Ditch

W31.5 cm × H38 cm

Living in the countryside means I am surrounded by ditches, grasses and rushes, and I never tire of watching them. Dead stems weave between fresh green growth, tiny drops of dew catch the light, and everything moves together in the breeze. What could seem like an ordinary patch of vegetation becomes an endlessly changing abstract pattern of colour, texture and line.

The photograph I took was never intended to be copied. It simply reminded me of the colours, movement and atmosphere I experienced while standing there. The embroidery became the place where those memories could grow into something more expressive than the original scene.

Using free-motion embroidery, I layered thousands of flowing stitches to echo the rhythm of grasses bending in the wind. Threads overlap, twist and sweep across the surface, creating a sense of constant movement. The changing colours of the threads mirror the richness of the landscape itself, where greens mingle with russet, gold, mauve and brown.

Although inspired by a familiar country ditch, this piece is also an exploration of abstraction. Viewed closely it becomes a tapestry of stitched marks and intersecting lines; from a distance the landscape quietly emerges again. It celebrates the extraordinary beauty hidden within the ordinary places we pass every day.