right here, right now

In between baking pies, changing sheets and many conversations, I've been piecing small components for 'precious water', the third panel of the circle project. Large paper templates help estimate how many one-patches are needed in each colour way.








We exist right here,
right now,
to complete our life's work.


Alison Kendall

Painted Rocks

We took our visitors to the painted rocks yesterday. One can walk for hours on these unique volcanic formations in Northern Georgian Bay. Still considering how to join my journal panels together.

Studio Visit

I am expecting a curator to visit my studio tomorrow. The piece he is interested in is Not to Know, But to Go On, my daily stitching. I'm considering how to join the panels together. Each panel holds about two weeks.





The paintings I had up for the July art tour have been relegated to a corner.











I also want to show him One Hundred Views of Wikwemikong - sketches that I've pulled out of journals from when we first moved to the island. I was enthralled by my view of the far shore across Manitowaning Bay. In a rush, I would write down the colours as they changed so extremely from hour to hour. This is a brand new piece.

Water is patient

April has come back from her road trip through the states. She worked on her quilt in the van while Andy drove. They went down the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico and then across to California and then north up to Vancouver. By the time they return to Montreal, they will have driven 20,000 km. She's getting ready to finish the edges.

Water flows.
When you plunge your hand into it, all you feel is a caress.
Water is not a solid wall, it will not stop you.
But water always goes where it wants to go.
Water is patient.
Remember that, my child.
Remember you are half water.

from the Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood

Nieces

reverse applique, damask and silk, (not the easiest technique...click here ) It takes patience. Sophie, 15 years It takes practice. Molly, 18 years It gives satisfaction. Molly and Helen (15 years)

Over and over and over.
Time, work, silence. Over and over I touch it.

Labour

hand quilting, linen thread

"by labour we set the will of our dreams in motion"
Tom Dean I was so focused on my own stitching, that the only photos I took at the circle project yesterday were of the beautiful cards Marian makes from tiny pressed flowers. Next week we are bringing African fabrics to look at. All welcome, Thursdays 9am - 6 pm. See sidebar.

Art Date in Toronto

fantastical ceramics by Julie Moon from her exhibition Pretty Strange at Narwhal Art Projects 680 Queen St W Toronto Plaster and printed fabric room decor by Celeste Toogood and Christopher Martin in the Gladstone Hotel (our room 301) No 5 / No 22, 1950 painting by Mark Rothko at the Art Gallery of Ontario and No. 16, (red, brown, black) 1958, another painting by Mark Rothko. Abstract Expressionism from the Museum of Modern Art in New York, at the AGO until September 4. In the explanatory videos the curator, Ann Temkin, advises: "These works ask for a type of concentration that is becoming increasingly unusual in a society that bombards our brains with simultaneous visual and auditory stimuli from countless directions. In a world that likes its culture fast, Abstract Expressionist works are uncompromisingly slow."

While at the AGO I watched Marcia Connolly's video about Annie Pootoogook. She spoke slowly and directly to the camera. So slowly, that I was able to write down every word.

"I am Annie Pootoogook
I am an artist
My mother was an artist
My grandmother was an artist
I'm a 3rd generation artist.
I used to go see my grandma drawing. She told us the stories.
They were true stories.
I wish I was born into that time. I would know Inuit tradition.
I'm very happy that I can draw what I have in my head and what I'm feeling.
It lifts my life a lot.
It's a very big thing to me.
I'm very happy.
I am an artist."

Freedom from Worldly Attachments

Apologies for still more photos of this third panel but it's the only thing I have been working on this month. I'm struggling to make it hang straight. (flat) I've been pinning the 90" width of it into the wide pine wall boards in the cottage dining room and shifting and adjusting the half circle in its half square. Every single stitch is by hand. This morning when I began defining the edges with trim Ned said, "Maybe you should start over". That's unthinkable.

I am so attached to it. We have spent a year on this so far, my Thursday group and moi. I'm not defeated. Yet.

Zen's sixth ruling principle : Freedom from Worldly Attachments (Datsuzoko)

The seven Zen principles
asymmetry
simplicity
austerity
naturalness
subtle profundity
freedom from worldly attachments
silence

non attachment to things or rules

nature is awesome

view of "the open" Georgian Bay We've been spending most of August at the cottage, and I've taken my circle project work with me. The floor of the main room there is just big enough to lay out the third panel. Progress on the second panel is steady. We've rolled both sides now, and stitch together on Thursdays in Little Current. It's slow work, but I really do think that the repeated touching of the dense quilting adds power to the panel, Mended World. same view, later in the day

Click here to see a skein of birds over Denmark. An amazing spirit lift/gift during times like these.

Vintage

vintage beaded dress vintage beaded dress, skirt detail




Anke brought in her beaded dress to the circle project last Thursday.


She had worn it at her birthday party last June.


It must have weighed at least ten pounds.










She wore it for two birthday parties actually,

her 50th and her 70th!

I find that remarkable.


She told us that she purchased it for $60
twenty or so years ago. We think it is from
the 1920's but I am not sure.

Detail of back closure.

Circle project continues today, all welcome. Thursdays 9 am to 6 pm in Little Current.

swimming

stitching every day swimming every day