G[r]eek Alphabet : M is for Medusa

The first thing that happened when I started making this one was I felt that although I liked my design as a drawing I was not looking forward to making or embroidering the snakes so small and so many.

 
So I decided I needed to make her head larger so the snakes could be larger and easier and played with how this would work.

With this first test sketch I was hoping it would have more of a Scarlet Witch type effect. Like this image:

But it didn't entirely work with the v of the M hitting Medusa's head.

So then I thought of bringing her head down further.

The hair and style is influenced by ancient Greek Pottery designs of Medusa.

So then I thought I better make her a little smaller and thought I'd bring her to one side like Athena in A or Heracles in H.

This brought in a new issue - what was I going to do with her snake hair so that it doesn't obscure the M too much? At first I thought the hair might be OK if the M was strong enough.
I started colour testing it with a strong red coloured letter M and making her hair go different ways.

This final sketch made it clear to me that most of the hair would have to be behind the M.

Then it was back to materials. I had chosen this funky fun stretchy cord that was shiny but it was also quite pale and the background cloth was pale yellow, so I went back to option 2 - green felt as I couldn't face hemming up all the snakes.

I did debate making her darker but I was already a bit edgy that the one bad person (or nasty character) on the alphabet was a woman, I didn't fancy making the one black woman in the selection a monster. I had some additional debates about including such a scary character as well at all at this point but decided kids like a few monsters. I was also cheered by finding on a funky classics website that in some versions Medusa is just born a monster rather than a punishment for pride and beauty! See Theoi : Medusa and the Gorgons which includes translated primary source literary references.

After that it was pretty simple to make being mainly ribbon and felt.

When I came to pin down the dress/top I was getting fed up with the way the pins buckle the fabric when you are using such a small piece. I used a technique that would normally only be used to pin things in place on a cushion - see below pins like studs

 From the back you can see the pins look like a hedgehog but they were very easy to avoid and sewing went quickly meaning you could get rid of them pretty quickly.

 So there we go! She's done! I may add in some shoulder brooches. I haven't decided at this point. I rather like her. Specially the eyes and forked tongues on the snakes.

I even looked up whether snakes have pink tongues - some certainly seem to!