trip to Guelph and back

We went to Guelph on the weekend to pick up my show at the Greenwood Quiltery. The show took up two rooms and according to everyone there as well as the comments in the guest book, it was well received. Thank you so much for the respect you gave my work, Christine and Joanne. The photo above is of the rolled up textile pieces that we dumped on the sofa last night, but looked so nice in the morning sun this morning. On the way home we drove through Mennonite country near Elora and further North, near Shelburne we stopped to listen to these windmills and were relieved to hear nothing. They are silent. A wind farm is going up next year on Manitoulin and there has been a great deal of controversy about it locally.

May Harvest

time passes so quickly beauty
brevity

tree drawings

I've been parking my car on country roads and drawing ash trees with pencil into a book of hand made watercolour paper. The water colour paint was put on afterwards, in the studio, from memory.

My dissertation research is a little more focused after this morning's tutorial. I am energized by the idea of researching Finnish and Japanese art textiles and considering their similar aesthetic.

And here is the photo of Ned and his big fish as requested.

gathering, processing, learning

The tan velvet was dyed with dandelions, the yellow fabrics with daffodils.




When I gathered the dandelions about a week ago, I also started harvesting daffodil blooms that were past their prime.









These were placed in a bowl of water to soak, and more were added as they became 'available'. I placed the bowl in the sun sometimes and stirred in two narrow strips of cotton. Yesterday I completed processing the daffodils with a double hot process. A) simmering then straining the flower heads, then B) simmering the result with the pre mordanted cloth for half an hour and leaving it to sit overnight. I wonder if that much heat was necessary.

Ash Trees

I have been noticing ash trees this spring. Late bloomers, they are the last tree to leaf out.

On Monday I went sketching with a sixteen year old and we drew ash trees. I drew another one today. Ash Tree: The Scandinavian sacred Cosmic Tree, the Yggdrasil, the Tree of Life. The ash also typifies adaptability, prudence, modesty.

zen circle

We're beginning the second panel at the Little Current United Church. It's the simplest design of the four, a large circle made from small pieces inside a square made from larger pieces. The original design was painted on paper last summer. Striped fabric is made by sewing two strips of tablecloth or silk lengthwise, cutting the result in half and sewing it together along the long edge, then repeating this process about three more times. This is then cut into narrow strips and hand sewn with back stitch onto the twelve horizontal foundation strips. At the same time Earth Ark, the first panel, is being hand quilted. This is a big job, and I went into the church hall three times last week to work on it. A small group attends the project every week. I had hoped that momentum would build.

folklore

I've started to read the book ON LONGING by Susan Stewart because I discovered that one of my favourite artists, Ann Hamilton, was influenced by it early in her career. Susan Stewart describes modernist novels (like those by James Joyce and Virgina Woolf) as being difficult. They, (like modernist painting) distance the author from the general reader. Susan Stewart reminds us about how folk tales were told around winter kitchen tables and summer campfires in a conversational way. (with no distance) I am reminded of how folk art, because the hand of the maker is so very evident, is like wise intimate. Unlike the mass produced slickness that we have become used to and expect in our daily lives.

"Both the electric toaster and Finnegan's Wake turn their makers into absent and invisible fictions." susan stewart

learn to do by doing

On Saturday morning I harvested dandelion flower heads.
In the evening I boiled them for 30 minutes to make a dye bath. I followed advice from a varieity of books on the subject. I chose to use silk because apparently dandelions dye animal fibre better. I wish I had put a little wool in as well to see if there was a brighter result. I mordanted two kinds of silk with alum and cream of tarter, following instructions. Dye stuff and flowers had to be in equal amounts so I used 6 inch pieces of fabric. The fabrics had to be brought to a simmering point and then be allowed to cool down again, remaining in the liquid over night. On Sunday I combined the fabrics in the dye and brought everything to a simmer and kept it simmering for an hour, but again the fabrics had to be allowed to cool and sit in the 'dye' overnight. This morning, nothing magical happened to turn the tan fabric yellow.

Dyeing with natural dyes is labour intensive, slow, and unpredicatble but I knew that. This is a process I have wanted to DO for years. I am posting this as evidence of my own learning.
Any advice on getting yellow rather than tan?

I heart you

I took this quilt over to the Perivale gallery today along with the two new mixed media pieces and a watercolour. The quilt is 90 inches high and may be too large to display, but Shiela kept it anyway to see if she could place it. Perivale gallery is in a period of flux, as Shiela's daughter, Shannon, has moved to Manitoulin to help her mother and eventually take over the gallery. I feel change in the air. Today is my dad's 87th birthday and since he usually reads my blog, I'll take this opportunity to say Happy Birthday DAD!!! The photo of April and Grampa was taken two weeks ago when we shared an ice cream cake for her birthday.

a reason to get up

I've tried not to post photos of my flowers. It seems indulgent, off topic, and as if I have nothing to say about what's going on with my art life. I'm giving in today, because sometimes the art and even more so - the 'life' - over whelms me and I have trouble facing the day. I know that this is all part of being alive, part of the emotional ride, and that once I have some time and space to catch my breath and actually breathe, I'll be revived. But for now, looking at these perky up-right blobs of colour and smelling the wonderful fresh air here in my own yard is reason enough to get out of bed. Aren't tulips wonderful?

grounds and mediums

fluid acrylic over molding and crackle paste on canvas paper

If you want to learn something, try teaching it.

I've been using the following as texts for the creative water media class. They have helped me a lot in regard to acrylics. Rheni Tauchid's The New Acrylics and Mary Todd Beam's Celebrate Your Creative Self and The Creative Edge.

akrasia, a new word for me

Why do we fail to carry out what we choose to do?
Akrasia is the inability to carry out what we plan to do. According to Aristotle it has has two parts.
a) weakness of will
b) impetuousness

This information is from the book, The Vehement Passions by Philip Fisher . I'm starting my dissertation research with learning more about the emotions.

I continue to stitch this piece of linen.

mixed media with stitch

open heart
encaustic on paper, thread on silk, text by T.S. Eliot
Shield for my open heart
block print, couched metal thread on book pages

The Perivale gallery opens for the season on May 23 so I took these two new mixed media pieces over to Minemoya for framing today.
We had snow.

new directions

Contemplating new work. Easing back into my art.