Seventy Degrees and Summer Beckons!

After a heavy focus on making costumes, this week I launched back into making pieces for the summer art fair circuit.  Yesterday the thermometer reached seventy and the day was sunny.  Eranthis, snowdrops and crocuses started flowering across the yard, filling it up with fresh colors.  The weather seduced my mind with thoughts of summer, so off I went to make some summer birches by a stony lake shore.  I picked up some florist wire remnants and have been wrapping them with yarn from alpacas that I buy at the summer farmer’s market.   

My friend Cathy Crosson of RedRosa farm raises alpacas and sells a yarn, spun from a particular color of charcoal grey alpaca that work well for me.  The wrapped wires contribute the narrow diameter branches of the birches, and I can bend them as I like to make natural tree pieces that hold their shape.  I wove the background for the piece about a month ago, but other responsibilities prevented me from advancing the piece.  I stretched out the weaving in one of the oak frames that Thom Bertolacini builds for me, so now I’m ready to build forward the background using a dimensional crochet technique.  When everything is in place I’ll attach the birch trees and start listening for the waves splashing up on the rocky shore. 

Friday marked a milestone in my other major focus, making circus costumes for the current Sounds of South members in the upcoming production of ‘Pippin’.  I’ll share a few individual pictures, but I think the image I like best shows the two racks jam packed and bursting with purples, blues and greens.  I even threw in some black, silver and white for good measure.  That was a good stopping point for my costuming, which allowed me to go back to creating weavings.  I’ll use the next month to focus on making art to travel to summer fairs.  

 I also need to develop pieces for a fall exhibit I’m working on titled ‘Treasures from the Earth’.  In April I’ll go back to Bloomington South and making circus costumes after the freshmen class has been selected and measured.  I’ll continue collecting used clothing in the color palette for the show until then to draw on for the new costumes. 

Speaking of costumes, yesterday I delivered twelve mannequins (a big thank you to Deb Christiansen from IU!) to the Blue LineGallery.  These will support my costumes from last fall’s ‘Beauty and the Beast’ production.  

 The gallery will host a joint exhibit with a fashion designer that will take you behind the scenes a little bit.  I’ll share my rough sketches for the costumes so people can see the thought process that connects the conception with costume building and leads to the final, wearable product.  Jim Andrews is curating the exhibit so I’m looking forward to getting a list from him describing which characters he would like to include.  I know he’s partial to the grater, the whisk and the potato mashers.  Mark your calendars and come out on March 4^th for the opening reception, although the show will be up for a couple of months. 

In travel news, I’m packing for a workshop in Memphis,Tennessee next weekend.  I do know that my three big boxes with fifteen looms and mountains of colorful yarn have arrived.  That helps give me confidence that everything will go smoothly when I get there.  I’m looking forward to the explosion of color when they come out.  I just need to remember to pack my Swiss army knife in my suitcase and not my carry on when I travel!  

 I probably won’t be able to write a blog next weekend, but I should have lots of news and pictures when I write again on March 5^th.   On the home front, Jim surprised me with a cherry pie on Saturday morning.  Hooray, my favorite!  I think he knew that.  We definitely need to pack more fresh farmer’s market cherries into the freezer for the cold months.  I’m going to have to muddle through on blueberry and raspberry pies until May.  

Until next week,

Martina Celerin

I’m Back in the Studio Weaving!

Life has settled down a little bit.  I’ve been able to carve out chunks of time to weave in the art studio.  I decided to launch into a piece for my upcoming “Looking at Water” exhibition as I’ve maintained progress on the rest of my projects.  It seems that every time the weather gets hot and humid I start thinking about cool Canadian lakes and birches.  It’s a source of comfort, thinking of my Canadian roots and travels north.  Looking at birches is meditative for me, in part because it brings back memories of my Grandmother.  In Pinery Provincial Park on Lake Huron I would collect pieces of driftwood, freshwater clam shells, pieces of birch bark paper and polished great lakes beach stones. I used these to make her little collages to use as ashtrays.  On the birch tree piece I’m making, I still have to create the birch tree trunks and leaf clumps but I’m really pleased with the woven canvas that I’ve created.  

 I also spent a little time this week dyeing yarn.  That’s less meditative, but it’s part of the art to produce the colors I need.  I currently have two ongoing commissions that require yellow yarn for different reasons.  The first includes a path that will require bright yellow and purple flowers.  The second is a commission that will feature autumn aspens.  The yellow yarns will go into the leaf clumps that I will crochet.  Having several different colors and texture of yellow yarns adds depth and structure.   

My commissions are pretty diverse, so while I’m working on birch trees I’ve also been advancing my big-headed ant commission for Wonderlab.  Right now I’m working on the super major.  I have completed the head and abdomen, and now I need to flesh out the structure that joins the two.  The queen will be the final piece for that insect collection.  As I move all my projects forward, I keep reminding myself that I need to focus on the ‘Looking at Water’ exhibition I’m scheduled to display in October.  I’m feeling some added pressure because I sold five pieces in Des Moines that I would have used in that collection.  Between travel, commissions, and readying the house for an Open House in mid August to celebrate the boy’s advancement to black belt, a lot has to happen in the next few months!  

 Also on the horizon is the Fourth Street Festival on Labor Day weekend.  We have monthly meetings to orchestrate the show and everything is coming together.  This year’s T-shirt design, a tribute to the late Jim Kemp, looks amazing.  Kyle Spears did a great job creating a layout for the art and bringing the project together.  On the family front, we celebrated Jacob’s twelfth birthday.  

 Tommie baked him a peanut butter cup pie, which was wonderful.   

Ever since we started grilling fish in North Carolina, Jacob has taken a real shining to grilling.  We’ve managed to outfit him with a new grill, chef’s hat, and an apron with grilling tools.  The weather has been pleasantly cool so we’ve been able to have many meals out on the veranda.  I’m hoping that Jim and Tommie can keep him supplied with fish!  

 The only bad news to report is that I didn’t get another pie after Des Moines.  I know we bought lots of tart cherries at the farmer’s market, but now I see that they’re in the freezer!  Jim seems to think that just because I finished one pie (raspberry) on Thursday I don’t need a fresh pie on Saturday!   Sometimes I just don’t know what he’s thinking. 

Until next week,

Martina Celerin

Birthday cakes and Christmas cheer!

Despite my best efforts, blogging fell to a low priority over the holidays.  I almost got this post out before Christmas but I never got around to posting.  I’m going to update and share it.  I’ll tell you what’s new and exciting in the new year in a fresh post shortly. 

Oh the weather outside is frightful, but my studio is delightful.  It’s been a very good week in the art studio.  I spent time there weaving each day this week and managed to finish a piece called ‘Cousins at the Lake’.  I’ve been thinking about family, and that the holiday season is the perfect time to get together.  I’ve been doing my nook and cranny cleaning and general home re-organizing in advance of my family coming in from Michigan and New Mexico over the Christmas holiday.  I also flashed back to my friend and photographer Tom, who has a cottage on a lake with birches surrounding it.  Somehow those ideas all came together into the piece as the holiday approaches. 

I’m also hoping to get at least one other piece completed before I have to convert my studio into a bedroom.  A drawing on a thank you card I received after I visited a fifth grade classroom at Binford last week inspired this piece.  I was invited to talk about using recycled materials to create art, something I do in each of my pieces.  I had a really good time with a fun and enthusiastic bunch of kids.  I was very impressed with the insightful questions they asked about interpretations of the pieces.  A few days later they surprised me with an amazing batch of thank-you cards!  One had a sketch that really spoke to me, and I’m planning to build a weaving around the idea.  The weaving will feature a balloon tied to a park bench that’s under a tree.  I’ll call it something like ‘Tethered Memories’.  Since the time I wrote the first and last draft of this post, I’ve managed to bring the piece to completion. 

If you didn’t get that I’ve been on an art frenzy since I’ve completed my last commission pieces and before I go into holiday mode, I can report that I have also been working on my felted fruit piece.  I have all but the seeds finished on the watermelon chunks.  I filled in the meat of the lemon slices with wool that I have in my stash that I dyed to a gentle yellow with dandelions.  Then I finished the edible white part of the apple slices.  It’s nice to be working on this project because I can work on it anywhere.   When my art studio becomes a bedroom for the New Mexico Drummonds I’ll still be able to move the piece forward.  I plan to do a lot of chatting with family, and I can always poke while I talk and listen. 

I have to start winding this down, but lots of other stuff is going on.  I’m in the process of sorting out my summer travel schedule. I heard back from the Des Moines art fair, but unfortunately they wait listed me.  Tommie is convinced that they’ll invite me to participate, so we’ll just wait and see.  On Thursday we celebrated Jim’s birthday.  It wasn’t a pie week, but I did make an elaborate German chocolate cake that Jim requested.  I found a Bobby Flay variation on the classic recipe listed with a high degree of difficulty.  I was up for a challenge, so off I went!  I was sold on the cake part when I read that it featured a cup of cocoa powder.  I ended up using Giaradelli’s instead of Dutch (Drost) because that was all I could find.  The frosting recipe called for a cup of goat milk, but I haven’t seen any goats lately so I improvised.  My favorite part of the process was learning Bobby’s ganache technique , which was the absolute simplest process I’ve ever used.  I’m definitely going to use that again on some other baked delight very soon.  The cake was a big hit!  It took several days to finish it off, even though it went very well with espresso for breakfast.  Who knew?  Happy birthday to my sweetie pie. 

Until next week,

Martina Celerin 

Weave, weave weave...

I think I have finally settled into a routine back at home.  I get to weave every day!  It feels nice to return to a regular rhythm in my art studio and at home with my family.  The only other big project from the week was to wash a pail full of rusty things.  Jim says I’m the only person he knows that washes rusty stuff.  I found some of my treasures in Champaign, Illinois, on our trip home from the Madison show.  Champaign isn’t as meticulous at keeping all their roads as spotless as Bloomington does.   

We discovered a secret gravel alleyway close to Papa Del’s where we found some great rusty things all over the road, including a rusty caster from a chair.  When I got home, I also discovered a use for the boys’ jeans that are blown out at the knees and are no longer wearable (that’s my opinion, anyway).  They make great drying pads for clean, rusty things!  Who knew!  Anyway, the rusty pieces will be for a new piece that features a crocus emerging from the rusty ground.  I have an orange, needle-felted crocus in hand from an earlier project, so I’m hoping I can bring a piece similar to ‘Spring Treasures’ together pretty quickly.

As I described last week, I had a terrific summer season that depleted me of my finished weavings.  That translates into a need to make new pieces for the upcoming Fourth Street Festival.  That’s my last summer art fair of the season, held over the Labor Day weekend.  I felt very comfortable making some new birch pieces that feature water as I worked in the cool July air.  How often do I ever get to report that!  I found several yarns that are really good for making sparkly water, which is a nice shade of blue with sparkly material incorporated into it.  I found it on our trip to Madison at the Knitting Tree.  The owner saw my work at the show and offered for me to come in to scour her place for yarns that might work in my pieces.  The previous owner had purchased a lot of novelty yarns, so there was quite a selection to look through.  While I mostly use reclaimed and recycled materials and dye and overdye a lot of my own yarns, sometimes I need small amounts of materials to create a specific effect, like sun on the water.  

 I’m really pleased with how the water on my latest piece turned out.  The whole thing came together came together pretty quickly because I had some birch trunks left over from a day-long birch wrapping fest earlier in the year. 

My family life has been pretty full too, since the boys don’t go back to school until next Wednesday, August 7^th.  Last night we went to the Monroe County Fair to see the pigs and rabbits, and I got my annual elephant ear.  I had to go through several rounds of “No, we are not getting a pet bunny!” and “Yes, they are very cute!”  Not always in that order, but you get the idea.  It has been a week of birthday parties, trips to the pool, and zip lining at eXplore Brown County.   

We had an amazing day in the park, with 75 degree weather and sunny, with a gentle breeze to keep it perfect.   We had the option to do one run backwards, free-falling off into oblivion.  That was quite a rush.  We zipped over lakes and threw in stones.  The people who ran the lines were friendly and fun, making it a very pleasant day.   

We went to the farmer’s market before going to Bollywood at Panache Dance Studio on Saturday morning, and I got pretty excited when Jim bought a big batch (three quarts) of perfectly ripe blackberries.  Unfortunately, he put them in the freezer for a winter pie.  Ouch!  Oh, and the last big news—I bought a trailer to haul my stuff to art fairs each year.  Grandma snooped it out for us in Bay City, and it’s just what I need.  We were planning on buying a used trailer in rough shape so we could personalize it with our own graffiti, but this one is very classy.  Hmmm.  Did I say I didn’t get a pie?

Until next week,

Martina Celerin

Fourth Street Festival is on the horizon…

I did a lot of driving to art fairs this summer.  During my most recent trip to Minneapolis I had some fond memories of the geology I grew up with in northern Ontario.  We drove through some beautiful granite formations, and I even got to see some cool hoodoos.  If you don’t know, these are striking rock spires that improbably narrow and widen as they rise.  Usually the top part is made of more durable rock, standing on a softer rock layers that were eroded.  I had gotten so used to southern Indiana’s limestone structures that it was striking to see the scraped granite outcroppings I remember from northern Ontario, especially on the Bruce Peninsula.  

 I also saw the familiar sycamores of Indiana replaced by the birches of the north.  I found myself missing the birch trees of my youth.  Of course I had to make more birch pieces!  This decision was reinforced by the fact that these pieces have been popular at art fairs this summer.  I have now finished two of these pieces, which will be on display at the Fourth Street Festival.

Another art project that I’m looking forward to seeing in action is the yarn bombing of some local trees.  This is a fundraising project for Middleway House, organized by Mary Ann Gingels of Yarns Unlimited.  There’s a nice story describing the project in Bloom Magazine  if you’d like to read more about it.  I’m sorry I couldn’t be part of it, but my plate is overflowing with preparations for the Fourth Street Festival.  Somewhere in Bloomington there’s probably a tree that’s grateful.  I did donate a bunch of yarn from my stock for the project, so I feel like I’ll be there in spirit. 

When it rains it pours, and this week was the start of school for my boys.  Tommie is starting middle school at Jackson Creek, so he has to be up at 6:30 to get ready and catch the bus.  He comes home exhausted every day.  Jacob is still cruising at Binford.  He’s Mr. Confident and is mature beyond his ten years.  And for those of you keeping track, yes, hubby Jim did make me a peach pie this week. Mmmmm. 

Close to the front door, my squash is thriving.  It has three babies, which I’m starting to suspect are either acorn squash or pumpkins, based on the shape.  I’m still watering the plant regularly with my dehumidifier water.  As it grew, it decided to crawl over the sidewalk, so I had to redirect it.  I love all my boys, but it takes a constant effort to keep them all in line! 

Until next week…

Martina Celerin

Happy Canada Day!

The big news from my week involves completion of my large-format commission piece.  YIPPEE! When I thought I was finished, I realized that the beige sides of my base were fighting visually with the path when the piece was viewed from side angles.  I asked my second set of eyes, my son Tommie, what he thought.  He looked at me because he knew the right answer and also what I wanted to hear.  He finally said yep, it needs the green.  I went back and needle felted the blue-green understory on the sides and that’s really what it needed.  It now sits in my living room awaiting the big move to its new owner.  Anyone who comes to visit, like our neighbor Katy, gets to visit with it for a while.  Katy noticed that if you sit on the floor and look up into the trees you feel like you are deep in the forest.  And it’s true! 

With the Madison show, Art Fair on the Square looming, I’ve been working hard to bring together some new pieces in the next two weeks.  I was scanning through some of the sketches I made last summer in Michigan and I found one I really liked.  We’ve been having some crazy heat here in Bloomington, with several days in a row over one hundred degrees.  That was probably the trigger that made me start channeling cool Canadian lakes.   

Which reminds me—happy Canada Day!  I may be an American citizen, but I can still channel all my good memories from Canada.  Anyway, I showed the sketch to my family for approval and to get a name for the piece.  It features a mature birch and a sapling next to a lake.  Jacob thought it should be called “Father and Son,” a name that stuck with me.  Jim suggested I avoid “Son of a Birch,” which eleven-year-old Tommie found surprisingly hilarious.  I spent some time yesterday creating the branches for the trees.  This story goes back to Katy again, who brought us some candy flowers on wire stems from her trip to Rome.  Not her last one, the one before that—Katy travels a lot.   

After we ate the candies I wrapped the wires in a charcoal-colored alpaca fur for the small branches.  The alpaca comes from Cathy Crosson, who raises alpaca on a farm just outside of Bloomington.  I saw her at the farmer’s market yesterday, and she just started dyeing the alpaca yarn.  She had the most wonderful blue that happens to match our front door, our car and my bathing suit.  Can you tell I like it?  I’m going to use it for the sky in another piece I’m planning that will be called “Flower Parade.”  

The really big news came last night, when we finally got some rain around three in the morning.  There was lots of thunder and lighting to go with it, but not much in the way of damaging winds.  There was enough water to get the creek flowing next to our driveway.  This morning all that was left was wet ground and a puddle in the driveway, which thankfully the paper delivery person missed.  I think all of our flowers are happy again.  

 On a sad note, my blueberry pie from last week is gone already.  With two boys who like fruit pies they don’t last long.  On the bright side, we bought way too many peaches to eat at the farmer’s market yesterday, thinking that they could go into the freezer for pies in the future.  But now I’m thinking, hmmm, the first peach pie of the summer!  The mornings are cool enough to use the oven, aren’t they Jim?

Until next week…

Martina Celerin