The heavy rain continued this week. Unfortunately, some of it wanted a tour of my
art studio. This happens all too often
for me, usually after the ground is saturated and rain keeps coming down. I even had rain running in through blocked up
windows in my storage area. That created
a whole new problem. The good news is
that none of my weavings were affected. I
like to turn adversity into a positive, so I took the opportunity to review all
the treasures in my studio that came upstairs to evade the water and purge the
items that have sat around for years.
I’ll find them some new, dry homes.
Before the rains, I had been making some good progress,
finishing the background weaving for my latest commission. I stretched it out on its frame, and next I’ll
launch into the dimensional crochet component where I build the foreground
further forward. I’ve already wrapped a
mountain of reeds and cattail leaves while watching the final episode of Face Off,
one of my few television guilty pleasures.
The contestants create dimensional make-up, prosthetics and costumes
that stretch the imagination. I love the
program because of the creative problem solving and challenges in the art
making. I’m just a sponge for new techniques.
You just never know when some technique will be useful, which is how I look at
my big supply of yarns and materials.
The boys have been on their usual after school circuit, so
this week I have been needle felting cherry tomatoes. I think they’re just adorable little plump
balls of sugar, and I’m looking forward to completing enough ingredients to
create my Salsa weaving. Speaking of
tomatoes, I have been making more beefsteak tomato slices for my felted
tiles. I’m looking forward to showing
them for the first time in Madison Wisconsin at the Art Fair on the Square, July
8th and 9th.
And speaking of
dates, next weekend I will be in Toledo Ohio doing a two-day workshop and
giving a talk and trunk show for the Fiber of Our Being felting guild. I will pack up about a dozen of my weavings, along
with a load of my felted tiles, most of my re-shirts, some felted sweater
petals, and about a dozen of my costumes from Beauty and the Beast to display
at the trunk show. That will happens on
the Monday night, the 15th of May.
It’s going to be a lot of fun to see all my work displayed
together. I’m especially looking forward
to sharing my work with an audience that hasn’t seen my work live.
I spent a little time this week reorganizing the costume
studio at South. I was ready for a
change after finishing up the 34 girls’ chorus costumes. I gleefully launched into creating the
principal’s costumes for Hello Dolly. At
the top of my agenda was creating Dolly’s opening number costume, and so I pulled out
all of the clothes, fabric scraps and trims that I had accumulated over this
past year in the color story that I was imagining.
I hung them on the closet doors of the
costume studio and just spent a little time taking everything in. From there I started designing and I have pieced
together the design for the dress. I
hope that this week I can pull all the elements together and watch the talented
sewing faeries take over and turn it into a beautiful costume. I really love and depend on my faeries, who
bring my costume designs to life and fit them on the cast.
On the family front, yesterday morning we made a delightful
but slightly damp trip to the farmer’s market.
We arrived a little late in the morning, but the weather kept away a lot
of people so we got our strawberries.
Poor Tommie missed the trip because he was taking the SAT test, but he
got some strawberries at home. On Friday
he took an AP test in US history, and next week are the AP tests in English and
calculus. We are all looking forward to
the end of the school year and the start of the family vacation!
Oh, and my last lonely solitary slice of pie
was consumed this morning. It was a
wonderful apple cranberry pie that appeared on Monday, but now it’s gone. I do hope the next one appears in time for
Mother’s day. If anyone is listening, it
would be better for it to appear around Tuesday when I get back!
Until next week,
Hi Martina,
ReplyDeleteMy name is Anuj Agarwal. I'm Founder of Feedspot.
I would like to personally congratulate you as your blog Dimensional Weaving has been selected by our panelist as one of the Top 100 Weaving Blogs on the web.
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I personally give you a high-five and want to thank you for your contribution to this world. This is the most comprehensive list of Top 100 Weaving Blogs on the internet and I’m honored to have you as part of this!
Also, you have the honor of displaying the badge on your blog.
Best,
Anuj
Martina can you tell us a little about your structural process. How do you frame your finished piece of art? Are they attached under tension or affixed/mounted to a board? Do you make a new loom or frame for each piece?
ReplyDeleteYes, they are stitched, under tension, onto frames that I have custom made. I re-use the looms, but I attach the weaving to its own frame.
DeleteI noticed that you attach the background weaving to a frame and then later reattach the finished piece to the frame. Is there a reason why you couldn't do the final attachment to the frame before you add the needle felting and other embellishments?
DeleteI create the weaving in a nail loom and then stretch and stitch it into a frame. This allows me to suspend the weaving in the frame and allows me to control the tension in the final piece.
Delete