Thursday, March 21, 2013

What is real time?

There are many kinds of time.
This stitch journal makes time visible, marking each day with a complete skein of embroidery floss.  It has been steady stitching since July 2010, nearly three years so far.
The panels here represent the day by day of January and February 2013.
But I stitched them in March.
I let eyelet stitching absorb me during the winter and my journal project fell behind.
But it's OK, because these new panels document a different kind of time.
The slow time.
Moving my hands, holding the fabric, repeating the stitch, I was able to let go of ordinary time.  Let go of worries of daily life and instead kept each present moment of sun in this journal.
The threads help me to net time.
When I look at the panel above,  I remember my vay-cay (as April calls it).
Even though the date says February, they read to me as that week off.
I think it is the power of touch.
Now I'm back with Dad in Kingston.  He's changed hospitals, and should be returning home in a week or so.  The panel in the background is propped on his power wheel chair.
Emotional time is different than real time.

10 comments:

Ms. said...

Hey there Judy
Every time I encounter your panels here I'm not surprised to find I'm still amazed. Something timeless is a gift. Best wishes to your Dad, and for you too, always.
Michelle

Judy Martin said...

Thanks Michelle. I am amazed by them too. What is becoming remarkable now about the journal project I began 32 months ago is the amount of it. I'm looking forward to seeing it installed this fall. I'm going to stop stitching on it in July.

Do something else.

Margaret said...

"Emotional time is different than real time." Yes. Emotional time can take you forward or backwards...memory time, sometimes sweet, sometimes sorrowful, always challenging. Stitching out your memories is a gift you give yourself and share with others, on into their memories.

(The "word" ID for this comment posting is 'artsMem'. Hmmmm...)

henrietta (aka ani aka zani) said...

ah but what a beautiful legacy to time this has become.

Jacky said...

You are going to stop stitching on it in July....that pulled me up! I dont know why, but I just didnt imagine and end (but of course there always has to be an end). This will be an amazing installation...very personal cloth.
Yes, emotional time is very different to real time.....

Jacky xox

jeanne hewell-chambers said...

Time, Schime. The marking of time is the beautiful thing.

Valerianna said...

Emotional time..... oh, I could muse and write on that for a very long time. But for now, I will just say, YES. And that the contrast in the panels reminds me of core samples - from land or tree or soul, maybe.

Sandra Reford said...

I am sorry this "time" will end in July. I was surprised to read that. I guess everything ends eventually. I should instead look forward to your new project /direction/ creation.

Velma Bolyard said...

constancy and emotional time.

Ann Knickerbocker said...

Funny. I was just thinking, as I was reading the post, then re-reading it, and looking at the photos, that this piece was like a river... stop-motion photographs, yet somehow, because of the length of the piece, the colors, the constancy of the stitching, and your stitched-in emotions, I see it as moving along, like a river... I can see stopping in in July, stopping then and starting up a new river's flow.