Well, it is. Pretty even, not my usual thing, but maybe that’s the point.
Start with the known and somewhere deliberately fall off the path. This thing will get bastardized within an inch of its life in the future.
Author: arlee
I am a Canadian textile artist in Calgary, Alberta. As textile artists, we connect and are connected to communities larger than our Selves, or our immediate environs. We encapsulate culture, technique, history and innovation every time we touch cloth.
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We’ve been off work this past week, a holiday, though we didn’t get as far or do as much as we had hoped to. A day trip to Waterton Park way down by the border was a good de-compression though. I just couldn’t do justice with the camera to the MILLIONS AND MILLIONS AND MILLIONS of flowers in bloom–i’ve never ever seen so much blooming beauty in all my days! There’s an old home movie with the three year old self exclaiming “but where are all the flowers?????” Every story book i’d ever read had pictures of woods covered in colour and form, and the real thing was quite disappointing 🙂 (Never mind that it was autumn with red and gold leaves, when everything is going to sleep 🙂 ) This latest experience was a payback, or a pay forward? for that 3 year old though! Imagine meadows, roadsides, forest floors and mountain sides covered, and i mean COVERED in purple, pink, yellow, white, blue, orange and red, coral and peach, lime and emerald in every form and hue, in every texture and shape, and OH what a glorious feast for the eyes.
I’m still kind of stuck with actually settling on anything of any import, but heck, just get on with something then. Often the doing will inspire other ideas or get the blood and imagination going and flowing, so why not? 
I’ve been switching between weights and types of thread for this, as is my wont, from finer 12 wt to a thicker #5 perle in shades of violet and browns, changing the scale of stitch and motif, hoping to make her come alive. I tried the working of the second eye upside down, and it did seem to work! Her “hair flower” will have more of that lovely wormy jellyfish stitching, but in greys to add more depth.
And now i’m seeing more flowers, floral do-eys on/with her. I’m not about to go all gaga with them though–as much as i’m a flower girl in my garden and day job, there must be a balance of personality on this as well. She will be what she will be in the end.
attention span of a gnat
I’m very unsettled right now. Can’t make up my mind what i want to do, where to start, wondering about burgeoning piles of “supplies” that excited me in the making, but not in the using of.
Had a deep deep look at old work, going back to the original photo files and remembering the intent, the feeling–
Ah yes, the feeling. That passion, excitement, joy, playfulness combined with serious effort has been missing. I’ve stuck myself in a rut, have been following along on my own status quo, staying inside a box (of my own devising admittedly) for the most part. I haven’t felt compelled or obsessed really since the making of A Birth of Silence, even the Leighton work kind of leaving me cold–competent, and interesting work, but not for my soul really.
I haven’t truly been spending much time in the stoodio. Oh, the stitch corner on the couch gets used, but too often lately, the work each evening has been tossed on a pile, an ever enlargening pile, one that frustrates and maddens me because the work isn’t coming out of my heart, just out from my fingers, fingers that need to Do, but aren’t really getting anything Done……..I’ve even subconsciously blocked the path TO the studio–there are boxes, bags, tool chests and suitcases literally in the way, necessitating a small delicate two step to get through–now what does THAT say about the import of being in there?????
So i’m going to go back to screwing around with whatever, with everything, flitting here, flapping there, nothing serious, nothing profound. Perhaps some “self directed workshops” again will open the sluices, summer tasking a million things because they *all* need doing: distraction and deflection.
Like my garden, i don’t know whether to fold up
or fold down
go to seed
buzz around
or just hang in there….
I may not make the end of summer residency exhibit because of this, but that may be a cost i have to absorb. Then again, maybe lightning will strike and new vision will appear.
I’m tired myself of the analyzing and overthinking. Screw it and the horse it rode in on.
slash and burn
Well, no *actual* burning yet…but who knows?
I like the lace but am not sure yet where it will go, as i have other “cracks” planned as well. Perhaps it will leak out somewhere else.
riding off in all directions at once, total recall
Too many possibilities! But not enough thought, texture, design in the start……………….
I’ve stuck myself in a rut, as much fun as it was to design “whole cloth” fabrics to work with. I need to go back to piecing in, layering and shaping. I also want to go back to myself in a sense, maybe with the GIRL series from 2012.
I can “see” this better now:
Maybe i’m just rambling, but i knew last night when i started stitching on the whole cloth piece, it didn’t feel right, didn’t satisfy, so much so that i burst into blubbering howls at a stupid, manipulative Sad Overly Dramatic Moment on the tubage because head and heart was so unhappy with what my hands were doing. Triggers are funny/strange/unrelated things.
Seriously? Yup, on “Containment” believe it or not……..
I still have some of that beautiful lace i used in that 2012 piece, i have bits of soft silk in the lavender and pink colours, i need more dimension and tactile whoopteedo’s–because it’s that texture that gets my heart racing, therwise it’ll languish in that damned pile of Maybe Someday I’ll Finish It. I post sometimes maybe too fast, too enthusiastically, and then Reality sets in, and the race is ended before it even began. Start at the beginning again. At least there isn’t any ripping out to do, and the start can still be incorporated.
you have to start somewhere
Tiny stitches in hesitation.
And stitching seeds.
Mining the stashlode for green velvet also, it’s in here somewhere……………….
after the blues have gone away
With a very healthy stack of new fabrics to work with, i turned my attention to sketchbooks from the past few years, and pulled some ideas that leaped out at me. Some date back to 2011, and gave a recurring theme. Browns, soft vintage violets and lavenders, machine work (!!!!yes) and “stacked” techniques, these are jump off points, and may or may not be incorporated in some form.
I’m calling this period/amalgamation the “Milkweed Studies”, though some of the resulting work won’t be recognizable as milkweeds! I started thinking about milkweeds back in 2013 when i was in FAN but never completed the piece and had to drop out of the exhibit, something that embarrassed and horrified me, as it was a collaborative effort with someone else. Being a gardener and protector of bees, butterflies and other pollinators, also means these plants are vital in my world view, despite the invasive label they have in some areas.
A few pieces get dropped right away, though filed for other work in the “series” maybe, and i am left with these:
The small black and purple page is a line study of sorts; though it’s a pattern in a sense, it will be merely a guideline with the fabric above it. The small milkweed paint sketches are my real focus, but they won’t be translated as purely in the final work.
As excited as i am by the face and figure pieces of fabric that i did during the residency, and though i have started on one face already, this is where my focus will be for the next while. I have a deadline again with the residency show, and will work this into the theme of “SelfEdge”, as the interpretation is rather loose. (It’s all in the artist statement when and how you write it 🙂 )
I’m going to incorporate hand and machine work again, something i haven’t done in awhile. My purist, obsessive side disagrees, but my pragmatic, it’s-just-a-tool side is thrilled. Let the fight games begin!
Blue Moon, Leighton Suite Blue done
Done. Round and round i went, round and round it goes and glows.
Except for the last bits of stretching the smaller moons to canvases, and signing the big moon, i can now say that my Leighton Suite Blue work is DONE.
This is the first time i have done a deliberate series, with work based on each previous piece, and the first (and probably only) based on responses to another artist’s work, and i’m pleased with the cohesiveness of the pieces. I don’t know that the original Marion Nicholl work will be visible during the exhibit, but hopefully, there will be some reference to it, so that the audience can see the antiphon i intended. The whole process, in photos, sketches and ramblings can be found here.
With the deadline of July 30th, i’m well ahead of the game, and ready to move on to new work!
day 11, all done!
Glad i crammed in those last 3 hours yesterday!
My back and neck are killing me from leanhanging over tables and deep sinks, mopping up the mess, and wringing out rags, but it was worth it 🙂
res day 10, coming to the end
This piece below is actually one of the dropsheets–though it’s plastic, i may just have to stitch it with those lovely strata markings!
A small line dance this time, some subtle, some strong, another “filler” piece, a nice deposit to the library though 🙂
I made the decision yesterday to do ONE more batch–it will be small as well, but i figured i best cram in as much as i could. I pick them up this afternoon, and then i am done for this year. (But with plans for a backyard expedition as well!) And then time to make decisions about stitching, and what goes to the shop.
albedo too 
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