Month: September 2011

Last week while I was doing yoga in my studio I looked down at my leg and saw a green thread and a blue thread on my brown pants.  “Wow”, I  said out loud “great colors.”

So I knew the colors of my next streaming pillow ( I added the pink when I started to run out of blue and what a good thing it turned out to be).   And when I walked into the studio this morning the words ” in the full light of the moon, i saw the shooting star” came to me.  I started with the words and the figure came next.  When I was done with her, I thought “She’s pretty cool”.  It wasn’t until I was half way done that I found myself writing “cowgirl madonna” down her right leg.

When  told Jon the title he asked what it meant.  I said I didn’t know.   And I didn’t, until I read Mary Muncil’s blog this morning.  She wrote about a new way of doing and seeing things.  She quoted Isaiah 43:19 about making a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.  Sounds like something a spiritual cowgirl would take on, to me.

We woke up early Saturday morning and looked out the window to see if there was a  mist.  The day before  Jon had lost a morning’s worth of photos, most of them of the sun coming through the mist.  So when we saw that the mist was back we got out of bed and hit the road.  I love getting up before the sun,  but have a hard time dragging myself out of bed unless there’s a reason.  Driving Jon around and sketching from the car was that reason.

I see it as a game.   I pull off the road then Jon gets out to take his pictures. I give myself the same amount of time to draw as it takes him to leave the car and come back.  I draw what’s in front of me whether it’s appealing to me or not.  But sometimes I cheat.  If I don’t get to finish  my drawing by the time Jon gets back,  I’ll sometimes go back to it instead of drawing the next scene we stop at.   I never remember what was there, so I just make it up.  Like the sun in this last drawing, it never has and never will rise or set above that barn.  But it makes the picture less real and more alive.  It’s as if I put a piece of myself in the drawing.   It may not be accurate, but this is what Saturday morning felt like to me.

I first met Diane Swanson when  I was volunteering  at a local art center where she was the Gallery Director.  I told her I’d be happy to help her install the exhibits, something I always enjoyed doing.  She was a little reluctant to take my help and I understood why.  If you’re hanging a show with someone you don’t get along with it can make the job twice as difficult instead of twice as easy.  But for some reason she did call me to help install a show at a local theater and  it was like we had been working together our whole lives.  We had the same sensibilities and most of all we worked quickly together.  Some people will spend hours moving the art around and trying to make decisions.  I don’t have that kind of patience, and apparently neither does Diane.

So when I decided to make a gallery out of the Pig Barn, I immediately thought of Diane and asked if she would help with the organizing and of course, hanging the show.  I think we make a good team.

Diane’s lack of  patience, when it comes to hanging shows,  doesn’t cross over into her work, which is generally labor intensive.  Whether it’s her drawings, painting or fusion art, her work has a quality about it of perfection and preciseness without being stiff or uptight.  Her  talent and love of the process is evident.

Diane was in the first show at the Pig Barn Gallery in June.  Her husband is one of those people who take computers apart and put them back together for fun, and they have a basement full of spare computer parts.  When Diane saw how beautiful some of them were she was inspired.  She combined the computer parts with her paintings and created what she calls “Fusion Art”.

For the Functional Art show in October, she decided to make boxes.  She used memory chips, plexi, and copper joints  to create  the structure and the painting is in  gouache.  The Memory Box above is the first of her Fall Remembered series.

Diane will also be selling her painted draw pulls at the show in the Pig Barn Gallery.  They could easily be framed and hung on the wall, but they are meant to be used. ( I think the nuthatch is my favorite).  To see more of Diane’s work and read her  blog check out her new website.

Last night I had a dream that I was taking a bath in a huge room filled with people who all looked like professional wrestlers.  A couple of them kept trying to come into the bathtub with me and I was yelling to the person who I thought was in charge to tell them to get out.  After a while, when no one responded, I stood up and yelled up to the wrestler who was standing in the bath in front of me “GET OUT OF MY BATH”.

When I got into the studio today, I knew exactly what I would do.  “Get Out of My Bath” flowed out of my like water.  As I was working I realized the Wrestler was made of obligation, guilt, tradition and worry.  I surrounded him with good things, warm chairs, hot baths, cupcakes and kittens and lots of joy hoping he’ll find his way out of my bath.

(By the way, the color’s pretty accurate on this one,  except the color around the edge is less red and more pink)

Susan sent me this photo of my potholders on her porch.  Such a beautiful setting, it looks like something you’d see in a magazine.

And this is my Trashy Victorian Quilt on Becca’s bed.  I have to say, I love seeing my quilts being used.  I feel as if I know them so well and then, there they are, in a whole new context.   It’s as if I’m seeing an old friend whose life I’ve lost touch with.  Someone else is becoming as  familiar with them as I am and will know them in a completely different way.  And when I’m no longer thinking about them, they continue to be used and appreciated by someone else.  It’s nice to be reminded that my quilts are  doing what I hope they would do, bring beauty and comfort to the people who own them.

I met Serena at the Hen House, a diner in Kingsbury,  for lunch.  I often get the name wrong calling it the Happy Hen.   Serena said that’s because when we meet there, we do a lot of clucking.  And we did about 3 hours worth of clucking today and didn’t even get the chocolate cake for dessert.

One of the things we clucked about was the idea of making our work accessible to as many people as possible.  I remeber reading in a Joseph Campbell book the story of the three artists.  The first made exactly what he wanted and didn’t care if no one ever saw it or understood or bought it.    The second got discouraged with the art world and quit making art altogether.  The third compromised and keeping the integrity of his message, created his art in a form that was accessible to the masses, getting his message to reach far and touch many people.

This third artist reminds me of Walt Whitman who wrote rave reviews  in local newspapers of Leaves of Grass using a pseudonym.  In some printings of the book he removed poems that referred to homosexuality in order to reach a larger audience. Sure this is censorship, but over 100 years later, we’re still reading Walt Whitman’s poems, even the ones he omitted.

When I was in art school, if I tried to make quilts or pillows, I would have been kicked or laughed out of class.  I was making art that  I could  barely explain.  It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t something someone could take home and hang on their wall either.  Years later when I started making quilts, I knew it was an art form anyone could understand and even use.  I wanted to make and sell my art and I wanted to reach as many people as possible.  I have my lines I won’t cross.  And sometimes I have to cross them to know I don’t want to.  But I’m so much happier and more fulfilled and having more fun than when I was making art that spoke to only a handful of people.   Sometimes you have to change and compromise to be able to do what you want to do.

The Functional Art show is less than a month away and there’s still plenty to do. Diane and Patrice and I got together for lunch today in Glens Falls to discuss and edit the press release Jon wrote for the Functional Art show.  Diane ( who is making Memory Boxes for the show) will email it  to the local papers. Ben finished the ramp, now there’s just the final dirt removal and grading to do.

The Chickens hung around Ben the whole time he was working.  They even tried out the ramp a few times and had a good time pecking around the freshly dug soil.

This morning I watched the wind fill up the tissue in the tissue box on the window sill. I watched the shape, color, light and shadows change.  It came alive again and again, like a lung, like seeing breath.

Nancy Bariluk-Smith is one of the nine artists in the Functional Art Show in The Pig Barn Gallery on October 8th and 9th.  (See my Events page for more details)I decided to ask Nancy to be in the show after going to one of her open studio days last year.  I bought earrings as a gift and a pair for myself.  I loved the detail on her small handmade glass beads and was especially drawn to her  unique signature earrings.   Nancy said, “I have been a creator, explorer and seeker for as long as I can remember. Expanding my experiences and pushing myself to learn and grown.I found fiber while traveling across New Zealand and Australia where the sheep roam wildly.
After 20 years of calling myself a fiber/ felt artist/ teacher I found the wonderful world of glass!! I packed up my wool and started making glass beads full time!
Its magical, mesmerizing and limitless!!
Bliss with a hot torch!!” Nancy’s Studio will be open this Saturday from 10-5 for the Washington County Cheese Tour.  You can visit her at 123 Gillis Hill Rd Salem NY  12865.  Or you can see her at Bedlam Farm in October.   Check out more of her work on her website.

Today was one of those days.  It started out when I overslept, then we had to take Rose to the Vet (which happily turned out fine), skipped meditation and  got to the studio really late.

I had 11 potholder for the Functional Art Show that were already sewn together and just needed to be turn in side in  and stitched, but somehow it took me hours to do it.  I just couldn’t focus and found myself repeatedly checking my email and  messing around on facebook.  I put on some music and after a couple of songs I would turn it off then a few minutes later try listening to something else.  I made phone calls and checked my email again.  I finally got my potholders done then actually focused long enough to design another pillow (who knows if it’s good or not, I’ll find out tomorrow).

After dinner I went back to the studio to take a photo of my potholders and when both Izzy and Frieda wanted to come I let them.  From the beginning, it was a two dog day.