The Rolling Stones, Lips 40x40 Mosaic

The album mosaics is an idea that was formulated while I was working on the album series. Since I embroider directly through the album covers I am limited by the size of the album to establish the finished piece. While there are a few albums that are double or triple foldouts, most albums are only 12”x12” in size. While I was looking at the installation wall I envisioned larger pieces and then it dawned on me how to accomplish that. I envisioned each album, recreated as a mosaic, with hundreds on 2”x2” tiles comprising the album cover. The mosaics tiles have been found in pieces I have created over the last 5 years, from my Americana series to the Shine a Light series and even as abstracts. The images or icons on each tile are hand digitized then each tile is individually embroidered and crafted as a separate piece and then combined to form an image. Some pieces contain hundreds of these individual pieces. The icons themselves also tell a story, and that story is different with each piece. Since each of these pieces contain hundreds of elements they are the hardest of my pieces to fabricate. The icons in The Rolling Stones tongue features over 50 different rock and roll icons including electric guitars, skulls, amplifiers, drum sets, microphones and many more, when combined they form the giant tongue.   40x40x2 inches, framed in acrylic.