I felt like i played hookey yesterday, staying home to work on Tabula Memoria, guilty as hell, and sneaking around in my own house!
This morning, back to res, and then to DayJob. There’s just not enough hours in the hours.
Category: Probably talking to just myself
damn dyelot differences again……
I KNOW it’s impossible to get consistency in dyeing, especially with variegated threads, and over a period of years, but wow. The original dyelot i bought in 2012, at the top, the new one below:
Fortunately, this is one time i don’t need to worry about “matching”, as neither is already being used in anything! And i actually like the new ones better 🙂 I do however when buying now, order 2, preferably 3-5 skeins of each so that interruptions won’t happen with colourways. Minor differences may not make or break work, but major ones *might* if you can’t integrate the different look.
cosmic debris clearing
Oh MY. It’s the annual “Clear all this crap, WTF was i thinking keeping this?” time. I’ve been going though boxes and piled bags, big Rubbermaids and small mystery piles, pulling out crap and good stuff and more crap, and getting rid of it. No more shuffling it into new piles or boxes, not gonna use it, LOSE it!!!
A few delights along the way though.
I don’t have this piece of fabric anymore, but i did find the metal “flowers” that left the marks. Set that aside for res work.
In one box, i discovered dozens of separating zippers, still in their original packaging, from the days of my wearable art business—1999!!!!! (That number looks so wrong now that we’re in the 2000’S….) I found plant saucers, sheer synthetic uglies, empty journals, full journals (half of which are not worth keeping, though i still have sketchbooks dating back to ’93 that i consider “valuable”), dried eucalyptus leaves, bags of rubber bands, patterns i haven’t touched for 20 years at least, bundles of fabrics tied together from when i mass produced bags (all cut and ready to stitch), a lot of paper garbage, scraps too tiny for even the savviest of hoarders to use and clumps of hair where obviously some animal we’ve had made a nest.
I apparently also have a plastic bag fetish, a secret one even to myself, as i had no idea that i have stored in various other plastic bags, enough to fill two large garbage bags……..pitched it in the recycle bin of course, not the garbage.
I managed to sort my cottons (and other “naturals”) into white solids for dyeing, and coloured solids for over-dyeing, by emptying 2 Rubbermaids that were filled with definitely what would be considered Crap with a capital S. Though i don’t sew clothes for myself anymore, i still can’t bear to part with a few yardages, but most of it is going going gone to UjaamaGramma donations.
I wish i could find someone who was truly interested in a collection of at least 100 Threads magazines.
Somehow i have three containers of indigo, and several of soda ash. And more measuring cups and spoons that you can poke a snake at. On the bright side, i have two boxes of ecoprint “fails” that are destined for indigo over-dyeing.
I figure by the time i’m done, i should have at least 5 very large garbage bags full of stuff to donate, and 3 to either recycle or huck in the Gar-bahj. Even if it doesn’t sell for the Grammas to use the funds from, some will get shipped after to places/people who can use it in some form. The last bits are today’s plan.
There’s floor space again.
happies at work
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.
oh, bother……………
Think i’m going to be offline for awhile. Damn computer keeps freezing and acting bizarrely………………………….
On the good side, my Valdani order arrived 3 days after i placed it, so stitching at least will fill the hours. And better really than computer time anyway, yes?????
translation
Still just peering over the edge of the rabbit hole, but on the way up now. It was a long fall.
Paint on paper above, painted cotton below.
FM on painted cotton above, hand embroidery below.
As i’m writing, i realize this exercise made me think of this:
(Hoodoo Sky, 2009, in progress)
Tests for possible work, i still have 2 other techniques to try with the remaining painted fabric.
There’s nothing more satisfying than bringing a cloth to life. I could easily stretch and frame these beginnings on their own, but that needle and thread thing is so addicting, and really, the translation from flat image to textured story is what turns my crank.
While i “designed” the base cloth for the one above, because it is an abstract, i had no idea when i made it what i would do with it, story wise. Sometimes narratives just happen. Stockpiling cloth like this is like prepping a bunch of canvases, or journal pages, no dreading that blank space!
Admittedly, the deliberate shape and design of a face means the face is the story, but things still can become what they are as they want.
The story will continue.
no sale…………………..
It’s with much regret that i must withdraw my intent to participate in the Contextural Artisan Christmas sale on the 19th.
Personal reasons, which i will not go into here, in public. As much as i appreciate the thoughts or wishes, please do not email privately either. This will pass.
I’m very sorry if this has caused inconvenience, or false pretense for publicity purposes.
“torn between two lovers”
I continue. And continue. And continue.
I’m reminding myself that the intended audience cares nothing for or about my “serious” work, that they want “pretty” or “interesting” for a reasonable price, and no one can blame them for that. The aim after all, of a Christmas Market is to get something into someone else’s hands for gift giving, and to get a few dollars in your own pocket. How can i complain about that? When i made “wearable art” in the 90’s that was my ONLY concern: i *didn’t* want things hanging about the Stoodio, or it was wasted materials, time and effort. The big problem really is that i committed late to the endeavour, giving myself only 37 days to get enough work together………..I blame ME for all of this then……The Financial Me says GO GO GO, and the Artist Me is dragging her heels and whining.
“Next year, i’ll start earlier for Christmas.” I *do* have an 11tybajillion ideas for that, so we’ll see what percolates up from the wells then. And all complaining aside, i like these efforts, BUT..
I keep staring at this, currently pinned to a design wall, trying out things in my mind, jotting notes, holding my breath.
I’m reminding myself it will all be “over” at the end of Nov 19, and i can return to this and other new work, with copious ideas, plans and colourways, motifs and techniques.
Snivel snivel snivel.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
PS Fabrics are on sale in the shop–winter clear out time! <——That’s a link 🙂
lost and resting
The slumps are here again. Two exhibits in the same time frame, and as always after intense periods of productivity, that means i don’t know where to go next. You’d think i’d be happy, energized, excited, but i always feel at a loss after finishing. My life is good, i like where i live and what i do at the Day Job, but in the time after the current work is completed, there’s always that feeling of something missing in the stoodio, that search for the Next Big Thing. I wish i could grab back some of the verve i had when i first started blogging 12 years ago: 4 posts a day, tons of enthusiasm, experimentation out the hoo-hoo, “WOW, OMG, HOLY SHIT, THE WORLD IS SO EXCITING”——— where’d that girl go?
But this time i’m going easy on myself. There’s no race, no competition. I’m enjoying what’s left of my garden outside, admiring the indoor jungle, note making for C***mas at the fffFlower Mines, and not doing much of anything but observing and thinking.
The beauty of old roses:
Orchid cactus:
Funk of the week at the fffFlower Mines, Leonotis leonurus:
Odontoglossum orchid:
A sad sad Medinilla! Lost most of its leaves this summer, but valiantly blooming again anyways:
The Orchid Cactus blows me away:
And the very little i have done with needle and thread, the start of a sixth indigo moon:
….The art of the breakthrough is the practice of figuring out all the ways to not do it on your way to an insight….We find our way by getting lost. Anything other than that is called reading a map. Seth Godin
they say it’s my birthday
A perennial favourite 🙂
I/we don’t mark birthdays anymore (or Christmas, New Year’s etc), just anniversaries–another day, older, sometimes wiser, sometimes more patient, sometimes more curmudgeonly, just more.
Same new old different days.
albedo too 
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