arlee

break on through to the other side

Posted on February 7, 2017February 7, 2017 by arlee

Since when do i have to “finish” a section before i move to the next? Perhaps that “drag point” merely means it’s time to move on to something else to stop the dragging of heels?

The other side is the same, but different 🙂 I decided to further “fragment” some of the hex/memory symbols, by using the blue and the red together behind. One or two of the smaller areas will be solid blue, but more of the red will be used, as i want this side to be more of the compartmentalizing and fracturing symbolism. The threads too will echo this, partly because the effect works, and partly because i have to marshall my stash carefully, as some of these threads can’t be replaced/re-ordered. Working the materials in this one is definitely a case of use what you have and don’t buy more, and more importantly, don’t change the plan just because you ran out of something!

It was also time to pin up on the wall, and see the whole. When you work by hand like this, and in intense areas, it gets a little myopic.

GADZOOKS! It sure FEELS like there’s more done…… (And the top third isn’t even in the photo…..) Okay, well, considering how much hand work has gone into this, yes i have so done a lot. I *do* see progress, i like the feel, and while i was a tad concerned the red would be too powerful, i can see that in value, it pretty much “matches” the other side. Not that i worry about “matching”, but the eye must travel properly.

drag point

Posted on February 6, 2017February 7, 2017 by arlee

There comes a time for me with every piece that is a drag point. I’ve been “in the zone” with the whole, but suddenly the whole has more parts than i realized, and there’s only so zoney you can get, to get it done! This is such a large piece, and it has many parts, not only in design and execution, but in meaning, so i’m looking at the pauses and stutters as part of the thinking process. I’ve done a lot of reading and research, something that had fallen by the wayside for awhile. I missed that, and am glad to be taking that time again.

The meanings of memory, of remembered, and true, time, the flashes of forgotten experience, the daily recognition and reflection, what would you do if you had no cognizance of most or any of this? Mental illness, dementia, repression, amnesia, delusion/illusion, cognitive conformity (oh that one really frosts my cookies), moral licensing, (the previous two can be/are linked), and most strangely of all, lifelong severely deficient autobiographical memory (SDAM) , and highly superior autobiographical memory (HSAM). What if you could remember *everything*??????????

I remember things from when i was 3, vivid memories of sneaking into the bathroom and taking one of my father’s razor blades (the real ones in those days), sitting on the top step of the stairs and slicing my thumb open, and knowing i was going to be in trouble for it. From the same time, i remember re-assuring my younger brothers (they were 2 and 1) that the loud noise at night was just a train going by. I don’t remember anything from ages 9 and 10. I remember too much from some really bad personal years, but, as in the old joke, not what i had for dinner last night. Some of my memories are distorted, integrated with someone else’s, stolen, i know that from talking with family or friends, who remember differently. Absence of memory, strong memory are protective mechanisms, talismans, guides (yes, do it, no, don’t), for me.

And now i remember i have limited time.

I’m close to done most of the hexes on the left panel of this work (more than these photos show), and wanting to “balance” the right side, will be adding more hexes, but with a different feeling, and configuration. (These photos are also “sideways” because the section is so long, easier to view this way, the bottom actually on the right!)

Next step will be to choose the threads for this side. The main one may still be a bamboo colourway “Stormy Weather”, of which i will have JUST enough (it’s ir-replaceable, as a gift and from a private dyer), OR this one below, and some warmer toned threads than the blues/greens i’ve been using on the left side. That red silk for “under” the hexes has been with me for at least 20 years!

I’ve used the hexagon shape over the past years in many ways, usually symbolizing nature and connectivity, and now have added the element that the hexes represent memories—connecting and referring to each other but separating, compartmentalizing, fragmenting as we get older–as we age the connections become disparate, as time and self dissociate.

And i still don’t have even a “working title” for this.

Day Job at the fffFlower Mines, Days of Honey, Probably talking to just myself

happies at work

Posted on February 2, 2017February 2, 2017 by arlee

Thank the deities for a fulfilling day job.

I “retired” once from the biz, but am so grateful for the distraction and creativity, and the trust of my clients.

"OPINIONATION"

FUMING

Posted on January 31, 2017 by arlee

Excuse me? Because i count the hours it takes to make something, do my stitching, i’m “cheapening” and “commodifying” my work???????????????????????????????????????

I’m not one to get into that mind-set that all creative work is “meditative”, but there are moments when it comes close. Often, my hands are occupied, while my brain sorts other tasks, or tunes out completely while watching tubage, whether it’s informative, trash, entertainment or “current”. I also sit without outside stimulus, sometimes i’m outside listening to the birds, sometimes i’m on the train conversing with fellow passengers. Time slows and speeds during these periods. “Mindful”? Well, all of creativity is mindful, whether good or bad. Intuition and spontaneity still spring from the subconscious, whether or not my brain is in Alpha, Beta or Theta mode. I will not/do not buy into that arena that says i can be/am only an artist when i am zoned out. I certainly can’t do it while in Delta, but maybe, just maybe, perhaps more likely, some of it is Gamma. Look all that up, the types of brain waves. When you come out of your coma, maybe.

When you PM me to take me to task for counting hours, instead of just “going with the flow”, you are saying my way of working is inferior to yours. You want to get nasty? I think your work that consists of attaching ragged scraps together in a cacaphony of colour and pattern, “embroidered” solely with running stitch and “completed” in two days is the cop out in this case. But that’s just my opinion.

I count hours for good reason. Deadlines must be met, commissions must be paid for –i can’t start a project that takes hundreds of hours to do if the deadline is in two weeks; i can’t AFFORD to sell work that takes hundreds of hours for a pittance, like maybe you’re fine with, because “you love doing it” as you “release the love into the world”.

In the final analysis, i do what i do because i DO LOVE it. You don’t like the way i work, tough beans, BabyCakes. My methods are my own, and they are no more “wrong” than your way. If it turns your crank, go ahead, but hands off the keyboard when you criticize my way as perverse.

rumi-quote

Dyeing

dye lot woes

Posted on January 31, 2017January 31, 2017 by arlee

Damn. Caron’s “Pebbles” (Wildflowers, #011) has been a favourite colourway of mine since i started working with the natural dyes. (My cloth is naturally dyed, not *most* of the threads, though some are occasionally.) The soft variations of purple and pink worked so well with rust and brazilwood, but alas, i noticed with the recent order that it wasn’t different pinks and purples, but completely different……………

The original on the left, the new on the right: greens, blues????????

Same name, same number, different dye lots.

I’m quite disappointed, but not really surprised. I’ve been buying this number for at least 5 years, and knew that eventually the dye lot would change, as it’s impossible to duplicate things over time. I did however think it would at least be close. Buying online precludes being able to actually see the difference, especially when the photo used is the “original” one. Even then, in real life, there would have been no guarantee that any in stock would all have been from the same batch!

Having used up one skein that was 3/4 left from other projects, i have one left of the original colourway. I’ll have to either integrate the new one, or find a reasonably close sub: Smoke is too blue, and Ash has too much white…..

In the grand scheme of things, most won’t notice the difference on the actual work, but i wanted that particular dye lot for other work as well.

AND lest anyone suggest i dye them myself, and ask why i’m not using naturally dyed threads instead of commercial “chemical” ones, i haven’t the skill, time or inclination to dye 1000’s of yards (praying that i get close to the colourway), and natural dyes do not do well on finer cotton threads in MY experience. I’m also not that much of a purist that everything has to be “natural” to get the colours or effects i want. Potassium permanganate after all is a chemical, not a natural. In my books, colour is colour, period. If that offends ya, too bad. My circus, my threads 🙂

C’est la Vie!

embrilting, in progress, journal: lessons to learn

a stitch, or many, in time

Posted on January 30, 2017January 31, 2017 by arlee

“How did it get so late so soon?” ― Dr. Seuss

Time and space are slowing with this one. Since the last “photo session” on the 25th, i have added 11 more hours worth of stitch to this area, and feel (while i’m loving it) that little more has been done…………..

Intricacy, tiny occlusions and inclusions, artistic license *and* accuracy, the Devil is in the details as They say.

(I however have to pick parts of that top hex out, as it woogled and borgled.)

The indigo was definitely the right choice.

I’ve had to make tons of notes as i go along, because there are many steps for working each section of the neuron. I keep missing little bits as i go through each one!

I wanted to add what i thought were synapses somewhere, but my thinking about this has been wrong. I thought a synapse was a totally different animal, but research shows me it’s the space “between” neurons.

I can appreciate the beauty of this though, as it’s not all cut and dried facts. My favourite shot to date below, though the lighting is not true.

The “hand” of all this stitching is sore, but the “hand” of all this stitching is so wonderfully tactile too 🙂

I had a big long discussion with myself originally on this post about “meditative” and “mindful”, but blah blah so i deleted it.

a collusion of ideas, Ecoprints and Natural Dyes, in progress, Indigo Dreams, journal: lessons to learn, potassium permanganate, Rust

hexes rising

Posted on January 25, 2017January 25, 2017 by arlee

A few years ago in a Yoshiko Wada workshop, i fortuitously dipped two previously ecoprinted hunks of silk in a henna based indigo pot. In the ensuing years i’ve often dug them out and admired the greeny blue that resulted, though often thought the mud colour induced by chemical reaction over the ecoprints was well, too muddy. Sometimes i’ve wondered about just tossing them or giving them away.

Whew, i didn’t. You never know what will be Useful and Beautiful and Perfect, if you throw it out. The earthiness now of those colours are what was called for in secret by this piece. I listened.

My biggest challenge with this though, is finding a UBP slab of true madder.

I’ve been tuning into certain words and phrases now as i stitch in the evenings, hearing from the strangest sources quotes about memory. A cheesy B movie yielded up “We survive by remembering, but sometimes we survive by forgetting,” and a Cicero quote from an episode of Criminal Minds ““The life of the dead is placed in the memory of the living.” Proves one never knows what might be relevant or inspiring, and from the oddest “sources”!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

a collusion of ideas, Collision: the work begins, embrilting, in progress, Sketchwork

stitching in semiotics

Posted on January 24, 2017January 25, 2017 by arlee

I wonder how meaning is created, not what it is. Symbolism, connotation, iconography, denotation, synecdoche: Memory.

(Sketch of normal neuron from 2011)

A long time ago, i worked a series i called the Artist’s Body. Bones, hearts and brains fascinated, still do fascinate me. How do all these things come together to make a living, breathing entity? Now i’m focusing on one of the more “ephemeral”, unquantifiable aspects of the brain, memory.

Not all of us will fall prey to Alzheimer’s, though most of us as we age, start having faulty memories, the connections becoming disparate, as time and self dissociate. And when you really think about it, all of life is memory, except for the moment of NOW, that changing moment of awareness as we live it, and instantly it becomes the past, another memory.

Memory is time as illustration also. (Even as i write this, i have to refer to my trusty Stitch Journal, for dates…) On the 22nd, i spent 5 hours laying this out and hand stitching.

Yesterday, another 5.25 hours:

I’m almost where i can start adding the indigo underneath certain pieces.

And can something so drifting and fleeting be so tangible to, and in, physical touch? Palpable, stirring, substantial, as i run my fingers over this.

"OPINIONATION"

not political but…..

Posted on January 20, 2017January 20, 2017 by arlee

But i AM a citizen of our beautiful fragile world. I keep seeing blacked out profile photos as people protest the Dumpster. Mine is a little more hopeful. I am VERY grateful that i am Canadian, but fear the way the world ~~may~~ will be affected by this narcissistic lunatic.

And i spend way too much time on FB, gonna have to cut that back, as it’s really starting to get me angry from that man, abused animal pictures, photos of dinners had, what Mrs Dump is wearing (i should give any shits???) and poorly sourced quotes.

in progress, Jam Day, Residency 2016, Samara

me break stitching

Posted on January 17, 2017January 17, 2017 by arlee

Erm, not that i broke anything! I’m just giving myself a stitching break from the big work, by going back to a project started last summer.

Samara has been languishing for a good while: ennui, boredom, what-evering (not to be confused with what-if-ing….), lack of direction. I dumped some threads on her to see what would work.

Above, while i love the colours and the combo, too bright for this one. They are however being used on these little bits, destined for something else: