Here is a update of what I have in progress, artwise. I have kept a little air conditioning unit going on energy-saver in the back studio for the past week so that I don’t have the excuse not to go back there because of the extreme heat wave we’ve been dealing with. The light I work under is hot too, so I should probably change the lighting. In a way it is good because it forces me to take a break when I get too hot. At the same time, it should be changed because it changes my perception of the colors I’m working with.
Suzanne lent me her Critter for beating paper pulp before I went to the lake, but I haven’t used it yet. When the weather dips back down into the mid-80s during a time that I don’t work, I’ll get right on that! I have a lot of different fibers that I want to experiment with on this nifty little piece of equipment. I’m lucky to have access to one, since they are made one at a time by paper artist Mark Lander in New Zealand. His web site seems to be down – he has had many challenges this past year, unfortunately – but here is a good web site about Mark and his Critter.
On the four-harness loom in the back, exploring huck, a lace weave pattern. I’ve finished two scarves, or table runners if they don’t wash up soft! These should look quite different once they are washed, so I’ll repost the after photos. I’m going to weave off the entire warp before I cut them off, so it will be at least a couple of weeks.
At the lake, my good intentions were to work on collage and book covers and bookbinding and inkle weaving. That didn’t pan out, because although I carried half my studio with me, I left certain tools home that would have made the creative process frustrating. Fortunately, I also took my tapestry loom and a bag of thrums (leftover yarn from weaving on the loom). Since I need a lot of quiet time when I’m making art, I decided to start a tapestry that was based more on intuition and randomness. I’d been thinking about doing this project with found objects from the lake for a long time. So I dived right in.
The idea was that I would reach into my bag of mostly cotton yarn scraps and use whatever I pulled out. I quickly realized that this was not going to result in a piece that I would be happy with, but I liked the concept – a free-style,Saori-like, wabi-sabi kind of aesthetic. So I started four little tapestry bands on the back side of the tapestry loom. If the yarn I chose at random really did not fit the movement and colors and feel of the lake experience at that point in the weaving, I flipped the loom over and picked one of the four little bands to weave it into.
I just can’t express how much fun this is, and it’s portable. I keep the whole thing in a backpack and so I can just grab it and go.
