simplicity unafraid

Q:   What was your route to becoming an artist?

A:  I will answer this question, but it will take several posts.

I've been working steadily away for a long and rich time.   

The posts will include photos of my most current work as well as links. 

The links go back to earlier posts from this journal.

These are the inspirations that helped me find my voice as an artist. 

Amish Quilts

Women who originally designed our traditional North American quilt patterns  inspired by the awesomeness of nature

Women who designed the traditional patterns inspired by the connection to the bed.  (This link goes to more autobiographical info so be warned. 

I have been maintaining this blog for 14 years.  So much has happened in the world in that short time.  Take good care my friends. xo  

art is when one plus one equals seventy two

I enjoy reading the interviews by Robert Enright in Border Crossings magazine. His thoughtful questions to a wide variety of artists over the years has provided me with much to ponder. For instance, I love this insight by photographer Laura Letinsky in issue 99 in response to his comment "You wouldn't think the elements you put together could add up to such elegance and formal beauty."

"I think that art is alchemical if it is good. I think that not good art is not alchemical. One of the key tests for whether art is good is one plus one equaling 72. It isn't about putting this thing with this thing: It's not like making a sandwich. It's that you make it and it turns into a 4-layer truffle cake."

last minute jitters

STILL working on my new protecton blanket. It's so important to look and look at an involved piece like this as it reaches the final stages and I've just today decided to interupt the zig zag with some red horizontal lines.

"Everyone can see what a fraud I am" Marc Rothko is rumored to have said the morning after his MOMA opening in 1961.

runaway global warming

I have been working quite steadily on binding and embellishing. I have been reading Bill McKibben. I think about my happy grandson and vow again to try harder and walk the walk of active environmentalism.

"More stuff is not making us happier--what we really seem to want is more community.
Standard economic theory has long assured us that we're insatiable bundles of desires. That may be true, but more and more it feels like our greatest wish is for more contact with other people. If everyone has to drive their own car everywhere, then it's hard to reduce emissions. If our idea of paradise remains a 4,000 square foot house on its own isolated lot, it's hard to imagine change. We don't need to erase individualism, but environmentalists desparately need to learn how to celebrate community, too" Bill McKibben

Quilting with Elva

Elva Lloyd worked on my new quilt "Not Defeated" for nearly two weeks. I was able to spend the last three days with her at her home near Kagawong, Manitoulin Island. We quilted all day!
THANK YOU ELVA! Your stitching is so beautiful.

Red Cross

Ned came to Kingston to be with me and two of our children for the Easter weekend. He left this morning and took my unfinished quilt back to Manitoulin Island with him. Elva Lloyd from Kagawong has agreed to put "Not Defeated" into her quilt frame and will try to complete the hand quilting on the zig zag border. I hope to be able to show this piece in my solo Cambridge Exhibition happening early in May. There is a large red cross on the front of this new piece (unable to post a photo unfortunately)and it holds a lot of meaning for me because the Canadian Red Cross Organization in Kingston has really helped us out over the last two weeks.

Not Defeated

Conditions here in Kingston have changed a bit and I have been able to do some quilting on this piece again. I still hope to have it done in time for my exhibition with Cambridge Galleries. The exhibit will be part of the Waterloo Area Quilt Festival, an annual May event in this Mennonite area of Ontario. I've changed the name of the quilt to reflect the battle that my family is still waging against old age, illness and accidental falls. We are not defeated. I apologize that I can't show the new stitching because I am using my mother's computer. The image on the front of the quilt resembles a shield. It is a protection blanket.