Every flower...

How often our posts relate - in a big or small way - to the subject of inspiration, personal reasons for creativity, and/or of finding ourselves falling unsuspectingly into that darkening pool, which acts as creative quick sand.

This week I was touched by Karen's creative questioning (and, BTW, Karen has moved here) and by Arlee's quest for originality, and was also reminded of a lovely comment left in response to one of my recent posts by Anya, saying:

"It never stops to amaze me how much effort, work and knowledge goes into creating something beautiful. It is always a labore of love at the end and the final result will always reflect the amount of effort put into it. :-)".

Which is so true!

Every flower must grow through dirt.

-- Anonymous

I'm fortunate, in that, I seem to have the inner critic - that inimical voice that says " You're so stupid... that's such a dumb idea, etc." - well under control. Also, I rarely find myself without inspiration. If anything, I have too many ideas, and it takes me a while to gather these thoughts into something tangible.

Of course, it doesn't always work out the way I imagined! And I frequesntly don't end up with a "finished" piece... oh, you already noticed that ;) But, since what I most enjoy about it all is the initial design phase, the research and exploration, and learning the process of making cloth - because I have no practical experience at this, folks! - the fact that it doesn't become something in the end, doesn't matter.

Nothing we do is useless!

Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you'll land among the stars
-- Les Brown













































Recent sketchbook page: Further developing pattern ideas from my last post.

Leafing into Spring: Part II

Following on from yesterday's post...

One of the things I'm always trying to teach master Nilo, is to be economical in his craft work. He is a big fan of the TV shows "Mr. Maker" and "Art Attack" and it drives me crazy - just as it did my mother - the sheer level of waste on these types of programs! "Now we're going to cut a circle of card for the sun...." And what do they do? Cut one measly 2" diameter circle from the absolute center of an A4 sheet of card! It's the same with paint. They need to paint something the size of a postage stamp, and prepare a half gallon of acrylic paint!!! End of rant. We lead by example! So I showed him this, which comes from part of what I'm working on at the moment. It may seem obvious to many of you, but it's surprising how many people still don't consider the need for us, as humans, to economize, in all areas of our lives. And so I'm thinking, as I write this, about the relationship between waste and wastfullness.















Leaf outlines drawn out onto a small corner of one of my recycled fabric scraps (yes, one of the ones dyed with Neurosa Yellow, which is the name I've decided to give the dye from the native plant Neurolaena lobata (Asteraceae), known locally as "Gavilana".)















The backside of my work (talking of which ;} I've been up since 2:15am this morning with more of the same plumbing related issues that I've been experiencing recently - I have an inkling of what that might be about). I'm rather proud of how neat this is all looking. Usually the back of my stitching is as inpenetrable as a Malaysian jungle (I'm not sure that they are, or are they? I just made that up).



















The arty shot. Always remember to throw into your portfolio at least one or two of these types of on-the-slant images, which always seem to make things look so much more interesting than they might otherwise be ;}















The work so far. Believe it or not this has taken me the best part of 12 hours to stitch! As you can see, there are 4 rows so far, but today I hope to add another two. More and more, (currently... 'coz you know how I have a habit of zipping off into a completely different direction with little advance warning, if any), I'm thinking how much I like the idea of creating an all-over print effect using applique or stitching or both. And if you're thinking that this reminds you of something else... you're quite right. It's a new angle on this.

Over the weekend, Arlee sent me this link, and I wrote to the lady responsible for the project, Fiona Wright and she responded last night and is opening a dialogue between us by writing this.

It sure is exciting to connect with the world!

Look at that, it's still only 4 am! ZZZZzzzzzzzzz

Opps! Forgot to mention these. I can haz niz shuz! *:)

Digital Thank You's!

Before I blog on...

This morning I would like to say a big thank you to two very special ladies, who have become blog friends, since I started to emerge in this space. They are, Arlee Barr of Albedo, and Sandra Smals of Inanna Shamaya. Because, yesterday afternoon, Reinaldo came back from the post office with two beautiful swap packages!















Swap scraps from Arlee.















Swap scraps from Sandra.

As a humble token of my deep appreciation for these jewel-like gifts, I have made each of you a small digital art quilt, using pieces of your own work - images from your own blogs - of things I have much admired, together with a sample or two from the swap pack that you sent to me. Each piece of cloth is splendid and exquisite, and will no doubt start to feature here, soon! :) :) :)



















Digital art quilt for Arlee.



















Digital art quilt for Sandra.

Thank you! It's a real pleaure getting to know you both, and to be inspired by what each of you do!

A lighter shade of pale

Now that I've finished the outstanding Indie-pendant ... I will rephrase that, or else sound totally egocentric... Now that I've finished the Indie-pendant that was outstanding... sound any better???... I figure it justifies moving on to start something new... completely ignoring the existance of all of those other projects, which I still haven't finished! ;)

Yesterday, I considered starting to work on that first piece of shibori that I've recently created - Well, it's not the first piece of shibori I've created, it's just the first piece that I've created and known about it. Here is a much better shot of it...















Here, you can actually see the patterns that were created where the little pebbles were tied into the cloth and more of the tonal range.

However, lovely as it is, I have decided not to start working on it just yet. Instead, I've opted for a similar cloth - again, one that I dyed at the end of last year - but which I left too long in the dye base and it started to go moldy...















That's what the little grey specks are about, and I rather like that softly spattered effect.
















I've basted it onto a plain piece of my peachy bark-dyed cotton cloths.















In turn, I think I'm going to baste that onto a kind of damask cotton with a raised block pattern, which comes from a slightly off-white colored pillow slip that I picked up in a thrift store in San Jose on the last visit.

It reminds me of this...



















A photograph of me, taken in 1897(!) at the Las Cruces Biological Station, in San Vito, Coto Brus (Costa Rica), where, for about 3 consecutive years, I lived on site as a young explorer and artist-in-residence.

Time passes and everything becomes a lighter shade of pale! Here in the tropics, it also starts growing new life forms!

Speaking of lighter shades of pale and new life forms... just look at this by Jude Hill, and this by Arlee Barr... and this by Deb Lacativa.

Pale is where it's at!

Turned out just peachy!

A while back, before Christmas time, I started some solar dying experiments. Some worked out pretty well, given that I didn't use any mordant (this year I'm going to try that!). Here's one that I untied yesterday. It was dyed using bark from a local tree species (can't remember which now, will ask husband about that and add the name later) and by wrapping small sections of the cloth around little pebbles and tying them with string, (which probably has some lovely-sounding technical name, except I haven't learnt it yet!) I don't know what I had expected, but it turned out a lovely soft rusty peach color.



















It was fun when I unwrapped it... looked like a volcanic clothscape.



















Or... belly buttons!















This is what it looked like once ironed. Very subtle color variations and little moon-flowers. Have some dusky-peachy-rose colored DMC thread. Might see how I go with that today. If I can find the sun-cream I might stitch in the garden even.













I like this... it goes well with today's cloth!


Arlee Barr kindly informed me that the technique is part of what's called Shibori. I've been admiring this technique on other people's pages, but hadn't got that the pebble-wrapping bit was part of it. If you're interested in finding out more about this traditional art, then you should definately check out this link, to where master clothmaker, Jude Hill, has a plethera of posts relating to the subject, with some fabulous examples, great explainations and links to others who are far more skilled at Shibori than I probably ever will be! :)

A kind (of) giving

Sometimes, we need to be kind to ourselves, and have a little (or a lot of!) patience.

If you're anything like me, then you will be alot better at showing kindness and patience to others, than you are at showing them to yourself!

Deep breath... here's the fruit ... or is it just a seed at this stage?... of my Thursday morning (not terribley well photographed it has to be said!)



















What is it?... Well, it's a tentative sketch, (graphite, oil and turp's) exploring how the light falls on a surface, and the movement (moment?) that follows. That's been on my mind alot lately.

Of course - of course! - it isn't finished yet. I don't know if it will get finished. Or, if it does get finished, what it will become. But it's a start! And that's what I needed. And I've decided to treat it as though somebody else started it. That way, I can be kinder about it, if need's be.

In a certain sense, it being the work of somebody else, is not so far from the truth.

Three years ago, I got sick... very sick. Now, I have a condition known as CIDP (Chronic Inflammatory Demyelinating Polyneuropathy). More recent medical tests revealed that I also have megabolistic aneamia (that's at the level of bone-marrow) and have suffered a deep brain stroke (lacunar infarction), which has apparently left a sizeable void in the old grey matter!

This little lot plays daily havoc in different areas of my life. Everything from speach to typing to walking (although, I'm very pleased to say that I've not been falling flat on my face this past year!) and, it would seem, it also effects certain creative activities, like... you guessed it!... painting and drawing!

It's going to take a while to stroke those neurons back into shape, if that's even possible now. It might be. I know that the skills I had are still in there somewhere, it's just a hell of alot harder to reach them, now that the bridge is down! ;}

Speaking of Neurons... if you haven't already, then take a close look at this amazingly skilled piece of cloth making - it's one of my very favorites - by blogging friend (and rapidly becoming stitch mentor) Arlee Barr, who I keep coming back to here and who is on the verge of opening her store Fyberspace. I'm sure that everyone out there in blogland joins me in wishing Arlee very great success with her new venture. I feel certain that it's going to be a big hit!!!

Little stitches...

Little stitches are remarkable things... which, inspite of their smallness, can bring about huge changes.















I am just starting to over-stitch the black and gold artifact cloth that I made over the weekend, and said was probably going nowhere. Well... you never know!

I'm finding I like very much what these little metallic thread stitches do to cloth, (but definately not liking what the cloth does to the metallic thread! It strips it down and knots it up and it's a total pain in the arse to work with this stuff! Anyone got any wise counsel to offer about that?)

Seems I'm not the only one here who's busy working small right now.















I love these crazy spiders that set up camp all over my house, particularly around the kitchen and dining room. A long while back, I blogged about one of these spiders over at the Los Charcos de Osa blog page,(which has been static for over a year now, but has some interesting stuff on it about life here). You can catch that post here. Stitched heart and all! (Arlee, how are you with arachnids?)

This beautiful little spider... actually, it's not that little once it reaches adulthood!... has the most fabulous metallic silver(!) thorax, and just look at those gorgeous stripey legs. They remind me so much of Jude Hill's black and white magic thread, which I think she has used to great effect here (and if you're in the US, while you're at it, please use that text info to donate 10 bucks to the American Red Cross for relief to Haiti!)

Thinking about it, Jude Hill is quite the spider... as she goes about carefully and lovingly stitching her magic cloth(s). (Jude, everytime I try a new catagory link on your site, I am delighted to find many pieces/posts that I haven't come across previously!)

And while we're on the subject of magic threads... check this out. It's a fabulous blog by Embellisher who is a gorgeous looking Indian female textile designer, based in Bangalore, India - which is my favorite spot on the globe right now - electronically speaking!

And then there are these magical Artfabrik threads by Laura, which Arlee Barr blogged recently here. They are such delicious color ways and they all have such delicious names to match! Even if I could afford some of these fabulous threads, I'm not sure I could choose which ones I would like to have most. Hmmm....? Let me see...

Burnt Marshmallows
Snakeskin
Copper Queen
Oasis Twilight
Indigo
Shadows
Wild Rice

So, there's my wish list!
And it just so happens that today is my birthday! ;}

Eye... Hand... Mind!

As you can see, I am playing with making a new header image. I haven't decided if this one will stay yet, or, if it will become something else shortly. In anycase, I had to blog this:

I just got an email from Arlee Barr a new blog friend, and an artist with an amazing eye.... hand... mind! She's a lady with a sassy sense of humor, and reading her blog always perks up my day!

Referring to my previous header image...







she said:

"it just struck me what is also attractive about that photo--did you see the figure in it? the woman with her face turned, a gorgeous snarl of blue hair and intricate earring showing at the hairline--"

Here is the image that she attached to her message:
















By adding that simple outline, she has transformed a scraggy piece of calico and a tangle of DCM embroidery thread into the "magical maiden of the blue hair". Something classical and perhaps a little færie about that, no? Infact, with that single white line she claims the work as hers :) I would never have seen it myself!

Arlee was one of the first textile journalists that I found and loved online, and the first person to follow my blog. Visit her pages. I promise that you won't regret it! With so much gorgeous artwork - just check this out - it's almost impossible to single work out. Currently, however, I love Mitochrondria: Incubation 1 (check out the details of this piece in her slides 2 and 3 as well). this is very similar to what was tumbling around inside my head, but not yet formed by me, whilst I have thinking about gold and repossé metal work, and that cream and black, semi-sheer, fabric remnant featured in one of my posts yesterday, the one with the dots.

Another of my favorites has to be Brain Pan (also check out slides 14 and 15 for detailed views). It entertains me that, in Spanish, pan means bread... and I fondly imagine that the piece is entitled Brain bread How delicious are the variations, conotations and associations that come with that idea! It also appeals to me as I do have a hole in the old grey matter.

Arlee's work is always alive, eloquent, challenging to the mind and eye, inviting a thorough exploration of every millimeter of it's fabulous fiberous detail.

In a word, Inspirational!