The big one on Tabula Memoria still has me stumped as to the middle visible sectioning.
Hexagons discrete? Holes? A tree? More synapses?
Still a mystery.
Category: in progress
pursuing perseverance
I figure i am actually at midpoint with “Tabula Memoria”, which makes me feel better. Mid point still means half again still to do, which makes me feel bad. I’m at Dithering Stage, second guessing, re-ordering threads to replace ones i’ve run out of, and measuring by the inch what goes where and why.
That darned second figure is *a* bugaboo right now. The aborted one is filed, and i’m re-figuring (snarf) how to do it so that it means what it’s supposed to mean. The centre of the top moon is *the* bugaboo though, has me bamboozled–not sure how i want to treat it. What does it mean when a moon is divided?
It’s also time to fill some negative space with some discrete, minimalist stitch for anchoring and to keep it “void” but not empty. My brain is trying to wrap around what it’s saying to me……i *know* what i mean, just can’t express it in words. Invisible memories. Impalpable boundaries. Undisclosed but there. Can something Not Be and Be?
Meow. Not Meow.
oh sorry, am i boring you?
I keep slogging away at the side panels for this piece, each day ending with me thinking “almost done this part!”, and then seeing it ain’t so. (Don’t get me wrong–i love what i’m doing for this one, but it gets SO SO SO myopic at this end of the needle…)
This morning i realized i can start other areas as most of the piece is side stabilized now with all the stitching that *is* done. Figure One is pinned to the bulletin board, Figure Two is still in my head after i aborted the first attempt at it, but there is another area that’s really important, and that’s the moon.
There will be dense work on this area, but “blending” in, so to speak. Two colourways in floss and perle, i’ve chosen DMC 4140 (Driftwood) to do the darker areas like the rust, and DMC 4145 (Sand Dune) to do the highlights/lighter areas.
I work by committing to something, and the best way to start this area was to clearly mark where the moon is. That’s commitment!
Now i HAVE to work that area, because the marks don’t come out. The moon is off centre, (i can’t abide symmetry!) and that’s something that will be worked with, as i intend to ghost a bit around it— the template (a huge stainless steel bowl for popcorn 😉 ) i used to mark for the circle, was not the same size as the original mark made by the rust and dyes. For the record, yes i do so use pencil, and occasionally fine black micron pens to mark some areas. Intuition is all fine and dandy and “sensitive to the cloth and intent”, but sometimes you have to have a guideline.
While i work this, i can think how to balance the top of the left panel, as it’s empty, unlike the top of the right one!
perfect perfect light
This is the time of day when light bends and flows, softens the rougher hand, the harder heart.
This is the day of time blinking out of illusion and desire, to touch hand to heart.
Time flickering, day febrile and lustrous, heart flutters and hand trembles.
I will give you the time of day.
out like a lion
I really need to photograph this at my favourite time of day, the mid afternoon, when the light bends properly over tactility. There’s little left on the right panel to work, but i still have void areas that will get a bit of treatment to balance the left side. (Photo shows side panels folded together, with middle panel not visible.)
It’s time to map out areas time wise. The amount of hours that have gone/are going into this, now need to be divided into other areas. I’m ready to start the top moon to stabilize the centre panel.
is it the right way on the wrong track, or the wrong way on the right track?
I started the second figure yesterday and up until 33.2657 minutes ago was pleased.
Now i’m not.
Photographing things helps me see more “objectively” and looking at this now it really doesn’t represent what i want in the second figure.
There’s also the fact that i WORKED IT FROM THE WRONG SIDE!!!! I want the figure facing the left, the hexes that represent stronger memories, youth’s facile way of remembering and the naive thinking that always the mind will be the same. (I know mine’s not anymore…)
It’s too red. The greeny blue is too greeny blue dark. It’s blotchy, but at the same time, too “solid”. This one has to be more robust, less disintegrated, but as it stands, it’s too Too.
The fabric must also have been pulled wrong, off grain when i started working it in the hoop, as the proportions and angles have shifted. I *knew* i would have a bit of a problem with that, due to the larger size, so i think it’s going to have to be stabilized differently.
Though the colourway of DMC 4140 matches in the perle #5 and the 6 strand embroidery floss (separated into 2 strands at a time in the needle), the perle is too heavy. Even if i was happy with the whole, i’d have to pull that head stitching out, and redo it with the floss. And i don’t think the harem cloth is strong enough to withstand having been so tensioned, stitched, ripped out and then restitched.
Time invested in this though was not Lost. I learned some things, and will start again.
walking while chewing gum
I know *how* i’m going to attach the figures to the back ground, having worked that out way back *and* while working the memory hexes.
Now i’ve put myself in a bit of a spot. There’s a LOT of background to work in the centre panel! I was thinking of a third figure, but that still leaves “”huge tracts of land” to not necessarily fill as heavily as the side panels, but they can’t be left too void either. Whether i use something that blends in or not, colourwise, there has to be some treatment in stitch. I do a lot of thinking ahead while working areas, dream about things, in my sleep and as daydreams, and trust that the Universe will unfold as it should when it comes to my handling a needle and thread. I “plan”, but i don’t always follow the plan. I intuit, but i trust sampling and testing as well. There’s no one way to work anymore in this stoodio. However i do the work, i know it will have my flavour, my style, my sensibility, and that’s the best way, however i/you do the work!
If you look at this picture below, know that above the second figure there’s at least as much as the photo shows to the top of the photo (if that makes sense…) of fabric above the standing figure.
Or do i move the figures all down further to the bottom? This photo does show the whole.
Then there’s ACRES above, though it might be easier to focus on a new element for that. Trees? I do like the idea of the top “moon” being more developed *as* a moon, but then how do i tie the other lower ones in?
As soon as i took this photo, i had my question answered. It’s *not” as big or empty as i thought it might be. Lower the figures, (do i need a third one after all????), accent the top moon, treat the two lower moons *somehow*— Nimbuses?
Nimbus means a cloud in Latin, and is found as a divine cloud in 1616, whereas as “a bright or golden disk surrounding the head” it does not appear until 1727. The plural “nimbi” is correct but “rare”; “nimbuses” is not in the OED but sometimes used. “Nimb” is an obsolete form of the noun, but not a verb, except that the obsolete “nimbated”, like the commoner “nimbate”, means “furnished with a nimbus”. It is sometimes preferred by art-historians, as sounding more technical than halo.[39]\
Meh. no, not as a “halo”.
Hmm, i like the second definition here, but not quite applicable:
nim·busˈnimbəs/nounnoun: nimbus; plural noun: nimbi; plural noun: nimbuses
-
1.a luminous cloud or a halo surrounding a supernatural being or a saint.
-
a light, color, etc., that surrounds someone or something.
-
- 2.
-
a large gray rain cloud.“nimbus clouds
AHA.
The imagined physical manifestation of your state of mind. Although not of the physical plane, it can be observed through the actions and interactions of the owner. And sometimes, just sometimes, it shines so bright you can almost see it.
“Imagined”, yes, since the crux of the biscuit for this one is Memory, that’s perfect. I shall work on the theory that these are Nimbuses of awareness, fabrication, illusion, perception, supposition, and what time, our brains, and neurological changes hold these to as we age.
first figure done!
Sweating bullets when it was done.
You can see how much the figure disintegrates as memory changes, diminishes and fades. But would it survive, maintain its integrity after being removed and transferred to the actual background?
Yes.
I’ll mop up the bullets, and move on confidently to the other figure now.
progress is as progress does
Day three, when ever that was (i’m losing track of what day i worked on what piece for this commission):
Added a bit more shading as well. Though i don’t want the figures to stand out too much once they’ve been applied to the background, i want them to integrate a bit more as well. That slight purple addition references some of the shades of brazilwood on the main cloth.
Day whatever, but as of March 14th:
The left panel is within two hours of being done, at least the hex memory part……
so close i can taste it
At least on most of the major work of the left panel!
This piece is huge and still has lots of area to work, but it bodes well so far.
I’m hoping to have coffee in the next two weeks with my “Patron”–a little nerve wracking, but also quite excited to be able to show the real thing to the person who commissioned this.
Part of this weekend also has me headed into the storage room where there are at least 10 big Rubbermaids to go through–i’m clearing out a lot of “commercial” fabric for donating to UjaamaGrammas.
albedo too 
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