Period/Full Stop

Then this morning, we dismantled our exhibition, which in my case took all of 23 minutes. With Ben's help, of course. And now the various piece reside in variously not-exactly-convenient places in my house.

 

I realize now that the one I got really very wrong are the postcards. They look much too dark and unattractive; I wouldn't buy them. I should leave at least a couple of days to work out the colors and values of the printed cards and not feel bad about taking up a lot of the designer's time because, ummm, the values and saturations in my cards are looking sad.

EDIT: I'm doing a little ac/counting. I prepared 96 postcards and sold only 8 at $3 each; I also prepared 68 buttons and sold 24 at $2 each. They are insignificant, but still it's worth making tiny affordable things to take away if I can't be bothered making middle-of-the-road affordable things also. Thanks you, Marlborough Weavers, for the most part! 

Normal

Starting this week, Week 2 of 8, I've been allowed back in the Friday morning drawing class. What a relief. Friends, morning sun, my favorite model. And for once, we were allowed to use a proper, A1-paper. Bliss. 

(The two in front are A3; the one in the back is A1 with some weirdness because I didn't stand back far enough to check the proportions. The poor thing looks like she has a tumor between her legs on the bottom right, but rest assured she doesn't.)

Then I went to see two satisfying films, "The Intouchables", (French, beautiful, comfortably predictable but laugh-out-loud hilarious,) and Mental, (noisy, very Australian, and in a strange twist, a most loving homage to the film"Sound of Music".)

I met Ben for pizza at the cinema, (Nelson's best pizza place is inside our cinema), came home and went to bed early. Nice, eh.

Colors

Mom often refers to colors as the "young" people's dominion and blames her chronological age for not being "able" to weave anything in a new color scheme. Phhhhh! I'm sending two of the more sedate (yes!) balls of Italian knitting yarns I found in the local shop as triggers.

Meanwhile I was a bit stuck for a new cashmere project for Santa Fe, but dithering in bed this morning paid off: I think there are going to be trees and leaves.

Ideas?

Something I've been thinking for a while and have been talking to Heidi, Lloyd's assistant, for a year was for me to give some of my time to raise funds for Arts Council. I spoke with Lloyd last week shooting off ideas. Cards and posters seem to be out of favor; too much work for too little return unless we can get the printers on board. Art auction seemed more to his taste; online to broaden possible participation.

I have other crazy ideas like putting a long table in the gallery amongst artworks and having a special lunch or dinner has been my fav; open studios and studio tours are always possible, as are workshops-as-fund-raisers, a few (intensive) days/evenings of artists talks with slide presentations, again at the gallery.

I want to be event-oriented, rather than, say, participating in the Arts Council Committee as Lloyd suggested. Goodness, can you imagine me in a committee meeting? No, that'll be more punishment than volunteering. I'd like much of the prep work to be doable at home, in my PJs, if that's not asking too much.

What interesting fund-raisers have you been to? Heard of? Arts Council helps art activities/events which are community-based, rather than help individual artists. With that in mind, there have to be new and exciting ways to raise funds even in a small place like Nelson? Do you know organizations, arts or otherwise, that do fun fund-raisers?? Do share!

* * * * *

Anybody interested in a Small Piece exhibition? Is it the timing that's so wrong?

Living the Weaver's Life

But I haven't been sitting around saturated in envy. In no particular order in roughly the last ten days:

Joan McLauchlan, Win, Chris and Rose came over from Marlborough to see "Beginnings" on Tuesday; Esmae joined us. This is Joan looking out the window while I tried to capture the light fixtures; from memory they were string-like fiber molded and stabilized until hard with some kind of liquid, after which the fiber shapes were bisected, the molds removed, light bulbs inserted, and shapes reassembled.

I feel I have to "host/entertain" when people come to see my work; by doing so I miss the chance to listen to what they think. I missed a good chance. It's that old, familiar performance anxiety.

I am back in Ronette's drawing class, but on Wednesday nights because the Friday morning class is full. I know none of my classmates; they don't know I'm a little... different. Or maybe I'm no more so than they. I loved the foot on my board I picked up randomly.

I finished weaving two scarves; had there been 20cm more warp left, I could have woven a third, but that not being the case, I shall weave more small twill fabric so I can make more buttons in the future. Our local craft store is out of 14mm and 17mm wrappable buttons; 12mm seem so tiny and 19mm too large for my purpose.

Two Hearts blanket have been ready for washing for yonks, and the weather dry and perfect for the task, but I've not felt much like pressing big pieces so they sit a-waiting. 

I made warp for Hearts Blanket's little sister in color schemes requested by Grandma; one soft pink knitting yarn, one blue-y pink weaving yarn and a mohair are treated as one. I've enough for two because I like the weft on the left better but am not sure if there is enough; the weft on the right I have more than enough but it finishes the cloth harder than I want.  

I don't often weave for myself but I wanted a new couch blanket in purples; it turned out I don't have enough purple wool, but I can make a big wrap/shawl, about 90cm wide and, well, the warp is nearly 3 meters! 

The warp is an unknown wool in black purple from Mom's stash; she started knitting something so some of the balls were crinkly like instant noodles; that's paired with a burgundy/grape merino boucle and I'm threading them in opposites. The weft is purple alpaca I bought from Elann.com ages ago when I fell in love with the color, together with the same boucle. It's been a while since I last used almost the full width of the 4-shaft Jack. It's been ages, (15 years?) since I planned a 10DPI/20EPI warp, and I wrapped and checked gazillion times, (21 pairs in an inch,) but it feels like I should sley the pair together 8DPI/16EPI.

The Cherry Blossom blanket I planned for Mom a few years ago shrank too much and ended up much narrower than I had hoped, and somehow became Dad's blanket. But Dad's become increasing frail and I'm afraid he's going to trip over the fringes one day, so I thought to make a ruana with a similar fabric, with boucle in the warp and the weft, but a shortish one so it covers him to between below the waist and not below his knees. I wanted to use Mom's lovely handdyed, handspun blue yarn as a base, but the boucle I intended to combine in the warp (the saturated blue and green one,) was too strong and killed the sporadic natural/brown bits in Mom's, so I lined up all suitable merino and boucles and made a mishmash of a warp. This is going on the 4-shaft loom after my purple piece, and will be woven in plain weave, double width for the back, two layers for the front. I have no idea what is going to be the main weft; there is Mom's handspun green yarn, (not photographed,) which would create a lovely texture but I may, if lucky, have enough to weave about 30cm of the back. It will end up like a patchwork of colors and textures, but inadvertently it's also going to turn into a good stash-reduction project of my nicest wools.  

Stash was what Pat and I talked about while we "womenned" the gallery yesterday for a couple of hours. I was disappointed Pillars used up surprisingly little. I now freely admit I'm delusional if I think I can make headways into my current stash in a "few" years; I think, if I stay productive, it's more between five and ten years.

Pat recommended I read "Art & Fear" by David Bayles and Ted Orland some time ago. Last week it popped up on sale at Audible.com and bought it right away, and man, this is good. It's a pre-New-Age, tell-it-like-it-is, short and sharp description of how we may feel/perceive/think as makers and putting them in context. I've never felt fear that I've been aware of, more disappointment or anger, yet this book is exactly what I needed now. I've listened to it twice so far, but wouldn't mind having a used paperback to read, reread, highlight, underline and scribble in the margin.

I'm going home for six to eight weeks in Jan/Feb/Mar, and I've started looking into air fares and schedules. I've signed up to a Kay Faulkner (Australia) workshop in April; it's residential, plus I need transport to there and back, but I've never been to Whanganui and my good friend Joan Rosier-Jones has made it her home a few years ago and I've never visited her there, either. And I thought it may mark a nice "full circle" at this juncture. I just have to weave a whole bunch of merchandises between now and my trip. There is also a "market" day on the last day of this workshop, so I shall schlep buttons, as well as scarves, then. I mustn't forget: I've got the Sketchbook Project to work on before I leave for Japan, too.

Finally, with Dianne and Alison's exhibition opened, I can pick Alison's brain about that same step where I get stuck in the design process. I'm looking forward to that.

Back to Shaft Envy

Mine is a "middle class" problem. I'm not sure if it applies to our working-poor-on-one-income middle-class-ness, but considering the equipment and stash I have and the fact I don't have to work for a living and looking at my experiences and skills, I think you'd agree with my broadly categorizing my work and me "middle class" in the weaving scheme of things.

I talked about sort of giving up getting my hands on a bigger, badder, meaner loom. I thought about my attitude towards my making, which is the same as how I spend my life. I listened to Adrianna Huffington and Nora Ephron several times when they spoke at the 42nd St Y, possibly in 2006. Best US 95cents I ever spent! They parade their very-high-up upper middle class women problems, but just because they're well-off doesn't diminish their efforts, you know. But I digress.

I have been thinking about getting older vs growing older. Life this side of 42 for me has been a process of resignation (bad!) and contentment (good); resignation from things I had always assumed I'd do some day but physically, emotionally or financially/geographically can't any more or won't so I can invest time/energy/money into something else. (And I add, I really didn't expect to live in such a small place and how this would impacts my perceptions/expectations.) I gave up serious writing, a higher degree or three, and most regrettably travel and workshop/education opportunities. Instead I looked for deeper investigation/contemplation in weaving in the first instance, and my understanding and participation in visual arts locally and on the Internet. These coincided with my efforts to turn down the noises in my head and approach something like internal peace, which made me more realistic about my abilities and thus made me more timid, too, rather than optimistic. I even started thinking my lust for equipment and experiences is a sort of materialism and immaturity, covering what's lacking within. I even looked forward to revisiting ideas and working on many iterations in my lifetime.

And observing my parents' aging process, the better I'm equipped to look inside myself for my own happiness/contentment, the happier/more content the rest of my life will be, and the earlier I get started, the better. 

But mechanism/structure of/in weaving is still what I am most interested in in the first instance. And it helps to have big, bad machines to hone in on this aspect, though by no means the only. So when Pat introduces me to works by a weaver who has 32-shafts and at least access to a jacquard, in this case one Jenny Robertson of Canberra, Australia in the context of multi-layered weave, I can't stop slipping back down the shaft-envy/materialism (as opposed to thinking-ism) slope.

Wanted: more growing up.

Debriefing - Part 4 of 3 (and I Think the Last)

We had a lukewarm meeting yesterday. Some were unwell, some were tired, and someone was very late, (though she did text the hostess, honest!) It was not quite the debriefing I had hoped for, but then I knew it was too soon for that. We mostly talked about where we want to go in our making individually.

I learned, or Pat told me, I work differently, at least from the other members of Strands. I have to see things in my mind, be it a specific piece, how it's installed in an exhibition in a specific part of a specific gallery, or the exhibition as a whole. I looked forward to discuss our exhibition as a whole at earlier meetings, but that wasn't to be, which still feels like a lost opportunity for me, because among the five of us, we've been to a fair few exhibitions in a fair few countries.

Things I make are site-specific, if you can call it that. It's always been so. Someone who's helped me a lot at one point was a woman whose back I saw at the Nelson School of Music, late-middle-aged, petite. In my mind, she rushed down a cobbled street as best she could in her heels, in an autumnal early evening to meet her husband, who is patient and kind but always annoyingly punctual, at the Opera House. She wore black some days, very dark brown other days; her husband preferred grays and blacks. Because it had been the kind of day where Summer had clearly refused to leave completely, she foolishly left home without a coat. Goodness me, I'd have to make her a large shawl, won't I? This is why my non-commission pieces tended to be very short at first, not just because I am short.

A whole cast of characters lived in my head, taking turn in telling me what they needed. There's no doubt I enjoy this process, and over days and weeks I fine-tune the item in question while ignoring them speaking, singing or humming. But I've always done this so I never gave it much thought. More recently, I don't always have a human protagonist, but the cloth flies on its own accord, in a specific context.

Pat told me others probably didn't work like this, and that's why others found it difficult to talk about what I wanted to talk about sometimes. 

About a year ago I declared to Ronette, Pat and Nola that after nine years of trying, I gave up designing according to prescription. While working on Pillars, Curvy and the Friends(hip) piece, I played around some, using tricks I've picked up in various design courses, but on the whole I ended up working the way I normally do. I'm always open to other/new ways, and if I come across a better way I'm more than happy to amend/switch. What I'm saying is, I finally don't feel the need to catch up with people who went to art/weaving school. After all, I say I'm self-taught in my blurbs. 

So working with the group for 18 months ended up a kind of a home-coming, a full circle, getting a little sharper picture of myself as a maker. I feel a kind of a quiet contentment, almost a confidence, at having tried other things, having observed other people work in their own ways, and relearning/reconfirming what works for me. Yeah, I don't fell like I need to catch up with anything or anyone, but need to keep making the way I've done. And I love working by myself.

Interesting that Maria, too, found her returning to where she was once, but more focused.

If I think of something else I learned, I'll tell you about it, but I think that's beyond debriefing. 

Hitting a Bump

Or a few in this case.

I like my cloths to have as few wrinkles as possible, so I steam press them while damp to within inches of their lives, samples and proper pieces. (Wool bounce back; mercirized cotton stay down some.) Though I do like textured cloths when other weavers make them, I never wanted to make them myself. Until the latest sample.

I was in such a hurry to get weaving that I washed but did not press the sample, and for some reason I'm really enjoying the tiny gentle bumps, and I'm wondering if I should wash and size the two scarves from this warp instead of power-steam-pressing. (I don't have proper facilities to size pieces so it will most likely mean pinning them down on the carpet where we don't walk around much.)   

A-side of Draft 35842 and a glimpse of Draft 40317 on the left; I'm about to finish weaving 40317 with the olive green weft.

B-side of Draft 35842; too, too Waffly for my taste, and yet, and yet... I'm weaving this teal/peacock weft next; it's a color I don't care for, but in this warp it makes the overall cloth so saturated and each little unit in the structure pop up.

Draft 40285 and I'm even thinking of trying this in wool, in what feels like a total departure for me.

All three are on 14 shafts, straight draw. I've included a tiny bit of basket weave in the selvedges.

Reviewed

The local newspaper has done a review of our exhibition. I must say, I never ever thought of Shoji screen partitions in Japanese homes when I was making the pillars. It's always interesting what others see.

I'm in Torres Straights Islands Heaven

I caught the African episode of BBC's Hidden Treasures of African, Indian and Australian Art yesterday. I've always liked Griff Rhys Jones, and preferred Jones' docos to Michael Palin's. Jones' observations on where culture/life interfaces art, be it his own or another writer's, were honest and touching.

After that, I went searching for the other two episodes and watched the Australian one twice so far. So thoughtful. So wondrous. I heartily recommend it. You can start from here and at the end of the clip, one of the tiles will be the second, third and fourth part.

It's about Torres Straights Islands artifacts/arts and life, and there, to this day, they are so intertwined and mysterious. I've seen some Torres Straights Islands artworks in Auckland and Dunedin, and have been struck how "modern/contemporary" they looked to me. (There are few prints at the Suter for another week, too.) I've searched the Internet several times about their art, but I never found such a comprehensive art-in-its-context package. Wonderful. If you are as interested as I, you can even read Haddon's book here. 

I haven't done anything else today yet. The Indian episode is all about textiles, Jones tells us.