2009/09/29
Moving On
This was my motto for the last few years, and since the day I bought the little magnet at the Red Gallery, the day Jay decided to sell my scarves there, it sat on top of the smaller window in my stash room, like the cross the Irish always wrote at the top center of the blackboard as soon as she entered our classroom.
I've been ready to move on with my motto of late. Considering what's happening with my life right now, it feels apropos, and I didn't want to just discard it, but I wanted to pass it on to someone else. So I posted it today. I hope I did the right thing.
I'll stick to "preposterous" at least for the rest of the year.
Kiva
I've heard of these micro lending schemes on the radio, but never knew I, too, could participate. How fabulous, and so easy. I started out with a loan to this group.
2009/09/28
Philosophical
Yesterday, a journo who writes for fancy magazines rang and complimented my weaving and tried to suss out if I would make an interesting story. I sounded unenthusiastic and dull so she asked me to recommend other Nelson artists instead. I was listening to my own voice as if it was someone else talking.
While driving back from the Frizzell exhibition, Rose asked me what my next big project is, and I didn't have an answer. She asked if I still felt passionate about weaving as I always did, and my answer as, "yes and no", and I made a joke about the amount of stash I have now allowing me to quit so easily.
It's almost October and my preposterously creative 2009 is heading towards the final stretch, and I'm not sure where I'm going, where I am, or where I've been all year.
When I was a child, I imagined getting older to mean being physically less agile, but intellectually superior and emotionally settled, the latter two more than making up for the first. I wasn't counting on having a mental illness (that sounds so serious!) and not being able to be productive. I've coped the best I could, and there's no use crying over unraveling threads; I try to be philosophical and stay positive.
And things aren't so bad. I'm finally sick and tired of the stash problem and am tackling it; for the first time I felt like checking out the 2009 courses via the UK Online Guild (but couldn't remember the url and had to ask Dot!); the client who wanted a baby blanket around February/March still wants it, and has put in a tentative order for the next, fourth commission; and I'm thinking about another warp of my gold, Rococo scarves, this time around 10 inches wide.
I'm ordering 1600 more heddles, some very fine merino, and though I struggle, I'm learning lots from Ali's mentoring. I really enjoy my figure/life drawing class; 6 terms ago when I signed up, I had hoped to learn to draw fine, accurate drawings, but my focus has changed and I'm into spontaneous, emotional gesture drawings. (Yeah, me, spontaneous!) And Textile Lunches have become a regular thing for all of us.
I'm still here, with all the yarns and equipment and books, and all the plans and To Do lists, and a husband with a day job who thinks my weaving is nice. And a dad who turned 82 today, who started to think this past January that I wasn't a lost cause after all.
So I go on, counting my blessings, and the recounting the warps over and over again as my thoughts drift from this project to that.
Thank you, friends.
While driving back from the Frizzell exhibition, Rose asked me what my next big project is, and I didn't have an answer. She asked if I still felt passionate about weaving as I always did, and my answer as, "yes and no", and I made a joke about the amount of stash I have now allowing me to quit so easily.
It's almost October and my preposterously creative 2009 is heading towards the final stretch, and I'm not sure where I'm going, where I am, or where I've been all year.
When I was a child, I imagined getting older to mean being physically less agile, but intellectually superior and emotionally settled, the latter two more than making up for the first. I wasn't counting on having a mental illness (that sounds so serious!) and not being able to be productive. I've coped the best I could, and there's no use crying over unraveling threads; I try to be philosophical and stay positive.
And things aren't so bad. I'm finally sick and tired of the stash problem and am tackling it; for the first time I felt like checking out the 2009 courses via the UK Online Guild (but couldn't remember the url and had to ask Dot!); the client who wanted a baby blanket around February/March still wants it, and has put in a tentative order for the next, fourth commission; and I'm thinking about another warp of my gold, Rococo scarves, this time around 10 inches wide.
I'm ordering 1600 more heddles, some very fine merino, and though I struggle, I'm learning lots from Ali's mentoring. I really enjoy my figure/life drawing class; 6 terms ago when I signed up, I had hoped to learn to draw fine, accurate drawings, but my focus has changed and I'm into spontaneous, emotional gesture drawings. (Yeah, me, spontaneous!) And Textile Lunches have become a regular thing for all of us.
I'm still here, with all the yarns and equipment and books, and all the plans and To Do lists, and a husband with a day job who thinks my weaving is nice. And a dad who turned 82 today, who started to think this past January that I wasn't a lost cause after all.
So I go on, counting my blessings, and the recounting the warps over and over again as my thoughts drift from this project to that.
Thank you, friends.
Appropriation - Textile Lunch V
I'm trying to recall the discussions during lunch on Friday the 18th.
"Appropriation", in the art context and the way I was explained, is a catch all phrase for using things other people created to make your art. Making a collage or doodling on magazine photographs to create your own work can be appropriation, as can using found objects to create a sculpture. Appropriation can be done in vastly different ways and in varying degrees. I'm not sure where the exact border between it and plagiarism is, but with appropriation the artist would put her/his own name on the work.
Then came the era of copyrights, intellectual property and cultural sensitivity, and even the Internet.
The first issue is cultural sensitivity. In New Zealand, there have been discussions on the ownership of indigenous Maori intellectual properties, among them the Haka (the war cry ritual at the start of many sports matches), and their many traditional motifs and patterns. There was an outcry of, for a want of a better word, blasphemy in some quarters when Robbie Williams got what to us is a clearly Maori design tattoo. I can't go any further because I've not studied the subject beyond what I hear on the radio news, but suffice it to say unless I get permission, and blessing, from Maori, it doesn't feel my place to research or develop ideas based on their culture, history or motifs, to make my own work. The same goes for the various Pacific Island cultures. (And now I'm thinking about my tapa-inspired series. Yikes.) To a degree, I not only get this, but sympathize. But things are nowhere near as clear cut as this in New Zealand.
As a Japanese, I cringe to see the costumes every time I heard of a new production of Madame Butterfly, especially the loose necklines or open hemlines. I cringe at the Hollywood rendition of geishas, samurais, Japanese tourists, or Japanese businessmen. And I feel uncomfortable, sometimes, seeing shibori or kumihimo, because they are taken out of the Japanese cultural context. Still, I don't feel any ownership of them, and I am amazed when I see genuinely good work, in or out of any context. In fact, theater forms such as kabuki and noh have enjoyed a resurgence because of their popularity overseas.
(You have to give me this one however: haiku and other poetical form just cannot be done in any other language, and outside the Japanese psyche. You've got to let me cringe big time at those.)
In short, we are used to anyone doing whatever they like with Japanese motifs and material.
But there is a problem. Most anything Japanese pre-1980's came from people and places to the west of us, via China and Korea, a large majority of it from the Han people, I think. So if I go to the extreme, not only can I not research and develop ideas on my pet subjects like Arabic writing, Rococo, Kente cloth, and Larsson, but about the only Japanese motif left to study would be Pokemon and co. Rosie, who is English, has similar problems with her heritage.
The second point is about originality vs copyright, and it gets murkier. Who owns rights to images? This is less of an issue in the style of weaving I do, i.e. not pictorial, but for example in painting, can I use Campbell soup, or Coca Cola or McDonalds to make a point, a social commentary? Is it "more" OK to make fun of large internationals? Is it OK if I'm celebrating their work? If I want to paint landscapes, can I paint your house in it without asking your permission? The list went on and we started to feel distraught.
There is no obvious conclusion, and I don't foresee there being one. Still, I would like to work ethically, and we felt it was important to ponder the point.
This is Dick Frizzell's True Colors, a spoof on the Four Square Man, which Frizzell himself designed as a graphic/commercial artist.
"Appropriation", in the art context and the way I was explained, is a catch all phrase for using things other people created to make your art. Making a collage or doodling on magazine photographs to create your own work can be appropriation, as can using found objects to create a sculpture. Appropriation can be done in vastly different ways and in varying degrees. I'm not sure where the exact border between it and plagiarism is, but with appropriation the artist would put her/his own name on the work.
Then came the era of copyrights, intellectual property and cultural sensitivity, and even the Internet.
The first issue is cultural sensitivity. In New Zealand, there have been discussions on the ownership of indigenous Maori intellectual properties, among them the Haka (the war cry ritual at the start of many sports matches), and their many traditional motifs and patterns. There was an outcry of, for a want of a better word, blasphemy in some quarters when Robbie Williams got what to us is a clearly Maori design tattoo. I can't go any further because I've not studied the subject beyond what I hear on the radio news, but suffice it to say unless I get permission, and blessing, from Maori, it doesn't feel my place to research or develop ideas based on their culture, history or motifs, to make my own work. The same goes for the various Pacific Island cultures. (And now I'm thinking about my tapa-inspired series. Yikes.) To a degree, I not only get this, but sympathize. But things are nowhere near as clear cut as this in New Zealand.
As a Japanese, I cringe to see the costumes every time I heard of a new production of Madame Butterfly, especially the loose necklines or open hemlines. I cringe at the Hollywood rendition of geishas, samurais, Japanese tourists, or Japanese businessmen. And I feel uncomfortable, sometimes, seeing shibori or kumihimo, because they are taken out of the Japanese cultural context. Still, I don't feel any ownership of them, and I am amazed when I see genuinely good work, in or out of any context. In fact, theater forms such as kabuki and noh have enjoyed a resurgence because of their popularity overseas.
(You have to give me this one however: haiku and other poetical form just cannot be done in any other language, and outside the Japanese psyche. You've got to let me cringe big time at those.)
In short, we are used to anyone doing whatever they like with Japanese motifs and material.
But there is a problem. Most anything Japanese pre-1980's came from people and places to the west of us, via China and Korea, a large majority of it from the Han people, I think. So if I go to the extreme, not only can I not research and develop ideas on my pet subjects like Arabic writing, Rococo, Kente cloth, and Larsson, but about the only Japanese motif left to study would be Pokemon and co. Rosie, who is English, has similar problems with her heritage.
The second point is about originality vs copyright, and it gets murkier. Who owns rights to images? This is less of an issue in the style of weaving I do, i.e. not pictorial, but for example in painting, can I use Campbell soup, or Coca Cola or McDonalds to make a point, a social commentary? Is it "more" OK to make fun of large internationals? Is it OK if I'm celebrating their work? If I want to paint landscapes, can I paint your house in it without asking your permission? The list went on and we started to feel distraught.
There is no obvious conclusion, and I don't foresee there being one. Still, I would like to work ethically, and we felt it was important to ponder the point.
This is Dick Frizzell's True Colors, a spoof on the Four Square Man, which Frizzell himself designed as a graphic/commercial artist.
Finds
Husband found this Flickr site, and we can't get enough of it.
If you want to weave something for breast cancer awareness, Bonnie Inouye posted two pink ribbon drafts some years ago on Handweaving.net, here and here.
If you are new to weaving, or is about to teach a beginner, have a look at Tracey's post in her Pioneering on the Home Front blog. (No, it's not new, but I just found it.)
If you want to weave something for breast cancer awareness, Bonnie Inouye posted two pink ribbon drafts some years ago on Handweaving.net, here and here.
If you are new to weaving, or is about to teach a beginner, have a look at Tracey's post in her Pioneering on the Home Front blog. (No, it's not new, but I just found it.)
"Feel of Fibre" Review
If anyone up Auckland way reads or hears about the Waiheke Art Gallery exhibition, can you please let me know? For now, I feel like a white asparagus shoot (kept in the dark). Thanks.
2009/09/27
Another Art Outing
Today Rose took me to Wollaston Estate Winery to see a Dick Frizzell exhibition. We saw six large paintings, five of which were based on hand painted signs on the roadside and on shop fronts. The viewing experience had a new twist; the gallery had MP3 players loaded with Frizzell's interview, so we went around the gallery listening to him describe each painting. We came out feeling we had a very intimate, immediate access to the paintings.
I appreciate my friends taking me to exhibitions. They've all had formal art education, whereas I've had none, and I am opinionated and have been known to blurt out, in not-so-inside voices, utterances such as "Yuuuuuuck!!!!" and "Good God!!" When asked, I can only say what I like about a work, or not. And when they discuss techniques, forms, compositions, etc., it gives me a deeper understanding of how to understand and appreciate (or not) paintings.
Sometimes I wonder why they put up with me because I react like a kid, but then they are all good mothers and they may be used to kids' reactions.
We started daylight savings today, so we are officially in spring/summer mode.
I appreciate my friends taking me to exhibitions. They've all had formal art education, whereas I've had none, and I am opinionated and have been known to blurt out, in not-so-inside voices, utterances such as "Yuuuuuuck!!!!" and "Good God!!" When asked, I can only say what I like about a work, or not. And when they discuss techniques, forms, compositions, etc., it gives me a deeper understanding of how to understand and appreciate (or not) paintings.
Sometimes I wonder why they put up with me because I react like a kid, but then they are all good mothers and they may be used to kids' reactions.
We started daylight savings today, so we are officially in spring/summer mode.
2009/09/24
CV/Resume??
I'm off to The Suter to look at John Bevan Ford works with Rosie the art historian, but before I go, I thought you might get a chuckle out of this. The chuckle, that is, what I sent to Waiheke as my "CV/Resume":
Born in Yokohama Japan.
Schooled in Tokyo, Japan, Minnesota and Arizona, USA.
Started weaving as an occasional hobby after moving to New Zealand in 1994. Decided to weave seriously after I found myself too old and unemployable for office jobs in 2004.
Selected Exhibitions:
Sea, Sand and Sky, (solo exhibition), Nelson, 2007
Re:fine, Wellington & Nelson, 2007
Culturally Routed, Nelson, 2007
Craft 08, Nelson, 2008
Born in Yokohama Japan.
Schooled in Tokyo, Japan, Minnesota and Arizona, USA.
Started weaving as an occasional hobby after moving to New Zealand in 1994. Decided to weave seriously after I found myself too old and unemployable for office jobs in 2004.
Selected Exhibitions:
Sea, Sand and Sky, (solo exhibition), Nelson, 2007
Re:fine, Wellington & Nelson, 2007
Culturally Routed, Nelson, 2007
Craft 08, Nelson, 2008
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