Why do we do art? Why did cavemen paint bisons in caves? Why do we feel a need to decorate, to beautify, to make things ornate> I can’t really speak for the human race. For myself, I’m restructuring my world. By the time I’ve played with my images, it changes how I view my world. I am changed, whether I can change my world or not.
949 Floral Arrangement 25
This last week was a bit of a roller coaster for me. I was supposed to have surgery last week on my knee that’s gone bad. After a roll call of more tests, I found I will have to wait for January for the prerequisite tests.
I have a no whine on line rule generally. Finding out I get to wait while my knee degenerates has left me belly low. I’ve gone through denial, doubt, fear, anger and have finally landed in that mud puddle of depression.
So this week I went into the studio, got out the most eye popping threads in my drawer. I pulled out the oranges, purples, yellows and greens and made the wildest flower I could. I’m told that Zinnias are called eyesores in Mexico. But what a way to make your eye soar!
Did it help? Yes. Yes it did. There’s something about yellow, orange, purple, red and green as a combination that lifts my heart. And it changes me.
So I’m making a pile of mushrooms. What better excuse for a riot of color? And yes, it makes me feel better. Perhaps I just needed more fiber in my diet.
I finished four quilts this week. Partially for the joy of it, Partially to fill the time.
Swirling Leaves
Butterfly Pond
Ginko Butterfly
Heron Pond
Heron Pond Detail
My body is betraying me. I have an infection in my replaced knee and we’re going to have to clean it out, let it heal and replace the knee. It’s a three month process.
Can I quilt? I don’t know. The question is, can I walk into the car and the studio. We’ll find out. We don’t know.
I hate the words, ‘We don’t know.’
What I know is that time forced away from your creative flow doesn’t stop it. It finds a way. Through quilts, through words, through my hands, through my dreams, through my prayers.
We came back from the surgeon who told us that instead of doing surgery now, we need to wait until January 19th. More we don’t know. And waiting for the covid vaccine.
If you’re a praying person pray. If not spare me a good thought. I guess the first trial is the wait. Thanks!
I remember the first time I saw a heron land on a pond. I watched it fold itself out of flight and land floating, tidied. You couldn’t imagine from it’s folded form, the shadow of it coming into land. Fierce and lovely, Of course I fell in love.
Eerie Street, Chicago
But that was not my first love. When scientists started to declare that birds were dinosaurs, I roared up in agreement. The only thing as fierce as a heron is a dinosaur! And the resemblance is striking. I’m a believer.
Lady Blue
Part of why I celebrate dinosaurs, and herons, and their survivors is that I see myself as a survivor. We all are. Living means that, so far, you’ve survived life. And time gives us a space to unpack that and understand a little the gifts we’ve been given.
Fall Stream
They aren’t always pretty. Survival can be a messy business. But it reminds me that I have strength and swiftness, if not in my body in my mind. I can be lovely even in my fierceness, if I choose to use it well.
Daylily Pond
And if I am a dinosaur of sorts, my survival, my ability to go on is strength in itself. I am grateful.
Where the Heart is
And I’m going to need it. I’m probably having my right knee replaced again, due to an infection. If I can’t walk, I should be able to fly. I’m related to the Pteranodons, thru my mother’s side. I can survive anything.
I finally feel I’m ready to open my studio to you. In a virtual world, that’s a bit, well, virtual. It’s been functional since May, but I finally have things in a state where I can show you.
I’m excited because the journey here has been so much more than just a new work space. it’s been a journey out of a wheel chair and onto my feet. It’s been a journey where I had no heart to make things to a place where fabric springs back into life under my fingers. It’s been a journey back to my heart.
I have a no whine on line rule. I’ve whined in the past, but I try very hard not to. Not that it isn’t ok to work through the hard places, and online is a place of support, but I find that it’s more public than I want and it tends to be boring for everyone else. And it can make you feel more stuck than you are. But I did hit a dark spot, several years back before I married Don, and I didn’t think I would quilt again.
But feelings are only feelings. And knees are fixable. Both can fix with rest and time.
Don stood by me through all the hard stuff. Then he gave me his house as a studio. And to my shock, and awe, I am able to create again.
So in celebration for that, in thanks for Don’s endless support, and in gratitude to God and the people who’ve held me up, I’m announcing the opening of the THREAD MAGIC STUDIO in Galesburg!
First off, I’m offering new work on sale for a short period of time. I haven’t been able to produce steadily for five or six years. Come see what I’ve been working on!
New blog posts:
Full of information and inspiration to help you out of the box!
New Fabric:
I’ll be able to offer dyed products again for sale. I’ve always sold fabric and thread to students. Now you can schedule a video call, pick out the fabric and threads you want or have me dye exactly what you need. My fabric is needle ready hand dyed cotton full of light sources and excitement.
Lettuce and Roses
Independent Studies:
Although I won’t be teaching on the road, I will be able to offer independent study time on line or at the studio in Galesburg. Come to the studio when you want. Stay with me and learn what you want to learn. I’ve had people come for specific classes, come just to learn one skill or another or come to solve a problem in their own work. It’s your time your way.
My mother gave me dancing trees. We were in a train at Christmas time watching out the window when she told me, “Look Ellen, they’re dancing.”
690Fall Fanfair detail
I’ve never gotten over that. They’re still dancing.
Dancing is its own miracle. Life is a dance, and hopefully, we learn to move in it.
Not all of us do. I was taught not to move. Sitting very quietly was much safer. Instead, I lived in my head and my hands.
But it was in high school that I learned not to dance. It seems people’s mores disappear on the dance floor. It was worse than not being asked. It involved being thrown in to the bleachers. Too humiliating to try again. I’m told I should get over that. I have and I haven’t.
MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERA
My friends, Donna and Roy Hinman gave me back dancing. They ran a contra dance party once a month. Contra is a gentle Ring around the Rosie game for grownups. It was wonderful to move with everyone and be a part of it. Slowly they coaxed me back into the dance.
A life time of not moving is hard to translate into a life of movement. I was able to dance at my wedding. I move in my water aerobic classes. I’m limited by age, wear and tear. But if I can’t always dance, my trees can.
I fell in love with praying mantises the first time I saw them. The eyes! Those glowing, impossible eyes. And the way they move! They’re every bad Sciffy movie you’ve ever seen.
I can’t say a thing for their domestic arrangements. But they are great gardeners. They will take care of your garden like no one else. Each year I would put in Mantis eggs. I rarely saw them. They would hatch 2 inch bright green baby mantises. My roses grew happy, with praying mantises guarding them like big eyed pit bulls.
That’s not the only reason though. My body has always felt so odd, so different and so scary. Add to it the insults that came daily from classmates and it won’t’ be a surprise that I felt like was from outer space. So when I saw my first praying mantis, beautiful and weird I knew I’d met a kindred soul.
I’ve learned several things from mantises.
Celebrate your weird. It’s yours! It will give you notions, dreams and destinations all your own.
Celebrate your beauty, even if it’s unlike anyone elses. If they can’t see it, it’s like not looking at blue skies or the rainbows in puddles. Their loss.
My father fished as a religion. His days off, his sabbath, was spent in a battered row boat, sitting, waiting for the fish to bite. The First Church of Fishing created much better people than those in my mother’s church. I didn’t really catch either of their faiths, but I was shaped by them. Perhaps faith is something one can really only come to on your own. She took me to her church on a regular Sunday
But when I was very lucky, he’d take me with him. He quickly learned that I had no interest in the death of fish. Or their consumption. I wanted nothing to do with fish dinner. Bur I was fascinated with their fishy lives. I would lean out of the boat until I could almost touch the water with my face, to look in on their fishy world.
I remember his hand on my shirt, lightly caught from the back just in case I slipped. I suspect that taking me fishing was very different than fishing on his own. But he never complained or refused to bring me. He just knew the day wouldn’t be spent in the catching of fish.
One of the things we do working in series, is that we retell our stories. Memory is not a static box. It’s a fluid river than changes moment to moment. In retelling the story, we find a way to make ourselves more brave, more healed, more whole. I know that I grow through series, working the images until they heal me.
To turn to turn, will be our delight, till by turning, turning we come round right.
Shzker song
If there’s an image or subject that catches your soul, even if it frightens you or unsettles you, work with it. It’s part of you trying to find it’s place, turned round right.
In support of women artists, I am happy to be participating in the Women’s Art Challenge. Thank you to Julie Duschack for inviting me to join. I agreed to participate for five days by posting a different artwork of my own and to nominate a different woman artist each day to do the same.
And that’s where I got stuck. I nominated two fabulous artists, Lauren Strach and Monique KIeinhans. I’m always so proud for both of you. You are such excellent artists.
Then everyone else I asked told me, in one way or another, no.
I realize I’m late to this game. Probably everyone has been asked but me by now. And I recognize everyone is busy and that people have technical problems and stress and a need to wash their hair this Saturday night. Ok. It’s either fun or it’s not.
With that in mind, if you are a woman doing your art, I NOMINATE YOU! Show it off.
Are you good enough? Yes. Yes you are. All art is emotional expression. The ability to express our emotions effectively makes us strong able people who can change the world with just one image.
If you doubt me, look at Van Gogh’s Starry Night. None of us are the same after we see that painting. And our ability to express that emotion is a lifelong journey. We work our art through our life and our life through our art. SHOW IT OFF.
Are you only making baby quilts? Keeping a baby warm and a mom happy is an art too. SHOW IT OFF.
Are you feeling your work is not perfect yet? Get a grip. There is no perfect any more than there is a normal. There’s only our work towards what is not perfect, but is fabulous. SHOW IT OFF.
Do you have to? Only if it’s more fun that what you are currently doing. Which I would assume would be washing dishes, fixing meals, and saving the world.
I will continue to show my next three quilts. I’ll post this in the form with it. And I invite you to post five works, quilt or not. You can title them, I was invited!
It’s been a while since I’ve blogged anything. There are times when you live your art. There are times when your art is an effort to live your life. I think most artists swing between those two points. With all the changes coming down, I’m hung somewhere between packing and planning. The art there is the art of putting it all into a box.
For those who’ve missed the punchline. I’m getting married, November 21st, to Don Bowers, a dear friend from college who somehow, miraculously has become my love. And I’m moving to Galesburg, IL.
At that point, I need to pack up and move my home and studio and plan a wedding. At 62.
I’d given up. I’d given up so often I could have written a book on giving up. Surprise.
Will I still teach? Yes if I’m asked. So ask. Will I still do my art? How do any of us stop doing are art? Art is not a process. It’s a by-product of an artist’s life. As we live we express ourselves in many ways. Art is just part of the expression.
What is today’s task? Emptying the dead and quite scary freezer to make room for the new one. There’s art for you. Bring out your dead. Find what’s still living. Hand the rest to Mo.
Tangentially, we’re having a mouse problem. The mice are a problem. Mo, the munificent and very messed up 14 year old cat is doing his best to show me that he is a magnificent mouser. I just wish he would stop putting them in the kitchen and in my bed. I always wanted breakfast in bed, but please. Not while it’s still warm.
I’ve had the privilege of sharing so much of my life with you all. It seems strange not to. So I’ll be writing a bit about this as I move, make room for the changes, start to merge with someone in a strange space. We are all artists, by genome, by birthright. And sometimes our lives are simply the art of trying to make sense of our lives.
If you’d like more information about the wedding, please check our web site on The Knot. If we had a failure of mail or brain pressure and you need to be with us on that day, let us know and we’ll put out more fudge for you. (Yes. I made ten batches). And if you have a moment, say a prayer for us. It’s a lot of changes.
