I lost my spiral necklace

I lost my spiral necklace. I wore it every day for thirty years. A simple metal spiral, quite large, it hung from a leather lace. I don't have a photo of it. Sometimes I wore it underneath my blouse, like an amulet. It was simple, curvy. It was me.
This may seem trivial, but to me, it is not.
Loss. Disappearance. I wonder if it was my fault? There must be a reason.

intimate, repetitive, slow, the body

Last night, I found areas that needed mending. Touch precedes language

Textiles are about touch

Textiles are intimate Textiles are slow to make

Textile processes are repetitive

Textiles are made with the body On the surface of a table were 14,000 human and animal teeth arranged in patterns according to their shape and size, not their species. These teeth were set into red iron oxide powder in a pristine manner as the slightest movement would stain the teeth. The hours of labour by Ann Hamilton and her colleagues was evident. The gathering, cleaning, and placing of this community of teeth one by one, omnivore beside herbivore beside carnivore was reverent and ritualistic.

These visceral materials, teeth, red staining, and the scientific order brings up ideas of the last supper, the holocaust, and lost time. Freudian and Jungian dream analyses tells us that when teeth fall out in dreams, they are symbols of loss.

The red coloured images are from Joan Simon's book about Ann Hamilton, illustrating her installation Between Taxonomy and Communion (1990)

memory or hope?

Luce Irigaray speaks about the invisible self and how it is accessed by the caress. The caress helps humans, both genders, into intimacy with the self.

Our inner world is glimpsed through our hands. Using the senses, specifically the sense of touch, is the way to reach that temporary moment of loss and realization. The inner self does not respond to didactic thought, but to suggestions of experience, recollection, and dream. A thread, a mark, a colour, a pared down open space distract us and invite contemplation.

Le Nouveau Louvre opens today in Sudbury. An image of my other piece can be seen on Judy's update.

my time in Barbados

fabric strips and cotton embroidery floss on canvas

The panel in the front was stitched while in Barbados. The panel just behind it covers the eleven previous days. Visually, the trip was very stimulating. The colours in the architecture and foliage were brilliant and nourishing. The air was hot and humid. I was so impressed with the people I saw on the streets. I feel a respect for the Bajan culture and hope that these photos show that respect. In 2007, I studied batik with Gasali Adeyemo and he told his students that to dress well was a gift to others, a sign of respect.




















I took most of these photos while walking. I asked permission from some of the subjects, but must admit that most were done quickly and because I was in love. I rarely post photos of figures, even though the human figure and how we each get through our lives is the main inspiration of my work. Concerned about ethics and boundaries, I offer these up to the internet with, as stated before, the greatest respect.

tropical update

Ned and I are visiting with relatives in Barbados for a week. We have never done this much traveling before.

I am fascinated by the tropical fauna every where. We walked Welchman's gully yesterday, feeling the moist air, experiencing the 100 year old tropical trees of every variety. Pictured is a huge bamboo.

My dissertation haunts me however, and I am being a wonk about it in the early mornings before any one else gets up.

Wonk: a studious or hard working person obsessively devoted to academic activities at the expense of social activities. (Canadian oxford dictionary)

flying over the atlantic

Because I am not you, I can return within myself, collect myself. Think.
You are the one who helps me to remain in myself, to stay in myself,
to contain me in myself, to remain present,
not paralyzed by the past, not in flight towards the future.


We flew to Barbados yesterday.
I read Luce Irigaray's To Be Two while being astonished.

love the questions themselves

Have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language.

Live the questions now.

Someday, you will live your way into the answer.

Rainer Maria Rilke

At Work (in Toronto)

The Rose 1964 Agnes Martin
I spent the entire day today at the Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto. The main exhibition (for me) was At Work - Agnes Martin, Eva Hesse and Betty Goodwin, up until January 2, 2011. These images don't really give an idea of Agnes Martin's work. Worse than reproductions in books they are google images as I didn't take any photos at the gallery (not allowed in Canada).

Twelve 70 inch square paintings, gesso, acrylic and pencil were installed in a large square room - all white or tones of palest aqua with horizontal lines spaced differently on each canvas. These were the ocean paintings, on loan from the whitney. Surrounded by them, I did feel as if I was looking out over the ocean, with just the horizon and my own thoughts huge within.

"The ocean is deathlesss
the islands rise and die
quietly come and go
a silently swaying breath"Agnes Martin

Also on view was the rarely seen 1974 interview with Agnes Martin by Lyn Blumenthal and Kate Horstfield. I sat and watched Agnes' gentle mouth move and tried very hard to hear her words but it was very difficult. I have read her mystical poetic writings however, so I felt I knew what she was saying.

For Eva, there were her cheesecloth and adhesive, cheesecloth and paper mache objects, laid out on a flat table. Other more famous pieces were displayed on walls

for Betty, there were her 50 years worth of notebooks, left to the AGO's archives when she died. Exhibited for the first time.

Agnes Martin is a key compnonet of my dissertation, and it was a treat to be able to see fourteen of her original paintings, for real.

Also seen

The Julian Schnabel exhibit, which included the paintings made with broken dishes that I'd only seen previously in books, and his newer twenty foot high paintings. Gasp.
Shary Boyle's new work was in three spaces, full of metaphor and hours of labour. Shary was at the gallery and spoke about it. She impressed me (and about 150 others, all standing around the pieces in awe) with her articulate and passionate intelligence.

Thanks v much to Tim and Mary for the Art gallery of Ontario membership, activated today. I was not aware that I was so starved for real live art and not just reproductions.

Emily Kame Kngwarreye

Untitled, (awelye) 1994 acrylic, Emily Kame Kngwarreye

Huge side track from my essay as I recall how much I love contemporary acrylic painting from Australia. The most acclaimed artist is Emily Kame Kngwarreye.(1915-1996)

Emily Kame Kngwarreye’s fabulous abstract paintings have been cited as probably the most striking ever made during the twentieth century. She lived close to nature and did no acrylics until she was in her late 70's. Centuries of philosophical theory, art galleries full of modern art: she knew nothing of them. However, during less than ten years at the end of her life, she made pared down, raw, large colour field paintings filled with organic and repetitive hand made marks that absolutely carry the viewer away. They stop our breath.

Utopia panel, 1996 acrylic, Emily Kame Kngwarreye


I've poked her work into my 8000 word disseration. Paintings like these make me question all this book learning.

November is Woman Abuse Prevention Month

November is Woman Abuse Prevention Month. It is every woman's fundamental right to live in safety and security in her home and community. The directors of the Manitoulin Family Resources contacted me last week and asked for some images for a media campaign. These are just a sample of what I sent them by email. All these from 2008. I deal with love which is our fate,
twisted thing,
tortuous,
delicate,
eager,
insatiable,
the best and worst thing,
the junction point between everything and nothing,
the oxymoric knot of all existence,
love which makes gods and cattle meat of us

but never with hate

Helene Cixous

rhizomatic writing

I made this sketch during Monday's phone tutorial when Catherine Dormer told me that my writing was rhizomatic (like a root that sends up many shoots) as opposed to arboreal (like a tree, logical with a single strong trunk). She said it was a compliment. I'm working on the theoretical section of my dissertation this week, trying to make sure I don't lose my focus and have been using my wall to organize the various shoots. Catherine told me I needed to back up my ideas with psychoanalysis, phenomenology and some feminine writing. New writers for me are Juhani Pallasmaa, Melanie Klein, Helene Cixous and Luce Irigaray. I have not read Freud, Jung, Lacan and Merleau Ponty in their original texts....yet. The beautiful writing that follows is from the prologue of To Be Two by Luce Irigaray.

Earth,

you who house me but with whom I share,

you who are fecund with so many children, who do not resemble one another,

you who grow without respite, both in secret and in the light,

you who bear seed, flower and fruit,

you who never cease to repair life,

you who at every time of the year work for the becoming of the living,

Earth,

you who are still lavish with sun when the frost comes,

Earth,

safeguard me, faithful one.

november circle day

Diana brought in this aged wool blanket yesterday. It is perfect for one of the four large liturgical panels in progress. Linda made string fabric from damask table cloths and silk for another of the panels. Couching is a technique Wendy is an expert at now. This for the third panel. Earth Ark has fields of french knots that Heather and Karen are quilting with chain stitch. It's the first of the four, and we are nearly finished it. I hope that Earth Ark will be come off the frame by the end of this month.

The project continues.

my release and salvation

My world is cerebral at present. I read entire books in single days. I stay up until 2 am to find solitary time to write my dissertation. One skein of embroidery floss every day, I look forward to stitching it.
Getting out in my yard for a little to rake, I need to do it.

boys will be bees

Oona sent me some photos of the grand boys in their costumes.

I know that there are a few out there who will enjoy seeing these. Shall share.







Everett was a bee this year.



13 month old Jack wore the baby gorilla costume that Oona made for E in 2007.

Well done on both of these, Oona.













Our son, Jay, won a trip for two to Ireland for the costume he built of a rescued Chilean miner. The contest was sponsored by Guinness I believe.

A Trip to Ireland! I am totally serious.


That is fantastic, Jay.









And I am so happy that Everett likes to wear the dinosaur costume I made for him last year when I was in Alaska.

He wore it to the grocery store.