recent work, sustainability is increasingly at the heart of Susan’s textile work and research interests.
Susan’s Mediums
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A French word that means 'to apply' pieces that are cut and stitched in layers to create a form of a textile collage.
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For my hand embroidery, I use simple stitches like running and satin stitch, worked in groups with cotton or silk embroidery thread to create areas of detail, texture and rhythm.
The machine embroidery elements use free motion embroidery, which involves adjusting the sewing machine to work freely with rayon threads almost like drawing with thread to build up areas of pattern and texture.
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Batik is an ancient wax resist technique. Layers of molten wax are added using tools or brushes to resist the dyes. Colour is then hand painted on building up in layers light to dark colours, between layers of wax which are ironed out once the piece is complete.
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Plant materials including leaves, petals, chopped roots, bark or powdered dye extracts are used in dye pots with water and mordants to set them on the fabric. They are either immersed in pots of water or painted with extracts to create a range of natural colours. I work mainly with weld (yellow), indigo (blue) and madder (red) which have good light and wash fast properties, over dyeing to achieve a wider range of colours. Walnut gives good browns and logwood for grey.