Mary's art is a big stitch-up (From St Helens Star)
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Mary's art is a big stitch-up
12:00pm Tuesday 29th January 2013 in News
Mary has created more than 130 colourful pieces of her embroidery art, 71 of which are on display in the exhibition.
WHILE many artists use a brush to create their masterpieces, Mary Roscoe is a dab hand with sewing needles.
As a young woman, Mary sewed together remnants from local stores to make a dress to go dancing on a Saturday night.
Some 20 years later, she saw an Impressionist painting in an exhibition and was inspired to take up her needles again.
And another 30 years on, you can admire the amazing results in a new exhibition in The Godfrey Pilkington Art Gallery at The World of Glass.
“I originally took up painting,” said Mary, who lives in Prescot.
“But it was a Monet painting that made me switch to what I call ‘painting with needles’.
“My copy of it was my first embroidery and visitors will be able to see it in the exhibition.”
Since then, Mary has created more than 130 colourful pieces of her embroidery art, 71 of which are on display in the exhibition.
She said: “My house feels a bit empty at the moment. Normally they are all covering the walls, lining the stairs and even spreading into the garage.”
Her subjects range from royal jubilees and Buckingham Palace garden parties to football fans, galloping horses, pigeons and dogs. And she still copies those Impressionist artists she loves so much.
Before starting to stitch, Mary blocks in the colour with children’s paints on white cotton – even using old bed sheets at times.
She then builds up her images with a combination of French knots, straight stitches, and occasionally chain stitch, often creating a 3-D effect.
Each piece takes many hours of work and at least one has taken more than six months to complete.
Elegance in Embroidery, Mary’s exhibition, runs at The World of Glass until Saturday, March 16.
