NL – ENG
The Making of..
For A Story of Unfolding Wings, I weaved 8.4 meters of fabric, in five canvases. I always used gray yarn in the warp and weft to outline the frames. I experienced the weaving of the two Boymask cloths as heavy. It was about a period of my life that was often difficult. But it also worked meditatively, it was yet another method of looking back on that period. The weaving of the subsequent fabrics was always a different experience. Waiting was exciting to weave because I wasn’t sure if my idea would work, so the weaving really felt like waiting. Assesement & Transitioning was based on an earlier weave, Ocular Aurora. It just felt playful and lighthearted weaving this, although the Assesement piece in particular was again a little more difficult to make. Unmaksed & Sereniy was especially very nice to weave. Both chapters are about euphoria!
During the seven months I spent weaving the cloths, I built up experience in ways of creating moving images out of fabric. The last fabric I weaved was Unmaksed & Sereniy, in which I used the Shuffle weaving technique. A weaving technique I found in my research project Weaving Glicthes, which I carried out simultaneously with A Story of Unfolding Wings. The technique turned out to be perfect for animation. There’s still much to discover!
After the weaving came the photographing. I did that mostly in two session of I guess a total of six full days. And another couple of days in an earlier session of which all the photos turned out to be out of focus. I had invented a system to make the picture taking faster. I wrapped the fabric around a short lath so that I could lay down a row of six frames flat each time. This in turn was on a board that I could slide up between two guides frame-by-frame. I borrowed a system camera from the Digital Art Lab, which handled light just a bit better than my own SLR. Fabrics are tricky to photograph because unwanted contrast arises quickly. The golden tip for softening the light came from Jasper Letschert, who had found this solution earlier. I used two loose layers of baking paper under each of my two LED lights, to the left and right of the camera.
In total, I took 1056 usable photos of the individual frames. In Photoshop, I stacked series of frames on top of each other in layers, in a basic document with guide lines that I had made beforehand. I corrected the ratio frame by frame by scaling with the selection tools. I also often had to digitally “straighten” the fabric a little more. Then I cut the document out at 3840×2160 pic, 4K/UHD, and saved it as a PSD. I used Animate to automatically place the layers in the PSD document one after the other, and test it by playing back the created clip. In Animate, I created an export of the placed images in PNG files. The PNG files I then imported as an image sequence into Premiere, where I edited the movie and sounds.
I embroidered the titles together with Noa Mac Donald in NOOF, New Order Of Fashion. NOOF is a textile workshop in Eindhoven, a kind of makerspace but for textiles. A heavenly environment! We were given a basic workshop in embroidery with the embroidery machine, and then a race against time ensued to embroider eight titles, three times each, in one day. Fortunately, there was a workshop after us, which allowed us to work just a little longer!
It was great to work with Noa. She also works with textiles, and with animation, and we are both very geeky. Working together gives extra energy and inspiration. I sometimes forget that, because I just love to weave on my own. The same goes for working away from home, NOOF is a nice place to work, I will definitely work there more often! Also because they have a 24 shaft dobby loom on site. With that, I can weave even more complex shapes than I already do, and with that, longer sequences.
For the soundtrack of A Story of Unfolding Wings, I asked Eefje Habraken. She plays violin in the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, but she is also my niece. As a child I could play with her without thinking about my boy mask. I even dressed up in skirt or dress there sometimes. So I asked her if she thought it would be an idea to think of something for A Story of Unolding Wings.
The first session was on the images in Assessment and Transitioning. She said she was a little worried because she is not practiced in improvisation. But I think exactly her classical training enabled her to compose something special; she responded to every change in the image with precision, as if it were notation. Together with Jasper Letschert who recorded the sound, we had three sessions. In the living room, so with multiple re-takes due to ambient noise. In the second session we recorded Boymask, and in the last session Unmasked and Serenity. Watching the film back, I keep feeling tears in my eyes at various moments. Eefje connected so affectionately with the images I made, the feeling is indescribable.
The noise in Boymask I recorded myself. It came from sound mechanisms I made from material found on the beach, as a beach comb artist in the last years before I learned to know and embrace my trans identity. The clock in Waiting Jasper recorded at the Huis van Gijn in Dordrecht.
Credits
Weaving, editing – Stellata Koppe
Violin, soundtrack composition – Eefje Habraken
Audio recording soundtrack – Jasper Letschert
Thank you!
WORM & Transpodium – for a stage and your trust
CKC Digital Art Lab – for borrowing your photo camera
Noa – for helping with embroidery at New Order Of Fashion
Thank you for being there during my transition Diane, Marian, Eefje, Jasper, Marijke, Marleen, Sandra, Daniela, Christel, Wouter, Monique, Elena, Fenna, Floor, Mariëlle, Dee, Pat, Nan, Babs,Vliedinnen, ex-Studio KO, Ilya, and so many many more! And my cat Sierra of course.
Love you!
Thank you so much for your donations, because of your support I could spread my wings and weave!
Amelie Veenstra, Andrea Grevink, Anka Pajor, Anne-Merceded Langhorst, Annemarie, Astrid van Rijn, Babs Loonen, Barbara van Olffen, Brighter World / Good to Give , Carolien Adriaansche, ChrisKrassen , Claudia Borges, Corrie Ettinger Tromp †, Daniëlle Brand, Dee, Diane van Ruyven, Dineke Keemink, Elena Gracia Santolaria, Emmelie, ETZorg, Fam. Brokking-Maltas-Ponjee, Fenna de Jong, Floor Van Meeuwen, Hans Beekmans, Hans en Hermien Lindeijer, Heleen Koppe, Indira Scholtmeijer , Inge Gijsbers, Inge Janse, Jacco van de Ree, Janneke, Javier, Jelka, Karin B, lichun, Loes van der Wolf, Mara de Baas, mariëlle, Marjatta Fehres, Marleen de Puydt, Mathijs, Mianne De vries, Miranda Pronk, Mishika, Monique Roering , Nia Konstantinova, Nicole, Noor Bink, Piem Wirtz, Pieternel, pooh, Quinna Sophia, Rachel Bellwinkel , Rowanne, Sandra Fauconnier, Sandra Langhorst , seriousFilm, Spinspul, Susanne Bout, trees burger / Admini Exact, Willemijn , Willy, Wouter, and all who donated anonymous too!
And thanks so much for your suport Gemeente Rotterdam, Voordekunst en het Cultuurfonds Zuid-Holland / Leve het Geven
If you are trans yourself, or have a loved one who is trans, or if you are on the waiting list at VUMC and are looking for a quicker way, consult the website of https://transvisie.nl (NL) or https://www.transgenderinfo.be (BE).