Marilyn Rea-Menzies – Verve – the Joy of Life

I taught myself to weave tapestries in early 1980 and became totally hooked on the process. Being an artist and drawing and painting since childhood, I found that tapestry was the best fit for my weaving practice. Since then, there has never been a time when there isn’t something on my loom. These days a lot of my designs are from my own photographs, manipulated on the computer, most recently focussing on the native bush and forests of New Zealand.
However, in the past I wove a lot of commissioned portraits, and the subject and design for my Verve tapestry was taken from one of my granddaughters’ selfie photographs. It represents joy in the life of a teenage girl.
These three images below were the results of manipulating a photograph of my granddaughter – different colourways. I chose to weave the third image. The fourth image shows the work in progress, woven on its side.