Embroidered Nature : The Art of Amanda Cobbett in the Buccleuch Collection - Andrew Montgomery

To look at Amanda Cobbett's work is to be transported deep into the heart of the forest,' writes Richard, Duke of Buccleuch, in his foreword. 'Tiny mushrooms spring from the stalks of decomposing leaves. Twigs and bark, both wind-fallen and living, are tufted, crusted and cushioned with mosaics of lichens and mosses of astonishing variety.'Although at first glance the pieces look entirely real, they are in fact embroideries, composed of thousands of threads, painstakingly worked and reworked into their final forms. Embroidered Nature catalogues the collection of embroidered sculptures inspired by fungi and lichen discovered in four strikingly different landscapes linked to the Buccleuch family: at Bowhill, in the Scottish Borders, at Dalkeith Palace, just south of Edinburgh, at Drumlanrig Castle in Scotland's warmer, wetter southwest, and at Boughton in Northamptonshire. Natasha Goodfellow, who has long followed Amanda's work, describes her approach and methods, and Andrew Montgomery's astonishingly precise photographs bring her works to vivid life on the page. This exquisite a book is also richly illustrated with dozens of Amanda's own photographs and watercolours. Where possible Amanda has given the specimens' genera and species names.�By also including the date, time and weather conditions of when they were found, she builds an ephemeral snapshot of what she encountered - a scene that most probably will never occur�in exactly this way again. Montgomery's plates are accompanied by her field notes, OS grid references and Goodfellow's commentary on both lichen and fungi portrayed and the techniques employed. The pieces Amanda makes are largely experimental. She works with�a basic domestic sewing machine but doesn't always stick to the same techniques, preferring in part to let nature dictate the outcome. Free-motion embroidery allows her to extemporise with the needle, and, by altering the machine's tension, stitch length and direction, she can control the colours in the bobbin and the spool. Thanks to their three-dimensional nature, the embroideries are intensely intricate.