I buckled down this week and focused on studio art. This Saturday (February 25th) is Bloom magazine’s Local Artists Showcase at the Convention Center. The show will run from 11 am – 5 pm and I plan to have some brand new pieces to display. I laid down a layer of skin on my hand this week –my felted hand, that is - and called it complete. I added the dandelion bouquet and attached the hand to the background piece. As often happens, when I saw it all together I realized it needed a little something more. I wanted to convey the sense of the hand and dandelions breaking through a background of more traditional bouquet flowers, so I created and added a few more background flowers behind the hand. As I looked at the completed piece I decided that I knew its name: Flowers for Mom. I’m really pleased with how it turned out. I also worked on a nature piece that’s been coming together in my mind. It will include some summer birches by a lake, and probably bicycling to the lake to sit and watch the water. I’ve been weaving the background and crocheting leaf clumps out of the mohair boucle I dyed a couple of weeks ago. I wrapped some old shoelaces, string and cord with yarn to create the birch bark tree trunks. To create the smaller branches I’ve used some
grey alpaca from Cathy Crosson. I’m close to finishing the bike piece, but I’m still waiting for it to tell me its name.
Of course my brain at Stone Belt is never far from my conscious thought these days. I visited to attach some spray painted letters to the dark side this week. WTIU, our local public television station, came to videotape the work in progress, so I put in an appearance when they filmed. This week the Louisville examiner is coming to town to do some interviews so interest in the project is starting to spread beyond Bloomington.
My big adventure this
week was a trip to Indianapolis to be fingerprinted by the naturalization people. Jim came with me for moral support, applying a stern eye to the humorless guard on duty. The interaction with him would have gone better if I didn’t bring my Swiss army knife in my purse. Much like the airports, weapons are frowned upon in federal buildings. Jim ran it back to the car while I was admitted to wait. Even though we came an hour early they took me right away and I breezed through the process. It was all remarkably painless. They gave me a big brochure with information to study for the next stage of the process, the civics test - one hundred questions about American history, government and geography. At least once a day Tommie pulls it out and asks if I want to try the test. I think I started out at about seventy five percent accuracy (sixty percent is a pass). I do better every time I try and I still haven’t read the booklet! All I know is that there will be a big party when it’s all over (right Jim?)!
On a final note, this is the third anniversary of the blog. The first two visitors came by on February 17, 2009. Since then, the blog has had around seven thousand visits from 106 countries and all fifty states! Thanks to everyone for stopping by.
Until next week…
Martina Celerin
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