digging and finding

Spontaneous Construction 42"x43" 

I spent a lot of time this weekend finding old things and seeing what's held up, and what hasn't.

It started with having to restore and update the music on my aging Ipod. The backups have been lost and so I was, one disc at a time, restoring the cuts I crave these days. I found several unlabelled subliminal recordings that sounded suspiciously like whale gut rumblings and I fell asleep with the thing on, earbuds plugged into my head! Who know what cracks in my brain have been reordered or re-routed and with what information?

  It was interesting that more than half of what was, is no more and not missed. Then again I found myself one-clicking one song after the next at Amazon from a long wish list of CDs, new and old.

Then I started in on the bedroom closet and and came across this piece which was hatched out at my first ever class at Arrowmont with Elizabeth Barton.  I was very new to dyeing and we were tasked with dyeing two gradations and these colors must have been assigned to me (although I can't imagine it) because red and green would be the last on my list of choices. A proper image is in order. At some point in my life I took the time and infinite patience to hand quilt this making it up as I went, as was the machine pieced construction. If you have the opportunity to take one of Elizabeth's classes, jump at it.

I also unearthed a fragment of a story that, although unfinished, is worth a second look and some harsh reworking. Who was it said "kill your darlings" ?

mystery PITA crayons

I've just finished messing up my kitchen cooking up this batch of soywax+dyepowder crayons but I'm afraid they are going to be a big pain in the ass to work with. No wonder these pounds of  soywax crumbs were so cheap at Binders. Although the package said 'melts at 150 degrees'  it was a lot hotter than that and the wax is much harder, more brittle than the stuff I'm used to from Prochem whose website is unable to take credit card orders right now.

 Lord only knows if and how I will be getting this stuff out of the cloth when the time comes. I may have to set up the cannibal pot on the lawn instead of just rinsing the  stuff out in the sink with Dawn and hot hot water. Time will tell. The nifty mold comes gratis when you buy a dozen votives at Yankee Candle, it had a nice lid too but I cut it off as it was getting in the way.

historical

Yesterday I got a lovely email from an artist in New Zealand asking permission to teach a class based on the technique I used in this piece which was published some years back.

I never thought of stitching layers of torn strips as any exclusive technique of mine (and I said so) but it was a very civilized gesture. I hope the students enjoy the class.

The first time I used this technique was on a piece that was about a yard long and only ten or so inches wide. I remember working on it while waiting in the car as my youngest son was taking his road test...ages ago. There was a lot of trepidation stitched into that one. Wonder where it is?

eye candy friday

Happy Friday!
Here's a site you should bookmark...but does it float 

 I was led to all of the following from there.

Gunta Stölzl

Art Hansen

Vangel Naumovski

WIP

Closing in on finished here, I've enjoyed working on this one with the simplest of techniques for me, hand  applique.

No trixie embroidery, no layering the threads, no crazed french knots - just a double strand of Sulky 12wt cotton in colors matching the fabric.

 Almost all the the fabrics are hand dyed damasks which has  tendency to creep away and fight the needle at every turn. The trick to needle turning this stuff is pins, pins and more pins and then stitches that are maybe an eighth inch apart. Sounds obsessive but the damask needles like butter.  I'd like to take this technique to a larger field for the next project.

Spring will be on us before you know and I'm daydreaming about the first dye fest of the year.
I have so much wonderful raw material at hand.