Last of 2017

Sometimes it gets to the point of ridiculousness how time slips through our grasp.  Today is New Year's Eve and, quite frankly, I'll be happy to see this year end.  But then again, I always feel this way about the current year as it comes to a close -- I suppose because the holiday season just rushes ahead, leaving us frazzled and stressed out.

So today, on a freezing cold day, I'm sitting in the lower level of the house, hunkered down and playing with stuff I never got around to posting / sharing.  I guess in some ways, I'll enjoy January - March just because it tends to be quiet and one feels quite content to hibernate.

Here are a few pieces I did in the past year or so -- sometimes these images get lost in the shuffle, buried under other "stuff."  

Wishing everyone a safe New Year's Eve

and a Happy New Year in 2018!

A pause in the madness --

Days are getting crazier and crazier . . . shopping, traffic, preparing for a possible snow storm tomorrow. Sometimes when life gets like this, it's best to find a quiet corner and pull out some papers and embellishments and make something simple. I was thinking of my daughter and her fiance when I made this. They just bought a house, and I thought this might be a sweet something to hang once I frame it.

See, simple things. Sweet things.

Sometimes that's all you need to tide you over . . .

Hope

Today I bought bags of potting soil and re-potted all the indoor houseplants -- just so that I could smell and feel dirt, earth, that dark brown stuff buried under almost three feet of snow.

How desperate can you get?

Pretty desperate, I guess.

Continued working on some small collages, playing with old watercolor and acrylic paintings, bits of fabric, 'rip-n-tears' from vintage books and such . . . 

Just seems like a kind of limbo -- waiting and watching for more snow (coming down now as I write this), waiting and watching for signs of spring (amazing bird song yesterday while walking, which made me smile!).

"Dio" (6"x8", watercolor and acrylic painting remnants, batik scrap, and found paper)

Next week we turn the clocks ahead for Daylight Savings -- whoooheee! And then spring arrives two weeks later. Don't be surprised to find me on my knees, kissing the ground (if I can find it).

"Contents" (6"x6", fabric bits, found papers)

So now I'm off to the fireplace and my cosy chair in the corner nearby.  I am counting the hours to Daylight Savings, continuously crocheting, reading, dreaming of the garden and making notes on what has to be done.  Lots of work but I cannot wait.

One of my favorite roses -- the English rose, Sweet Juliet -- a light, fruity smell and so lovely!  I hope this warms your heart as it does mine (taken last summer) . . .

“Hope” is the thing with feathers -

That perches in the soul -

And sings the tune without the words -

And never stops - at all - 

 

Emily Dickinson

Your Choice (collage on nujabi paper, fabrics, rice and specialty papers)

 On this slushy, cold and damp Sunday afternoon, I find myself moping around, moving from one unfinished project to another.  I touch papers and canvases, fiddle with the oils and pastels, picking up, putting down, shifting side to side.

Ho, hum . . . this is not good.  Usually I go charging ahead in the new year, filled with goals and promises.  But not this one.  

This year it's more like a total pull-back.  For so long, I've dashed about, becoming a jack of all trades, master at none -- except at my work.  Over 25 years in the world of libraries and information research.  Nothing to sneeze at . . . and yet --

Feeling anxious, tired of the same-old, same-old.  Of course, as soon as you say that, watch out.  Life throws a whammie your way, and you instantly regret those thoughts.

Like the small work above, I suppose it's a choice of whether to continue moping and sighing, or just to get on with it. In a bit I'll light the fire, pull some crochet (my "gargantuan" granny afghan) onto my lap along with a mystery book and settle in for the duration.

So, hold tight, listen for the bird calls, find the tiny footprints in the snow -- the little things of life -- simplicity, a time for a general hunkering down and drawing inward.  Just like the natural world.  

I think I just convinced myself that this ennui is part of the seasonal process.  Soon the gardening and seed catalogs will start arriving in the mail, a sure sign that spring is on the way.  

*   *   *

“I prefer winter . . . when you feel the bone structure of the landscape - 

the loneliness of it, the dead feeling of winter. Something waits beneath it, 

the whole story doesn't show.”

Andrew Wyeth 

 

Remnants Series

a fiddling kind of day -- 

bits and pieces, remnants 

of old paintings, 

trashed fabrics from unfinished 

objects. 

building a collage 

is a bit like gardening. 

you dig, 

transplant, 

snip and prune until 

what is before you pleases, 

affirms -- 

or perhaps more

like daydreaming,

reverie.

thoughts flow,

like water and

memories surface --

only to submerge

when within 

reach.


 


 

Collaging with color

At a Glance

Taking advantage of the fairly mild weather -- no digging out from under snow and ice -- to get back to something more creative. I had begun these collages for an annual invitational, but never was able to reach the point where I wanted to inflict them on others . . . 

Not that I'm a big fan of pink but after looking out the window at white for weeks on end . . . well, you just want to see something invigorating for a change from gray, black, white and brown.

I've used these papers before, taken from Italian at a Glance (1920). The pages are quite brittle and the cover has fallen off, but I try to salvage the pages themselves.

The scrap of mathematics is from a child's primer from about 1910, and the pieces of fabric are scraps from old quilting projects.  I like them because they're soft and wrinkled, but when the acrylic gel is applied, it smooths them right out.

Earlier today I pulled out some old  paintings on birch panels and decided to 'upcycle' them into something a bit more abstract.  

I tend to be influenced by what I'm reading and yesterday I pulled a book off the shelf that I had forgotten about:  Barbara Rae Prints.  Talk about being hit by color -- Rae's monoprints and etchings are fantastical, surreal, dream-like.  

But now it's a race against time as the gardens will be screaming for work by mid-April -- and on top of all this, I've gotten back to writing again.  I'm hoping to have a manuscript (or two) ready for submittal by early May.  Well, at least that's the goal.  However, every time I set a goal, someone keeps moving those goal posts!

Here is the meaning of the happy moment:

color and I are one.     

Paul Klee

Building the Simple

bird fly away

Collage

5" x 7" 

Oddly enough, life is quiet now only two days away from Christmas.  Having some time off, I've been working with simple materials: papers, fabrics, text from an old Italian dictionary, small bits of willow branches found on my morning walks. I'm hoping to take part in the International Collage Exhibition and Exchange run by Dale Copeland. It's been a few years since my last participation, so it's time to bring out the boxes of papers and such. The work above is mainly created from specialty papers from Nepal and India, some bits of marbleized papers, scrap fabrics from the quilt stash and a slender piece of Japanese silk yarn around the perimeter. I then stitched the collage onto Canson pastel paper using another Japanese paper thread.

Leave Taking

Collage
4" x 6"

Leave Taking is built upon a scrap of silk dupioni using papers, a bit of a monoprint I did last year,  Italian text and a willow branch stitched down with copper on Bristol paper.  I love the contrast between the fragile silk and the papers and copper stitching.  I hope to work on some more over the coming weeks.  I think participating in an exchange/exhibit keeps one focused and on track.  I find that I need that type of structure to discipline myself -- otherwise, I fiddle and procrastinate.

Quilting is another form of building with simple materials. This is a glimpse of a smaller work I did years ago, but became impatient to finish it as a full-scale quilt. So I framed it in a wooden embroidery hoop and hung it on the wall by the fireplace. Now when I'm on the couch reading or doing more hand-stitching, I look up at this and feel good about its simple lines and monochromatic colors.

No Rhyme or Reason

36" x 40"

In an all-together different vein, this is a mid-sized wallhanging quilt, mostly done over several summers at Cape Cod, hand-stitched and then machine-stitched into a larger piece when I had finally accumulated enough blocks. There was never any pattern except for the basic log cabin pattern. It is certainly not symmetrical; perhaps a bit wonky here and there -- but it makes me smile when I look at it, thinking of those summer days at the Cape and how the slow stitching and piecing kept me sane while raising teenagers -- need I say more?

Collage and quilting -- a process of building, of piecing, of working with colors and textures, with surface and design. Don't you just love it?

 In the depth of winter I finally learned

that there was in me an invincible summer. 

Albert Camus

Marking Time

And still it goes . . . time compressed, hours in the car commuting, juggling budgets, hiring, training, publicity . . . poor right brain! It sits quietly squashed into a corner, waiting patiently for a gesture, a signal that it can function once again.

But I know the time is approaching. Perhaps the Solstice is nudging things along? More and more, as I work, commute, do laundry, food shopping, weed the garden, part of my mind is shifting and sorting, fingering ideas of color and shape, of how the light spills at a certain time of day. For the first time in months, I picked up the camera to catch the early morning light on some roses. A kind of coming home after a long departure . . .

When time is short, simple papers and a glue stick work for me. What works for you? These could end up as note cards for friends and family -- or they could be framed up as small works to be arranged on a white wall that catches the summer sunlight, a kind of paper quilt . . .

Archipelago

6" x 8"

collaged papers

Translation iii

5" x 7"

collaged papers and fabric

Totem

6" x 8"

collaged papers; fabric

The Source

5" x 6"

collaged papers (sold)

Translations ii

5" x 7"

collaged papers; paint; text

Even if it is only the tactile movement of touching papers and fabric, of moving small masses of color and textures around on a clear, white space . . . it is enough -- for now.

What art offers is space - 

a certain breathing room for the spirit. 

~John Updike

Piecing One's Dreams

What sits on the margins, forgotten, shoved aside in search of something "better?"   In another effort to sift and sort, to organize my workspace, to dig and toss the detritus of years of making, one stumbles upon little projects, items that intrigued months, years ago . . . and then were shoved aside.  Perhaps not intentionally, but life has a way of shoving the small aside, including people.

These were little works,  bits of flotsam and jetsam, like puzzle pieces that I had pieced together for some reason, maybe for no other reason than that I love the idea of Italy, of traveling someday to Venice and Florence, to the Italian Lake District (remember that wonderful movie, A Month by the Lake, with Vanessa Redgrave?) or to the Italian Riviera (another great one, Enchanted April) --

So this was my way of bringing Italy closer to me, by finding an old 1920s Italian grammar book filled with lovely phrases, and making these small collages.  And then something else came along, and they were slipped into a drawer until the other day.

Funny, though.  Once again they brought a smile to my face, a fleeting glimpse of standing on a canal or on a seaside cliff, speaking Italian effortlessly with the locals, sipping golden wine alongside my husband who would be draped in a soft linen jacket and wearing a panama hat just like Edward Fox in A Month by the Lake  (don't tell him about that point, though) . . .

Well, all I can say is that at least now I have finally renewed my passport -- that's a step in the right direction, which I believe is due east and about 3,000 miles away.  Ah, some day . . .

Venice, the flattering and suspect beauty - 

this city, half fairy tale

Capabilities & Possibilities

Last Memory (encaustic, oil, and found papers on 6"x12" cradled panel)

Pale  (encaustic, oil, monotype fragments on 8"x8" cradled panel)

Solutions (encaustic, oil & found papers on 8"x10" cradled panel)

Working more with the encaustic method and exploring the capabilities and possibilities of this medium. After several burnt fingers and waxed appendanges (don't ask!), I find myself in a love affair. It's as simple as that.

We argue and fight; we grapple and dance to ultimately find middle ground somewhere on the surface of the panel.

Things I had not anticipated occur -- small bubbles and striations that make me think of old walls and pitted stonework.

I rub and scrub and the oils converge with the hot wax and beautiful hues emerge. Bits and pieces of old works sink into the wax and take on a patina that I could never achieve on my own.

Over the hours the hot wax, the oils and the papers continue to converse with me, and I with them. We become better acquainted and agree to meet again soon.

Who knows what will happen next? But they will leave me, just like the others.  Off to the Gallery next week and someone else will fall in love (I hope), and they will no longer belong to me. . . sigh . . .

Opposition

 

Restlessness surging -- gray skies and clouds scudding overhead -- winds blowing, whipping trees into a frenzy --

The changing seasons always seems to make one unsettled, as if trying to get the sea legs squared away beneath one --

The urge to drive straight north up to the Canadian border non-stop, to see mountains and hillsides slipping gold and scarlet petticoats mixed with the scent of pine --

One theory in American history is that the westward expansion was fueled by the growing sense of claustrophobia here on the East Coast, with its' crowded cities and towns.

I believe it. Henry Thoreau's acreage around Walden Pond is surrounded by developments and corporations leaking out from the Boston area. The Cape is a long string of beach motels and cottages, many strung with for sale signs.

But one must slog on. Soon we adjust -- to the light, to the growing cold, to the crowded highways and strip malls.

An escape hatch is needed -- where do we find them?

Inside our heads as we feel for the edges of our space . . . 

in one breath

leaves fall --

skies open wide

*   *   *

You see, I want a lot.
Perhaps I want everything:
the darkness that comes with every infinite fall
and the shivering blaze of every step up.
Rilke 

Translations & Obliterations: New Work

Last weekend was a good weekend/holiday -- quiet with lots of time to paint and explore various ways to express thoughts and desires.  The weather was perfect -- sunny, warm with intermittent cool breezes.  One day it was watercolors and gouache, using papers that had been gessoed, painting watercolor/gouache on jajara paper (handmade in India).  I found it could really take a beating -- scrubbing, multiple layers of paints, etc.

But now this weekend was good in an all-together different way -- weather was chilly, clouds scudding through, sun in and out (mostly in).  So I worked inside trying out ideas on these 8" x 8" gallery canvases.  There are "unsuccessful" paintings underneath, so that the primed surface was very textured and rough.  Working with wax and oils, I scrubbed and rubbed, using fragments of other paintings and found translations from old Italian and French dictionaries published back in the 1920s --

Translation #1: I shall love

Translation #2: That I might love

While I let those dry, I moved over to the "paper" table and worked on more "Translations," using watercolor papers, fragments of old paintings and more dictionary terms. What great fun!  Time slid by unnoticed, music played and incense burned. No inner critics around, either . . . :-)

Translation #3: I would speak

I'll continue to work on this series of translations and see where it leads me -- another creative trail to follow.  There's something about these notions of ephemera that intrigue me -- flotsam and jetsam, bits and pieces of sentiments, thoughts, passing moments in time that drift into oblivion, obliterated from sight and mind . . .

Time flies on restless pinions - constant never.  

Friedrich Schiller

It's the small things that count . . .

Patterns
collage on watercolor paper
collograph remnant, rice papers, silk remnant

Whooeee! This morning I found a very small thing that made me very happy -- a little red dot beneath my collage in the 12th International Collage Exchange & Exhibit! To think that somewhere in the world, someone said Yes, I would like to own that work. Whoever they are, many heartfelt thanks to you from a struggling artist who undergoes serious self-doubts almost as frequently as there are full moons and high tides!

Oddly enough, I am home today because my car was doing a shuffle at red lights and stop signs. Coming home late last night from a board meeting, I wasn't quite sure I would make it. So today, up early and driving downhill with both feet, one on the gas, one on the brake, hoping it wouldn't die before I reached the garage. Then a walk home in the rain (a light one, thank goodness) without an umbrella.

But it was one of those spring mornings when the light rains are more like a mist, the birds are carousing and the tulips, daffodils, grape hyacinths and magnolias are in full bloom. The crabapples are beginning to bud forth, as well as the cherry trees.

First Light

When I got home, I went downstairs into my work area and started straightening the messes I left from last weekend, just puttering. The music was playing and incense was filling the space with a light scent of pine. Suddenly I had this sense of ease, of being "home" in this space, although it tends to be a bit dim at times. I felt that I would go back to some works I had set aside, I gessoed over others that weren't working and then decided to check my blog.

And there it was -- the little red dot. A sign perhaps? A gift certainly.

Pleasure is spread through the earth
In stray gifts to be claimed by whoever shall find.
~William Wordsworth

12th International Collage Exchange & Exhibit

"Deep Nocturne"

5" x 7"
papers, batik fabric, stamps & hand-embellishment

Dale Copeland has been running this international collage exchange & exhibit for a number of years now and I wonder how she does it, accepting shiploads of collages from artists all over the world, uploading images to the site, selecting the ones that will go into the "on the ground" gallery as well as the "virtual" gallery. Then dividing up the spoils so that each participant receives a wonderful package in the mail later in the spring filled with works from fellow participants.

Well, here's my heartfelt appreciation to all her hard work and dedication to this art form and to the numerous creative folk who participated this year. This was my first year, but I am sure I will continue to participate in coming years -- if Dale can hold up!

I've thought about the collage genre and why, for me, it is something I've been doing quietly for a number of years. When I first began, it was during a year that was extremely difficult for my husband and I as parents. Too much was going on -- elderly parent's stroke, an engagement and wedding coming down the road quickly, our teenage son's difficulties, work for both of us -- all just too, too much. For a time only fingering paper and silk scraps, moving them around, looking for pleasing combinations and making greeting cards for friends and family was all I could handle, mentally and creatively. Like worry beads, it would calm me down and give me a sense that I had not lost all connectivity to my art-making. It was portable. I could sit by the window with the light pouring in and just "play" with these bits of paper and fabric.

Even now, when stuck as to how to combine certain colors in a painting or how to balance this mass on the left with that on the right, I'll pull out my bag of bits and begin to move them around.

I also wonder if this is a seasonal or cyclical process? In the deep cold of winter, oils seem to work well, their viscosity and richness so replete with color and depth. Yet, come spring and summer, I often turn to watercolors and/or paper and fiber. Perhaps it is the tactile nature that draws one, just as the watercolors seem to reflect the lightness of the season, so too the papers and fabrics.

Well, whatever the reason -- to be able to touch color and texture, to build and take down and re-build again with whatever medium one chooses -- cherish this love to create. Nurture it and let it grow. Sometimes it may go fallow but that's natural, just like a field that must rest. But then, like Persephone emerging and returning to Demeter's world of spring and summer, it begins again.

Recommended Reading that seems to echo this entry: To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf.

Happy April to all!

Gift from the Heart

Jardin
3 x 5 mat opening
in an 8x10 frame

Song
3 x 5 mat opening
in an 8x10 frame

A few weeks ago, Neva wrote about framing her paintings and how the frames completed the works. Somehow, by surrounding one's work with a frame, we seem to christen our creation, giving it that final touch. And as an extension of that sense, I'd like to add the gifting of a work to someone we love as another final touch.

This afternoon, my daughter stopped by to visit (and do some laundry -- what else?), and we chatted, had some coffee and laughs and caught up with each other's lives. She has just moved into a new apartment and is in the process of decorating her space on a shoestring budget.

So I pulled out my box of "little works" and had her sort through and see what she would like; gathered some mats and frames and voila! -- a set of petite collages for her living room. She was quite tickled, and it made me happy to know these little ones were going to a good home.

After all, I don't want to be my own best collector. I would rather undersell or gift a work and see it move out into the world, living in someone's home or office, perhaps giving pleasure daily.

Art is a communication of the spirit, the heart, the head. If it sits on a shelf, waiting, there is no communication. It is mute, residing in limbo.

So my daughter is happy, I'm happy and this was a story with an upbeat ending for the last day of February! :-)