Meaning is the Key

I am feeling really pleased with how my cloth is turning out. I began today by writing text onto the quilt with fabric pen and then added lighter value pencil crayon to make the letters more legible. Then I added pattern to the moth wings with copper paint and sequin waste. Next I added cheesecloth to my brayer and rolled it through copper and black paint and onto the background of the cloth around the labyrinth - you can see this effect in the photo directly above(I was thinking of string theory and the universe). I made a stamp with a key by taping it to a wooden block and then stamped it in gold paint into the center of the labyrinth (photo above the one of the cheesecloth design). I then added feelers to the moths with felt pen (nocturnal creatures who navigate by feel, as I liken how we intuit and create meaning) and then cut a star out of craft foam to use to rub shiva paint stix over. The light stars drew my eye more then the central key, so I thought about how I might alter that - maybe make a trail of gold glitter leading to the key, through the labyrinth? But I was loathe to make it too gilt - I was aiming for some subtlety and a sense of the ephemeral. I ended up putting gold glitter on the stamp of the key to heighten its contrast and I think that works pretty well. You can compare the difference of the key before the glitter and after in the second photo from the top. Each time I made an addition to the cloth, I felt the risk of possibly ruining what I'd done so far - yet I also felt the pull to keep making it more interesting and infusing it further with what I was trying to express. On a different note, yesterday I signed up for Gail Harker's 'A Journey of Visual Discovery: Journals and Sketchbooks. Gail usually teaches at her Creative Studies Center in Washington, but she is here in Victoria in a few months to teach this course and its an opportunity to see whether I might sometime want to take more of her stitch-related courses. I have always kept journals and in recent years I include visual information, but I want to develop my sketchbook abilities further because I still tend to largely use text in mine.