Lemons in the Snow

When life gives you lemons, mail them to Massachusetts!  According to the UPS, the lemon piece has touched down in Massachusetts at its new home.  As promised, here’s the image of the final piece.  Every end turns into a new beginning, or at least a reminder that it’s time to get back to the other projects you’ve ignored along the way.  To that end I’ve been chugging away at my Winter Birches commission.  I’m pleased to report that I have all of the tree trunks made for the piece, as well as the branches. 

 If all goes well this coming week I should assemble the piece and send it off to its new home in Chicago.  The caveat stems from fact that my weekly schedule was rather disjointed because Tommie was sick.  I think it’s that stinking flu going around.  He’s much better now and was able to go back to school on Thursday.  Fortunately, the illness was isolated to Tommie, at least so far. 

Unfortunately, it meant that my art making was a little of this and a little of that.  I did launch into another piece for the garden show.  It’s the fifth piece I have in progress at one time, which is a record for me.  The piece will be titled “Washing the Harvest” and will feature an outstretched hand holding a radish under a water faucet emerging from a stone wall.  This week I managed to weave the wall and I got a good start on the hand. 

 I have a thumb and one finger, perfect for picking things up.  My hope is to add more fingers this evening during the IU-Michigan game, but I’m worried that it’s going to be too exciting.  I just can’t safely poke with a needle when I have to keep looking up at the game.  When I transitioned into art, I never imagined that college basketball games would slow down progress. 

 

 My goal for the upcoming week is to keep making progress on weavings, but the following week I will pull out the sewing machine to make Re-Shirts.  They were well received at the Unitarian Universalist Art Fair in December of last year, and I promised people that I would make more for this event.  They were so popular that I sold the one I was wearing three times, so I need to make myself one as well!  The Bloom Artists’ Showcase is coming up on Sunday February 24^th, and will run from noon to 5:30 at the Bloomington Convention Center. I found this pic from last year's event on Bloom's web site.  Fortunately, I spent a little time over the holidays cutting out the actual Re-Shirt fabrics, which come from old clothing, curtains, tablecloths and random fabric scraps.  That means I’m ready to put Grandma’s sewing machine into high gear for about a week.  It’s called the Jeans Machine, and it’s a real workhorse.  On my old machine the zigzags would skip a few stitches when I put the petal to the metal, but this machine just hums along perfectly, even at “Interstate speed.”  I like that.  

 

After a long week of poor sleep and tired days, last night we celebrated with a delightful fish dinner.  Jim prepared his now famous orange-ginger-glazed salmon and jasmine rice.  The dish was accompanied by steamed broccoli, for which Jacob requested a cheese sauce - so out came my trusty old Fanny Farmer.  That sauce increased his broccoli consumption about five-fold, so I plan to make that again.  The adults added a delightful bottle of wine—the tempranillo with the pig on the label.  It’s actually a super inexpensive wine from Trader Joe’s, but when you just need a reliable tipple it does a fine job.  I wonder how it goes with peach pie.  Is anybody listening? 

Until next week,

Martina Celerin

Bloom and brains but still no pie

The Bloom magazine’s Local Artist Showcase was the focal point of my art week. Malcolm Abrams, the editor and publisher of Bloom, and his group put together an excellent event. I was especially pleased by how well promoted and attended the show was. We had the perfect convergence of events on Saturday. The weather was mild enough to get everyone out of the house, and the crowds were ready to see some fresh art after a long winter. Gosh, I haven’t gotten to chitty-chatty like that since the Unitarian Universalist show last year in December! I sure hope this becomes an annual event! I even found a lovely scarf from a Martinsville artist. By wearing it I think I managed to get two more sales for her after a city meeting last night.

Of course my other projects had to keep moving along. I had Tom Bertolacini, my photographer, come by to capture images of my recently completed weavings. I’m hoping to translate some of the images into a new set of note cards. I think my ‘Flowers for Mom’ piece and some of my bike-themed pieces are good choices.

I also spent part of the week finishing my Trashion/Refashion outfits. This year my son Jacob is participating too. He designed an outfit that I’m helping him put together. I don’t want to ruin the surprise with pictures, but after the images are submitted for jurying Thursday I’ll include them in my blog.

Last, my giant brain project is advancing. I found a bunch of Valentines Day decorations that were on sale (90% off) so I snapped them up and spray-painted the hearts black. I know that that sounds creepy – and it is. I also searched through my collection of found objects and pulled out some other appropriate objects to paint black, including an old watch and a doll. It’s moving a little slowly because I can only deal with the happy objects turned black for an hour or two each day. So much life is drained out of the objects when you paint them black, and that just isn’t who I am. To balance things out I spent some time working on butterflies for the euphoric side of the brain. They will be suspended over the enormous flower garden on the right side of the brain. I have until April seventh and I feel good about what I’ve gotten accomplished so far. It’s really nice working at Stone Belt because I get to interact with other artists. When I’m in my art studio I only have my own thoughts to keep me moving along. I’m very productive, but it isn’t as much fun as being surrounded by a group of supportive artist friends.

Let’s see, what else isn’t happening in my life that should, and very soon. I’m thinking pie! Aren’t there apples in the freezer, ready to go? Some of those really nice, big Mutsus from the fall Farmer’s market?

Jim?

Until next week…

Martina Celerin

More art, less brain and my third anniversary.

I buckled down this week and focused on studio art. This Saturday (February 25^th) 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