Quiet Simplicity

Cross My Heart, layered and stitched silk and linen, silk threads. 2010.

I have agreed to speak about my work in Toronto this September. It took me hours to settle on this plain and simple title for the lecture. Cross My Heart detail

Quiet Simplicity

Judy Martin’s new work has a pared down simplicity that is inviting. Her imagery is archetypal, used for centuries across world cultures. She constructs her pieces by layering and piecing torn fabrics by hand, and then adds repeated simple and familiar domestic stitches. The evidence of time and touch gives power to the work.

My name

My name is Judy Martin.
My parents gave me the name Judy, short for Judith.
My husband gave me the name Martin and I am proud to have it.
My name until I was 22 years old was Judy Johnson. There's a Judy Martin who has the same mailing address I do, she lives just down the road. I talked to a Judy Martin who lives in Sudbury on the phone yesterday. But the Judy Martin who makes me wonder about using my name is the Judy Martin who writes books about traditional quilting. It's not her fault. She can't help it that she used to be a featured writer in Quilters Newsletter and creates very popular patterns. That Judy martin has a popular website, click here. I used to call her the real Judy Martin and still apologize when people suddenly realize that I'm not her. I could add an initial, I could add Johnson, I've tried using Judith....but nothing feels quite as right as Judy Martin. It's my name. what can I say?

art

Are all five of the design elements included in mended world?

line ? maybe
shape ? yes
pattern ? maybe
texture ? YES
colour? nope
What about the design principles?

focal point ? yes
contrast? not really
rhythm and repetition? YES!
movement? no
balance ? what does that mean?
symmetry ? yes
unity? yes I hope that we can roll this sweetheart on Thursday. It's been in the frame for over two months and is still stretched out to the full 100 inches.

The Manitoulin Circle Project meets every Thursday in Little Current United Church hall. We've been doing this since October 2009. Please feel welcome to drop in and stitch a while.

Blog hopping? See wearable stitching at ateliercolore.

Leave a mark

nine patch, hand stitched When I found myself without any stitching to do during the sixteen hour trip from Manitoulin to Fort Frances, I stopped in Espanola and got supplies for an entirely new project. A hand stitched grid. On this trip I sat in the back of the van, hence my photos of black spruce turned out better than those of the most magnificent Lake Superior. Why did we go? Uncle Henry 82 years, Dad 88 years, Uncle Johnnie 100 years! Fix time and its erosion. Cause something to survive. Leave a trace. Leave a mark. (paraphased from George Perec) Time is relentless. I have to constantly mark it. Aunt Ellie, 96 years, with Dad.

Millie Gladu

ink on paper, Millie Gladu, 1966

I am in Fort Frances, the town closest to the farm where I grew up. Ned and I are here with my father for a family event. ink on paper, Millie Gladu, about 1967


Yesterday I went into the Fort Frances museum. The Ontario Craft Council exhibition is on display, which is serendipitous.

Upstairs in a back room there was an art sale. detail of above

It was disturbing for me to see that the life's work of Millie Gladu was being sold off in a yard sale type situation. Her name was well respected when I was a child. My mother studied with her. The above painting of hers is in the main area of the museum and is not for sale. It used to hang in the main area of the bank. ink on paper, Millie Gladu, mid 60's

What does it all mean? Emotions about mortalitiy, isolation, and gender make my throat ache.
I purchased four of her drawings. ink on paper, Millie Gladu mid 1960's. I spent ten dollars. Can you feel her touch?

Night Garden from Dryden Ontario

I saw Michele Coslett Goodman's Night Garden exhibition at the Thunder Bay Art Gallery on Wednesday. A large room made into a realistic and fantastic life sized garden using old rubber inner tubes. The use of discarded materials in such a sensuous and provocative manner affected me on so many levels. I truly hope that this exhibition will show again in a larger center and that this artist from Dryden will be appreciated by curators in say, Toronto.

car window photos

We're driving 17
across the top of Lake Superior

two days so far
with my father.

heat waves

Rayon damask weave tablecloth, hand stitched To create a focal point for the third panel of the circle project, we are using a commercial product and intense heat. It comes in packages of about a yard and is stitched to the back of the fabric. The directions say to use machine stitch and a steam iron held above the cloth, but my experiment with hand stitched waves and a heat gun gave good results. 6 inches shrink to about 4 inches in all directions. I'm not one to

use products such as misty fuze or steam a seam, but the discovery of texture magic may have changed my mind. Ah, well.

Still mourning the loss of fiber arts magazine and telos. Read Olga's comments here.

studio tour

I'm really enjoying the Manitoulin Art Tour this weekend. The visitors I've had so far are very engaged with the work, and our discussions are thought provoking. I took some risks this year and decided to show work in progress (plus five framed paintings). Most of it is very large ongoing work like my stitched journal pinned across one entire wall and three of the huge meditation panels pinned to the others. A smaller more intimate piece is the golden notebook - my 1991 journal with most of the text painted out. Details are shown above, but see here for a view of the entire piece. To see Earth Ark as it is today, nearly done, click here.
Have a great weekend.

chance

Chance touches on the very idea of freedom. To give yourself over to chance is to embrace freedom, the unknown, total openness. Montreal curator Claude Gosselin spoke about the importance of chance in contemporary art in a recent Canadian Art magazine. It reminded me of the way I choose threads for my daily journal. I close my eyes.

a letter to my children

Jack. Twenty months.

Time goes by too fast. The seasons. Our lifetimes.
The best thing I've ever done in my life was to have children with Ned. We did our best with you and that's all anyone can do. Oona
The thing that is so wonderful is that people are different. I'm different from Ned. My background is different. But maybe it's our differences that are the most important thing.

And it all happens so fast. Too fast. Jay

Not to know but to go on.
When I'm with family, I downplay the importance of art in my life.

That I'm trying to understand my response to my immediate world and how to best express that response.

When I was a mom with babes, I spent so much time watching my children play. Then in the evenings I painted watercolours of those times. Grace and April

I made quilts from shapes stitched together into a female language. The quilts helped me to express my own unique feelings about things. What things? Those things that I spent my time with. For years, it was you children.

Now, being with all four of you is a rare event. What I notice about each of you, about all of you, is that you are each unique. You are different from us, from each other, and from your partners.

Everyone is unique. Eveyone is different.
All of us have something of our very own to do with our time here. Our life time. detail of portrait of moi by April

And our time goes so fast.
Too fast.