Tidal River Installation, Day 1

This was the day I had been waiting for: installation of my project at the new public library.  Shortly after 10am the crew had the scaffolding and all the necessary tools in place, and got started.

The first silk organza panel being leveled.  They hang on aluminum rods suspended on thin steel cables which are threaded thru eye-screws fastened to the ceiling.

The wall above the circulation desk is curved and the ceiling slopes, making measurements tricky and time consuming.

The second panel going up.

Watching the boys way up there was very nerve wracking!

By 3pm, 7 of the 12 panels were up and we have a sure shot at completing the installation tomorrow.  Please join me for Part Two and the finale in my next post.

100 Year Celebration Stole

As mentioned in my last post, I have recently completed a couple of projects, one being a celebration stole commemorating my congregations' 100th anniversary.  Last evening I presented the stole to our Pastor and the church council.  I'd like to show you a few detail shots of the piece as it was being created.

You may remember when I dyed silk dupioni and raw silk for this project during the summer.

The dupioni is ombre style, running from bright yellow-green through deep indigo.

Tracing a pattern for the stole from an existing one, I drew a simple design on freezer paper and ironed that onto the silk which I had prepared for fusing with Misty Fuse.

freezer paper being traced with tree design

 I included 'stars of gold on a field of blue' in honor of Alaska's state anthem.

The golden hills at the lower edges of the stole were cut from remnant silk velvet I had dyed long ago and serendipitously kept in my scrap bag.

Once the design elements were fused I edged them with dense zigzag binding stitch.

The finished stole.  I can't wait to see it being worn by Pastor Mike this weekend!

P L C: 1913-2013

An Extra Day

Monday was a holiday here in the United States, and so, a break from the Mighty Mighty Day Job.  I worked on my silk project at the studio instead. 

My calculations and notes from the prototype design stitched last week, hand-dyed silk organza panels on the left.

The panels dyed up really beautifully.

I drew the cutting line on freezer paper, and traced it onto the silk with pencil.

At mid-afternoon, one third of the panels were edge-finished, and the beauty of the early autumn afternoon drew Flossy and I outdoors.

Mushroom season is upon us.

My friend had a camp set up out the road, and we stayed for a hot dog picnic after walking the Dogs.

A Forest Spirit we met in the beach fringe.

I am beginning to get ready to travel a week from tomorrow.  

Lots of things on the list of things to do.  

Happy mid-week to all!

Chaos and Order DC

‘Chaos isn’t a pit.  Chaos is a ladder... Only the ladder is real.  The climb is all there is”.

-Little Finger, Game of Thrones 

Well, how appropriate that I should run across this quote from one of my favorite stories of all time as I was doing research for this week’s Drawing Challenge.  And how fitting taken into my own  personal context, painting, where at the outset, chaos is always the order of the day.

'Chaos' - water soluable crayons, casein, and pigma pen in 8x6 sketchbook

chaos: silk organza ready for wash-out

order: silk (dupion and raw) after wash-out and dryer, folded for use

Thanks to Barbara Bee for this interesting challenge.  Please make sure to stop by her eye-popping blog to catch a glimpse of other interpretations of our theme by a variety of highly skilled artists. 

 Wishing you a week of which ever you prefer.  
For me, I'll take the ladder.

Details: Fiberactions

Fiberactions Challenge, Color Challenge 9:  Use at least three colors of food in your kitchen
Proposed by Kathy Sperino
Reveal Date ~ May 15, 2013 

A couple years ago I was invited to join an on-line fiber artists group and have enjoyed participating in our bi-monthly challenges.  This time the exercise involved using colors of food as our palette.

I wrote a list and dragged out the scrap bag looking for celery, avocado, pimento, green pepper, red pepper, and lemon.

Then I came across a 'failed' monoprint done on a piece of hand-dyed cotton back in February or March.  The pale overlay of zinc white acrylic reminded me of skim milk.  The image seemed to hold possibilities I hadn't seen when I first pulled the print.

 

 

  Soon I had my scraps assembled using curved piecing techniques, and got ready to machine quilt layered up on two pieces of felt. 

 

'Foggy' 16.75"x11"

The edges are bound with zigzag stitches over rat tail cording. As I finished the piece, I realized that the palette ended up reminding me far more of moldy food colors than the fresh vegetables originally intended!

Over at the Fiberactions Blog today you can see how the other members dealt with this challenge.

Abbild - Portrayal - DC

This week's challenge from our hostess Ariane-the-Rose lead me to use tea and rust dyed fabric scraps left over from my recent accordion book project to create a likeness of a doll I might have loved to play with as a child.

'Harriette' - tea/rust dyed vintage linen, antique buttons, pigma pen; approximately 8" tall

detail of Harriette

Did you (do you) play with dolls?  Did you sew for them?  Please do visit over at Ariane's - many more abbilder for your amazement and amusement there.

Three Ring Circus

Whew!  The days sure flew by this week, kicking off with a wearable art workshop I taught through our wonderful local library.

I had one student, J, a very focused third grader who brought her own recycled fabrics and great design idea drawn up in her sketch book.  Very impressive!

headband sketch by 8 year old student

While my librarian friend and I cut out flower shapes for her, J stitched away on her project, attaching the flowers to her t-shirt with buttons and beads and sequins.  

She designed this charming headband to accessorize her outfit (see sketch above).

After 2 solid hours of determined hand sewing, J's wearable art was complete. She was pleased and we were amazed at her tenacity.

Back at my studio, more wearable art is evolving as I develop a second 'look' for next month's show.  This one will be modeled by a young friend of mine.  

The base for the head piece is 16 ga. wire bent to encircle the head and rest on the shoulders

Cardboard shoulder pieces being attached to the wire frame with paper mache.  (My paste recipe is 1.5 parts flour to 1 part cool water plus .25 part white glue, stirred smooth).

These silk yoyos will adorn the head piece, along with leaves fashioned from the velveteen I dyed last week.

Hand-dyed rayon with Dynaflow textile paint vines and leaves.   (These are incorporated into the skirt).

I also spent some time wandering through my fabric deciding on a split complementary palette for the next Fiberactions challenge.  All in all, a great work week.  I like the three-ring circus approach, do you?

Making Swatches

The bundles we over-dyed Tuesday were ready for the first layer of stamping when we got to class on Wednesday morning.

 

 

 

 

 

Jane provided some great exercises to facilitate our swatch-making:

Tone on tone with a registered repeat stamped over the entire cloth...

Registered repeat in a complimentary color...

and scattered design elements using both tone on tone and complimentary colors. We also covered a silk screen and some cloth with flour-and-water paste resist.

I did my first successful silk screening with Jane’s encouragement and help.  I was ELATED to find that I love this process of getting an image on cloth, and feel so grateful to have overcome my fear!

Other processes we learned included glue resists, foiling and gold leafing, freezer paper screening, and working with Thermafax screens.

At the end of the day today, our last, we all hung some of our completed – or nearly completed – work on the wall.  This is but a small sample of the terrific work that was produced by our class over the four days.

Art Quilt Tahoe was a truly wonderful experience all around, mentally, spiritually and physically.  What I learned here is going to take my work to whole new places.  Thank you to Jane Dunnewold, and all the great women I met during this memorable week. 

 Cat in her workshop, hard at it.