Weaving a Magical World

Cartoonist and illustrator Shelley Knoll Miller weaves together her first love of illustration into her new love for creating beauty from sea debris and milled wool offcuts.

Words by Shelley Knoll-Miller Photography Supplied

Shelley combines the fishing nets and debris that are collected on volunteer “beach patrols” with alpaca wool offcuts, weaving a magical world where her illustrations can come to life. Junkies delved a little deeper into the world of creative detritus.

Tell us a little bit about your work as an illustrator and cartoonist.

I’ve worked as an illustrator and cartoonist for over 20 years, including editorial cartoonist positions with the Melbourne Age newspaper and the Darwin Sun, and freelance illustration work for publishers and magazines such as The Big Issue and Eureka Street.

In 2016, I started to become interested in children’s picture book illustration, and that’s now my main focus. My first illustrated picture book was Shoo Grumpers Shoo, written by comedian Josh Lawson and published by Scholastic in 2018. I’ve spent the last year writing children’s picture books and incorporating weaving into my illustration work.

What led you to become interested in weaving?

I’ve crocheted for years, experimenting with different materials like wire and recycled plastic bags, and doing big-scale projects like large rugs and floor cushions. My foray into weaving began when a local group of artists in Warrnambool, frustrated at the amount of pollution washing up on our beaches, decided to hold a group exhibition that encouraged artists to create art with plastics, old nets or beach rope that had washed ashore. I decided to try weaving with a huge broken net, using an old iron cray pot rim as the frame. The first task was to chop the net into small workable lengths. The net was thick, weathered nylon and really difficult to cut. I found that reflecting on the damage the net could have done to marine life made my hacking efforts very satisfying! Vengeful crafting, ha!

That satisfying, rewarding feeling remained so I’ve just kept weaving. I’ve since gone on to create many weavings, using rope and nets collected by my local Beach Patrol group.

Tell us more about Beach Patrol.

Beach Patrol is a chain of volunteer community groups that comb the beaches picking up anything that will harm local marine life. There are 45 groups in Melbourne, covering over 150 km of beaches. Beach Patrol 3280 actually records what they find to a database, which scientists use for tracking and research purposes. It’s a lot of work done by committed volunteers. I don’t do much of this work; I mostly just use what they collect.

Apart from the nets and rope you find washed up on the beaches, what other materials do you use in your work?

I also use barnacles and seaweed, as it is often tangled up in the rope when it washes up. I was delighted when I discovered the Great Ocean Road Woollen Mill. They run a small herd of alpacas, operate a small woollen mill, and sell their own

yarn. My favourite yarn has come from their ‘bargain box’ of milled wool that was a bit irregular and so not quite up to their regular standard. I’ve also discovered several local spinners of sheep’s wool, seeking out those that produce yarn with a really ‘homemade wobble’ to it! I also scour op shops for leftover yarn. As a frame to my works, I’ve regularly used copper pipe, experimenting with ways to give it that lovely green patina.

The physicality of collecting my resources, and the chats and connections along the way, is sometimes as pleasurable as the work itself. It’s particularly rewarding to collect the rope and nets from Beach Patrol, as they are reluctant to throw it into landfill but, of course, can’t store it all either.

How did your love of weaving and your illustrations work merge into your work featured here?

Several months after starting to weave, I realised that I could incorporate my new hobby into my existing practise as an illustrator. I began combining weaving and illustration, for example using the weavings as a backdrop for a strange alien planet or the sea-bed for a family of seals. My first efforts proved popular on social media, so I just kept experimenting. As well as exhibiting the original weavings (which sold out), I have since written a picture book based around the illustration weavings. It’s a space adventure to a strange alien planet and the weavings form the planet’s surface.

computer, drawing with a tablet. In some ways, you have to work that way because it’s a competitive market and it’s so much quicker to edit changes if you are working digitally. But whilst appreciating the ease of working, most of us miss the physicality of brushes and paint, the scratch of a pen across a page. Bringing weaving into my illustration work has brought a lovely tactility back. It’s been a delightful, if somewhat unexpected, journey.

Do you think your eye for detail as a cartoonist and illustrator has helped you and maybe inspired your weaving work?

Working as a creative for a long time always hones your visual skills. It’s all the same process of looking at your work, tilting your head to the side like a confused dog, and asking yourself “What does this work need to be better?”.

I think 20 years working as an illustrator has taught me to be more patient. I used to get really frustrated at my efforts and then overwork things or make hasty decisions, when I really should have just set the page aside and slept on it. You really can look at something for too long and it sort of muddies your vision. So I’m thankful that I am more patient now, in that each weaving takes a long time to complete. Chopping up a weaving in frustration, and then waking up in the morning and seeing a solution that I could have tried, would be incredibly frustrating!

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