From Frog Toes to Fall Cooking

My week started off with frog toes. I needed eighteen fresh ones for my red-eyed tree frog piece. Fortunately, I had lots of art-in-the-community meetings this week, plus my usual afternoon slots watching the boys do Tae Kwon Do at Monroe County Martial Arts. I started off by cutting copper wire pieces create the toe structure, then I searched out just the right shade of peachy pink for the sticky orbs. A little wrapping here, a little poking there, and before I knew it the little toes emerged. They’re so cute! They even get cuter when they’re attached to the red-eyed tree frog. The whole project was made all the more satisfying because I had a support section at MCMA that watched the whole thing come together and encouraged me at every step of the process. Except for poking the frog eyes, anyway. The frog is done—Oh happy day! Soon it will be hopping into the fern background before snuggling down in protective packaging for the trip to Ohio.

I also hung a show at the Bellevue Gallery at the Bloomington Playwright’s Project (BPP) front foyer. This fall exhibit is called “Reduce, Reuse and Re-weave.” It's part of this year's Aware-fest: A Greener World and happily, I was the recipient of a BPP/BEAD (Bloomington Entertainment and Arts Districts) grant to create the show. The exhibit is actually spread out over two venues, the BPP and the downtown Bloomington Bagel Company (BBC). I spent my time at the BPP today and on October 1st I’ll set up the rest of the exhibit at the BBC. The opening night reception will be on Friday, October 1st from 5-8 pm—please come! I can’t promise a lot of excitement, but I will bring some nice bruschetta from Trader Joe’s and a fresh baguette from The Bakehouse to contribute to the finger food spread.

My new art endeavor for the week center around a dimensional forest piece that features a secluded walk. I started with some dark brown yarns that I’ve been using to wrap around a core of shoelaces, used packing cords and old lanyards to create the tree trunks and reclaimed copper wire to create the tree branches. For the trees in the background, I’ve been mixing in some lighter brown yarns together to create the illusion of depth. With plenty of meeting this week I had ample time multitask and crochet leaf clumps using my suite of freshly dyed green yarns from last week. The piece construction has been moving right along in hopes of having it ready to hang at the BBC location on October 1st. I finished the woven background a few weeks ago and the piece has hung on my art studio wall in a place where I could see it every day. Sometimes the composition takes a while to develop, and seeing the unfinished background stimulates my ideas about which direction to take the piece.

We had a noticeable weather change this week with summer temperatures in the mid nineties giving way to the first hints of cooler fall weather. That got me into a baking mood; today I whipped out fresh bread, peanut butter cookies, and a big batch of peppered salmon using loads of peppers from the morning’s Farmer’s Market adventure. A lot of that will go into the freezer. I even planned out a recipe for pumpkin and red pepper fall soup to make soon. And so the choice becomes cook, felt, or weave, which should I do first!?

Until next week…

Martina Celerin