I'm preparing a lecture to go with my new workshop, Narrative Traditions. It's been wonderful to sink into the pile of books I've gathered over the last twenty years or so and be ever astounded by the bold design and spiritual meaning that people from all over the world put into their textiles.
So often I feel that I am the one who is responsible for all the things that are happening to me and to those around me. I feel that I should be more in control of the situation when in actual fact, there's not much I or anyone can do. The only place where I can do exactly what I want and can take total responsibility is in the art I make. Thank goodness for art.
In 1947 Matisse made 'Jazz', a book of painted papers cut into organic shapes and fixed to coloured backgrounds. He was inspired to continue the method in a larger format. He discovered that it was so simple to place the shapes correctly because he could move them around until he found the balance he was seeking. "This simplification guarantees precision" he said.
I travelled with John Gillow this morning. We went to Africa and I was especially inspired by the amazing textiles created by the Kuba people from the central part of the continent. In the afternoon I let Henri Matisse be my guide and marvelled at how he had used clothing and hangings from Algeria, Morroco and Romania in his paintings. In the later part of the day I visited Rajasthan, one of the provinces of India, with Vandana Bhandari . She made sure that I knew the correct names for every garment we looked at and for every embroidey stitch that was used. Doing research in world textiles is a pretty cool way to spend a day.
I finally got over to Spring Bay to collect my work from the Perivale Gallery which had closed for the season a month ago. Sheila McMullan and I had a nice visit, and she let me gather up some of the yellow Ginko leaves that had fallen from her new tree.
I spend a lot of time thinking. The sketches I make during this early time look like rough scribbles - they could not be called drawings. I am inspired by words I've recently read. I make sketches in a book using ball point pen. Sometimes I make drawings or paintings, which are quite often cut up and then sewn back together. After these procrastinations, I am ready to begin.
The one unconventional thing I do is to use the embroidery stitch as a functional quilting stitch. I like the fact that both sides of my work are marked with the slow process of coloured stitching. The pieces are documents of time spent.
