Absorbing Disappointment

Two more rejection letters from the SAQA exhibition 'Wild Fabrications' leaves me to internally question, "What do I need to fix in order to get a more favorable outcome?" Knowing that sometimes a piece just doesn't work with other chosen pieces, I still am questioning what it might have been this time. I entered both 'Caught' and a new piece, 'Crazy Eights' and neither were accepted.

My composition on 'Caught' is a bit bottom heavy but there is good color movement to offset it. 'Crazy Eights' has a wonderful flow, great color contrast and movement, interesting fabric choices and a solid composition. So, other than the pieces not fitting into the show, I am left with two possible culprits. Either my stitching is not as consistently professional as it should be, or my photographs did not read well.

I am still working to get the hang of free motion quilting. Thankfully my Sweet 16 allows me to choose a percentage of the speed it does at full throttle. I have mine still set low at 35%. But I still have issues with my brain working slower than my foot. I wonder if I will ever really get the hang of it. Here are two shots of the background quilting for Crazy of the swirly moon and the still dark sky. 

If you look closely you will see how even though some areas are working well with even lines and stitching, there are wonky lines every so often and occasional uneven stitches. Judges look closely. This is a dilemma for me because the artist in me can envision the work but my skill is not keeping up. Practice, practice, practice, you might say. Well, I have taken years to do just that and it hasn't really paid off in increased skill. 

My strong skill lies in other areas. 

Contrast is a tool I often use.

I've been saving this silk specialty fabric for a long time and with it's likeness to fire was the perfect choice for a border for this fire breathing dragon.

Imagination, draftsmanship, color theory, composition, construction, fabric knowledge. These are my strong suits. I very seldom get stuck in choosing my fabrics. In the dragon I have chosen lots of complementary colors for drama, lime greens and raspberry reds, fiery oranges against the deep blue of the sky, pale yellows and light lilacs in the moon.

Fabrics can also add interest in how they play with light. The wings not only reflect light but are two layers of organza which create moire patterns when cut across the grain and are transparent giving depth to the design. One of the wings is sewn to the quilt only at one edge, free floating over the body, tethered with one stitch and wired along the top.

The wing's transparency is allowing the moon and sky to show through. 

In this shot above, the relief work is more evident and the left wing is showing the curl of it's wired edge. All of these effects took some brain-power to figure out. The quilt stitching was done on the front body pieces with interfacing behind before stitching a tube (below) and filling with fiber fill. The flanges on the head were completely made with a lining and stitched before both fusing and stitching to the background. 

 

I was really worried about whether the background would be strong enough to hold the weight and twisted contortion of the relief work in the front. I used thermal curtain batting as my choice of batting and the end result is that it helped to make the background stiff and sturdy. It crinkles a bit when moved around.

I am thankful for my strong workhorse Bernina, which with a leather needle, sewed through several layers with it's perfect satin stitch to adhere the body pieces. Some of those body pieces, like the tail are hand stitched in key areas and free floating in others.

I did have a photographer take my entry shots. He is a seasoned, but amateur photographer. I may have this one reshot by professional, Joe Ofria, from Arlington, MA at SAQA MA/RI's workshop in April and see if he gets a better result with the relief imaging. My details and full shot follow:

First detail shot

Side detail shot

CRAZY EIGHTS

36" x 46"

Completed January 2015

$2,750.00

I am working on my next piece for a deadline again. It will be my third SAQA deadline in a row since 2014's 'Food For Thought' exhibit. It is a piece about how my grandmother raised chickens and sold her eggs door to door to have extra money in the household. The deadline for 'Balancing Act' is February 28, but I hope to have it completed by early next week. 

As I continue working on this piece I am ever mindful now of the need to keep my stitching as perfect as I can. I wonder if my photographer will render me a great shot. And I wonder if with three strikes you are out or if my luck will come back. Ultimately, an artist can't be thin skinned. I need to just keep making my art and hope for the best. Absorb the blow. Wish me luck.

NEW Year, NEW Work

Busy as a beaver; busier than a one armed paper hanger; busy bee. However you wish to say it, that has been my experience since the holidays ended. My studio is so cold in the winter with glass all around to transfer the cold. Long icicles are hanging off the eaves. The studio is heated on it's own zone but if I turn it up, we go through oil like water. So I am working with cold hands. On what you ask? 

Well I thought it was about time to finish up a design I first drew in 1995 which was inspired by the story of Peter and the Wolf, music and story by Sergei Prokofiev. I had just seen an article in Smithsonian Magazine featuring the exhibit "A Deck of Cards" and I was so moved and excited by the work I viewed that I knew instantly I wanted to work with fabric. I had no supplies, as you can clearly see, not even decent paper to draw on. I taped 8 1/2" x 11" paper together to create a larger field to draw, put on some appropriate music, and began to draw. What I ended up with is a very complex drawing of the four characters involved in that scene and a sample of the music for each of them complete with their instruments.

I began working the center piece by creating the background of grass, sky and one very rigid tree. I didn't understand about 'take-up' and the grassy area shrunk by a whole inch, frustrating the dickens out of me. I pushed on to sew the wolf out of every scrap of wool I had and hand stitched him down with extra padding to the background. I moved on to create Peter and the bird and two of the musical panels. Again using every scrap of fabric I had, upholstery, velvet, lace, lame, knits, etc. You name it, it's in there! Needless to say it was an epic fail and I let it sit as a UFO for many years as I moved on, having learned some invaluable hard lessons about construction.

In 2010, after having just joined SAQA in September of 2009, I decided to give the wolf a second shot. I entered the Visions Program offered by SAQA which is a program created for artists to set goals and with the help of other artists to achieve them. One goal was to finish "Peter and the Wolf". I redrew (still limited in supplies, I pieced the paper again with tape) both the tree and the wolf. I wanted to make the tree more life-like and gave it some flex. I edited the wolf, keeping the same general shape but giving him a more graphic nature. The sky and grass became two large background pieces.

Peter was drawn separately and made to set into the tree. I Made my background out of two pieces of batik. I added fused branches in reds, russets and golds. 

Then I set to work on the wolf. This time I fused him onto muslin, a technique I now use often. My plan was to satin stitch the pieces onto the muslin and hand stitch the muslin to the background with extra batting under the wolf. I ran into problems. I forgot to add interfacing and many of the curvy lines puckered horribly. I had used a silk/wool blend for the inside of the ears. The iron singed it so that it's white fibers were now an uneven tan. And the hand stitching was impossible around the fine points of his ruff. Ugh, I gave up again not really knowing how to proceed.

In 2014 I became determined to get this piece finished and when I saw the call come out for a SAQA show called "Wild Fabrications" which was all about animals, my wolf, wild and imaginary, seemed to fit the bill. This gave me a deadline to shoot for, which seems to be my only successful incentive. I also had a drawing for a dragon which would be a possible for the same call. So after discussing goals with my mentor I added both quilts onto my list of works to accomplish in 2015 for that specific call for entry.

I remade the wolf from some of the same wools and added some new ones. (I dropped the silk/wool fabric out of the mix this time.) Fusing onto muslin again, this time I fused a thin cotton batting onto the back as interfacing before adding my satin stitches. The wolf's ruff has some extra padding placed with fusible under the wolf before I satin stitched him down to the background. This technique of creating separate segments of a quilt has become a signature of mine, making construction and composition easier for me. Both Peter and the bird were also done in this way and then placed onto the background of sky, grass and tree.

Then came the fun of leafing out the tree. I cut about a hundred leaves or more, fused them, quilted veins and then satin stitched them. The satin stitches have to be done with my Bernina (6" neck) and I couldn't use the Sweet 16. Boy do I wish the Sweet 16 could do simple satin stitching. It took hours more than I expected to complete. Can you say labor intensive!

With the deadline for "Wild Fabrications" quickly approaching and two quilts only partly done, I flew into a rage of sewing, night and day. I ended up pulling another all-nighter to get this one completed with the border and binding so it could be photographed in time. 

The blizzard last week near gave me a heart attack as I was uncertain if the photographer would be able to make it. But he was able to come up to the studio on Saturday morning on the last day of the call. So I was able to enter both pieces for that call and I am now waiting to hear if one of them will be chosen or not.

In my next post I will detail the progression of the dragon called "Crazy Eights"

CAUGHT

32 1/2" x 48 1/2"

Completed January 2015

NFS

Commercial cottons, batiks, wool; fused, extra batting applied behind some pieces to create depth, machine stitched

Photography by Eric Zhang

Goodbye 2014

I know that we are halfway through January, but it's been a busy end of year. I'm just getting around to reflecting. As I try to wrap up work on two decent sized quilts this month, I am thinking about how I pushed through the month of December half in a daze. From mid November through the end of the year, we have 4 birthdays, one of which is Riley's. The three holidays are enough in and of themselves! I'm tired.

On a personal level, I started 2014 with surgery and recovery. It was a tough start. Tony lost his Mom in the spring and my dear cousin, Jeff passed this fall. Tony's business took the hit of three of his clients shutting down for good. We buried our cat, Maddie out under the trees this year too. Our son Peter moved permanently to Florida, the first child to move far away. Quite a few of our plans went awry this past year and there were plenty of sad, difficult and teary moments. I must say, I am not sorry to see the year gone! 

However many challenges we faced, there were some bright spots for me, a lot of them tied to my studio. I became a SAQA Co Rep in early summer, working with Sue Bleiweiss to set in place two upcoming exhibitions in our region. Even with time constraints, I completed 5 pieces in 2014. Mariposa showed with the Butterflies and Their Kin exhibit in Texas in the spring and continued on to other venues. Nancy's Garden showed at the Whistler Museum this summer. I got a new addition to my studio, an HQ16, which has made the world of difference in my quilting.

There are still three, black furry, mischievous little elves (kittens) in my studio space. Blue, Bing and Teensy are now 9 months old and still wrecking my workspace daily. Left by their feral mommy, they are now part of the family. I got my first rejection letter this year with Queen Bee but she is so awesome I don't half mind. I am working with a mentor this coming year in the hopes that I will learn some business skills. The program was set 

up by the SAQA MA/RI region. In the latter part of the year I focused on setting goals and doing some much needed paperwork.

The last few projects of the year began with a blast from my past. I did much of my learning how to sew and construct as a teen making dolls. I thought it was time to get back into it, so I made Mary Lennox from The Secret Garden for my granddaughter Riley's Christmas present.

She came out pretty cute if I do say so myself!

After Christmas I returned to a UFO that I wanted to complete. I had done most of the hard part with the markers already. All it needed was some stitch work and a border. Below is the completed Monumental.

MONUMENTAL

20" x 27"

December, 2014

Commercial fabrics & batiks, silk background; fused & machine stitched; overdrawn with fabric markers

$750.00

I got some great Christmas gifts this year. One of which was markers and a sketchbook. It's tiny so I can complete my sketches quickly and move on to my stitching. I hope to use this sketchbook as a precursor to a body of work called, "In the Garden".

So goodbye to 2014. Hold on to your hat 'cause here comes 2015 with a huge bang!

The dragon and the wolf are calling my name. They are both neck and neck, as I work in a frenzy to get them done and photographed by January 31. Wish me luck! (Progress and pictures will be coming soon)

Setting Goals

I have a mentor. For the year of 2015, I have the privilege of working with someone who has a wealth of information, experience and business savvy. And she is willing to part with some of that information to help me progress as a professional artist. Puts a smile on my face. 

So the first hurdle I had to face was in setting goals. Not unlike most moderately ambitious people, my first attempt at a list had way too much on it and in much too vague a way. It had 28 items on it. In my second draft I split my ideas into "artist goals" and "professional goals" but pretty much had the same amount of goals combined on the two lists. So then, as suggested, I broke what I had into "short term" and "long term" goals. This got me thinking about time, ability and reality.

As I slipped things into the long term list, I wondered if I was just tabling things that would never be realized due to lack of time. I will turn 59 in 2015. I have always found the "nine" years to be brutal and as I face the inevitability of aging, the looming 60 seems a mountainous hurdle with a hell of a backslide. How much longer will I be allowed to do this work? Will my eyes go, or my hands get shaky, or perhaps an illness or disease will table my goals. So I decided to burn rubber on the short term goals. Seize the day, right?

My business goal list has 11 items on it. My artist goals are 5. I have completed 4 items on my business list already. They were easy, relatively. I now get to dig in to the harder goals. Without listing all of them I will discuss a few key goals. My first artist goal is to create 5-7 pieces in 2015 for entering into specific exhibitions. I have now a detailed list of all the calls I want to enter with their important information, the submission due date and the piece I want to have completed for entry. While a heavy list, I will push to get all 7 done if possible. Having this list in front of me gives me a daily reminder that goal #3 which is to develop better discipline, is absolutely necessary. 

One of my business goals is to smarten up my blog page so that I can use it like a website, offering it to anyone who wants to see what I do. If you read my posts, you will see subtle and even some not so subtle changes happening. I am adding pages to my blog. One for a resume and artist statement, and one for my artist portfolio. Until I start receiving income from my art, I have to make due with an old, slow computer and I can't commit to paying for a website's monthly charges yet. As suggested by my mentor, "You don't need a website, just use your blog." Using my blog not only means adding pages, but also designing it to be a professional extension of my art. Soon you will see a redesign. It also implies that I have to be much more diligent about posting. So the simple goal of having stronger and more professional internet presence entails a moderate amount of work in making changes.

I will be talking about the progress I am making in defining and developing some of my other goals as time permits. In my next "Goal Post" I will talk about how I am developing a few concepts for articles as well as taking those concepts one step further into planning demos and teaching workshops around them.

As our professional lives as artists are so closely interwoven with our personal lives, I have allowed a certain amount of my life into these posts. I have a west coast family. My mother grew up in California with her three sisters. They all stayed in the west with the exception of my mother who moved to her husband's home town in the east. My maternal cousins are all much older than I, as my mother was the last of the sisters to marry and the last to start a family. I have seen some of my cousins on occasion, many of them I have not seen since I was very young. One of these cousins kept in touch with me via snail mail and an occasional phone call. Jeff had been battling with cancer for seven years and has recently lost his fight. In sadness over the loss of him, and in respect for his kindness, gentleness, and his sensitive, generous spirit, I honor his passing here with all the love in my heart. You will be sorely missed, dear cousin.

Jeffrey Wilson Helmer
July 15, 1945 - November 5, 2014

Textile Exhibition in Review

Last evening I was delighted to attend an artist reception for a textile exhibition in Fall River. Called MODERN SPIN: CONtemporary TEXTiles in an Historic Mill it was a fantastic blend of exciting textiles from a broad range of media. Providence artist, Jules of Heron Pond Studio was the juror and the artists came largely from the New England area but also from as far away as Romania.

Called "Pine Needles" this piece is a cutwork of triangular shapes. It is mounted several inches from the wall and with direct lighting on it, cast amazing shadows behind, creating very exciting imagery. Joy Stocksdale of Sebastopol, CA has two other pieces in the show that you can see peeking out in the photo above. Her panels are made of polychromatic screen-printed silk, stiffened and then cut. To see more of her work, www.joystocksdale.com 

It was unfortunate that the only place you could read about the materials was in an artist's portfolio booklet. The signs on the wall did not include materials or artist statements. Now I understand why it is important to have all the information printed on the wall next to the piece. While some artwork was easy to spot materials and processes, others were more difficult.

Always amazing in it's detail is the work of Salley Mavor from Falmouth, MA. This is a detail of a fantastic piece called, "Self Portrait: Personal History of Fashion". Spiraling outward from the center infant are images of Salley as she grew. She creates her vignettes from wool felt, trims and beads. Set inside a glass case it was difficult for me to photograph without glare and really this photo does nothing to accentuate the detail within this piece. If you are interested in Salley's work you can find her artwork and information at, www.weefolkstudio.com

Another favorite of mine was this piece by Laurie Carlson Steger, a weaver from South Dartmouth, MA. Laurie's weavings are studies in work with reflective properties and incorporate fiber optic strands. Called, "Black Forest Gold" this piece was inspired by patches of sunlight filtering through the dense trees of the Black Forest in Germany. 

In this detail of Laurie's piece you can see the beadwork she used to help reflect light. This piece is handwoven, stitched, beaded and quilted. Laurie also has other work in this show. For information about her work go to, www.liteweave.com

I fell in love with the intense work of artist, Kerstin Zettmar. Not only is it colorful work but it is dramatic, and peaceful at the same time. At a distance and in photographs, you see an image not unlike an impressionist painting, but up close and personal you realize she has created her image by embroidering large ply yarns of a multitude of colors that literally burst from the surface of the work creating a cacophony of wildly intersecting fibers and colors. Honestly, my jaw dropped and my husband, Tony wanted to take this one home.

Called, "Sunbursts", this piece by Kerstin radiates light and shadow in a very romantic and captivating way. She has three pieces in the exhibition and all three are well worth seeing. Kerstin is a native of Sweden but now calls Newport, RI her home where she is a licensed massage therapist and artist. She chooses her subjects from both landscapes and more mythological and spiritual themes. For more information about her artwork, www.zettmar.com

This is a shot of me with SAQA friends Sandy Gregg, Janis Doucette, and Diane Wright. Sandy's artwork is hanging behind us. This really is an exciting show that I recommend highly to anyone who loves textiles. You will find the show at the Narrows Center for the Arts, 16 Anawan St. in Fall River, MA. It is open now through December 27, 2014. For questions on directions or gallery hours call 508.324.1926 or go to their website, www.narrowscenter.org/manager/gallery-details-new.php?id=1289

Studio Days

Busy days in the studio. The new wolf has been stitched in part to the background. He has extra loft behind him and it is making him seem more real. You can see some shadows above his eyes. He'll be done soon so I moved onto the next step.

Here, Peter is being fleshed out onto a piece of muslin. All the pieces are fused to the muslin. The excess gets cut away and he settles into the tree. The rope eases down from his hand to catch the wolf's tail. The little bird is flying about the wolf's nose. The leaves on the tree are the last to go on. You'll be seeing more of the process and the completed pictures soon.

Monument was started in 2013 to go with the three other Santa Fe pieces I did at that time. This piece did not fit well into the "Three Cohesive Pieces" theme of the exhibition I was preparing for so I set it aside. However, I really love this piece. I have done a bit more drawing on it with my fabric markers to delineate the stones in the intersecting walls. My new Sweet 16 will help me make short work of the stitching.

More updated pictures coming.

Multiplicities:New Directions in Fiber

Tonight was the artist reception for an exciting juried exhibit of textiles at the IMAGO Foundation for the Arts Gallery in Warren, RI. Called "Multiplicities: New Directions in Fiber" it was a show with a broad range of work within the textile field. Works pushing the boundaries of embroidery, weaving, quilting, felting, and dyeing were mixed with sculptural forms utilizing some very interesting materials such as seaweed, plastic bottle caps, thorny branches and pine needles. The opening reception was very well attended and the gallery is spacious, bright, easy to find, and the show was extremely well curated and hung.

My husband Tony took this shot of Allison Wilbur, who lives very near the gallery, and myself. We had a lovely time walking through the show discovering the many interesting secrets within each piece. SAQA members were well represented in this show with pieces from Natalya Aikens, Betty Busby, Nancy Bardach, Wen Redmond and Marianne Williamson. 

Hanging behind Allison and myself, detail to the right is a woven piece called "1364 Threads Pulled One at a Time" by Debbie Barrett-Jones. My terrible old digital camera does it no justice. Beautifully dyed warp threads were pulled to create tension and texture and through the middle of the piece you saw only the warp threads hanging. It really was captivating and won a Juror Award. The Juror for this amazing show was Elin Noble, a textile artist and SAQA member who lives in the MA/RI region.

Another captivating piece was done by Marianne Williamson. My camera again, does this no justice. It is literally covered with multicolored thread, fabric and paint. Allison and I spent a good amount of time soaking it all in. You can see other works by Marianne on her website at: www.movinthreads.com/news/

This piece was created by New York artist, Natalya Aikens. I have loved watching the progression of Natalya's work over the past few years. She has a finely tuned understanding of architecture and a playful hand with unusual materials and color. Made primarily of plastics, "Sunset" screamed with innovation and pure excitement. You can view her work on her website: www.artbynatalya.com


My husband Tony was as enthralled by this piece by Betty Busby as I was. "Dichotomy" is rich with colorful dyed fabrics and a wildly flowing structure of stitching which punctuates and defines both minute and large areas. The colorplay and stitching skillfully seems to undulate areas of the piece so that it creates depth and movement. A master, you will find more of Betty's work on her website at: bbusbyarts.com

If you would like to see this exhibition it is showing at the IMAGO Foundation for the Arts Gallery, at 36 Market St. in Warren, RI 02885. This show runs now through November 8. Gallery hours are Thursdays from 4-8pm, Fridays & Saturdays from noon to 8pm and Sundays from 10am to 2pm. You will find information about the gallery and this show at their website: imagofoundation4art.org/IFA/Welcome.html