Multi tasking

I always work better when I have a few projects going on at the same time. It puts me in my zone, which is my favorite place to be. Right now I'm stitching on some of the A View Within work, and this kind stitching is pretty mindless.

Up on my design wall is an idea for the "Loss" series, with a few samples of what I want to do right where I can see them when I glance up.

Over on the window are some x-rays a friend gave us of a family member, taken in 1958.  We are thinking about a miniseries, and when I take a break from stitching, I make some sketches,

and work on some color samples.

I work so much better when I take my time and ponder my ideas.  I'm usually not happy with work that I rush through.  I don't have any deadlines right now, so I'm just doodling along, in my happy place

A This and That Post

I have been crazy busy with various deadlines, travels and art excursions.  A few weeks ago I took a class at Arrowmont, in Gatlinburg Tenn. with Yoshiko Wada. In this class we explored ways of giving our work more dimension, and I was introduced to my first indigo dye bath. 

I loved the immediateness of indigo, no waiting for the colors to set, just dip and rinse. I didn't love the idea of maintaining a dye bath, which involves feeding it a sucrose solution and generalized babying. I'm not sure how much of this I would do at home. The best part of the class was spending time with Yoshiko. She pushed me to experiment a lot more with my work, take some chances, risk some failures. I came home rather immobilized, not sure where to go with my ideas. I made a few samples, cut some things up, stitched some wire to old samples to bend them. Now I'm looking at these experiments while back in my comfort zone of stitching and dyeing. It takes time to move forward.

A few days after I was home, Ted and I went to CAFAM to see the paperworks exhibit. One of my favorites was Susan Sironi, whose carved up books were amazing. The piles of "leftover" paper was a testament to the work involved.

The second artist I was interested in was Lorenzo Hurtado Segovia.

When looking at his website, I couldn't find anything resembling this work.  It fascinated me,

I think because it was simple and complex at the same time.

All that paper, woven together to make these shapes.

Paula and I have an exhibit going on currently at  Penn College which has been getting a lot of play on Facebook. It was included in a "slow art" day, in which viewers were invited to study a piece of art for 20 minutes, then draw and discuss it, and it was exciting to see some radiology students recognize the images they were looking at.

Our A View Within work has a busy schedule next year, traveling to Oregon, Florida and Illinois, with a possible stop in Houston.  I'm excited to see our art out in the public eye.

Artist Talk

It seems like I only blog when I have an upcoming event, which is not good at all, so I'm going to try to get back into blogging once a week.  That being said, I do have an upcoming event!  I'm going to be giving an artist talk at the Monday, August 3rd at 7pm at the Monterey Peninsula Quilt Guild.  My talk is "Finding What's Meaningful Through Experimentation", which is going to focus on how I was able to figure out what I love to do.
In addition to the work I am making for A View Within, I have been working on some more personal work.  I'm trying to work in three dimension, and I'm trying to delve into loss, separation and broken connections, without hitting you over the head with emotions.  It's not easy, but it's very satisfying.

I'm going to do a series of posts about working on an installation, and all the challenges that brings.
In the meantime, here is another, two dimensional (back in my comfort zone) piece

Busy, But Not With Art

I have felt like I'm in limbo land the last few weeks.  After returning from India, I had several projects to work on.

I made a busy book for my grandson Holden, who's 1 1/2.  I included zippers, buttons,

and his favorite, buckles. It's been so long since I've sewn 5/8 inch seems, I kept checking myself, sure I was doing everything wrong.

I needed to shorten the pants on a few outfits I bought for the granddaughters, Riley and Marlee

I just had to guess at the sizes, and luckily I guessed large.

I am continuing on a 3D exploration of the body, to be incorporated into A View Within

And the best thing was a trip to Phoenix to welcome our new granddaughter, Zoey Gwendolyn

and to play dress up with her big sister

I'm starting to get back into my routine now, I've been craving it for a while

Patchwork Professional

Some of the good publicity to come out of my solo show at Art Quilt Gallery New York  was the attention it got from Dorothee Crane, the publisher of Patchwork Professional

This is a German magazine, published quarterly.

I was surprised to see the length of the article, I had only expected one or two pages.

Originally Dorothee wanted to focus on my travel journals, seen below,

but she ended up publishing pieces from my current work with "A View Within", from my texture series, and from the "Twelve by Twelve" challenge.

It's pretty cool to see my work in such a beautiful magazine.


Patchwork Professional

When It Rains...

It actually is raining here, but that's not what I'm referring to.

Yesterday, Paula and I gave a brief Skype talk to META http://www.meetup.com/ArtsTechNJ/ , which is a group of scientists, engineers, and artists who get together monthly and frequently find common ground in their very different fields.  Madelaine Shellaby, from Art Times Two Gallery
http://www.arttimestwo.com/present-exhibition.htmlarranged the meet up and it was really fun to  talk about our work to people from other walks of life.

Today, I took some time off from fiber art to play around with encaustics again.  I tried stitching some cylinders out of organza, then applying wax and manipulating them into different shapes.  This lead to more questions than answers, but that's what's so fun about all of this.

Next Thursday I am heading to New York for the opening of my solo show at the Art Quilt Gallery in the Chelsea district.  This has been in the planning stages for several months and I'm really excited to be able to see it in person. http://www.artquiltgallerynyc.com/The_ArtQuilt_Gallery_NYC/The_Art_Quilt_Gallery_in_New_York.html  ( I just realized my name is wrong on the announcement!)

It almost seems like a retrospective, since they are showing work from as long ago as 2010, and it will be interesting to see how my arts has changed over that time.

I feel crazy busy right now, but it's all good things so I'm not complaining at all.  I am looking forward to some serious studio time when I get back though.

SAQA Auction

I have been working like crazy in my studio, creating new pieces for my collaboration with Paula, "A View Within", and making a small series for the Twelve by Twelve theme Metamorphosis.  I also took some time to make a 12" piece for the SAQA auction.  This is from a sample I made for a larger piece, trying to see if wool felting I used as batting would cause too much waffling of the fabric.  Turns out, when I blocked it the piece was fine.  I cut this down to size and added  little handstitching.  It's one of those pieces that's difficult to photograph properly, because of the black/white and because there is so much texture. This is not an official photo, just something quick for the blog.

For the body images series, I'm working on a fractured wrist next, and I wanted to do some shibori  for the two arm bones (radius and ulna).  This worked out really well, with some random marks left over on the side.

This will be the 15th in a series for this work, and I can't see slowing down yet.