In conjunction with my solo show last fall at Mitchell-Giddings FIne Art gallery, I gave an artist talk jointly with fellow fiber artist, Jackie Abrams. If you’re interested, here’s a link to the full talk. I cover a lot of ground! Including my inspiration, materials and techniques.
Boy, is it weird to watch myself!
This fall in order to try to stretch my creative chops, I took a semester long Life Drawing class. The last time I did this was a hundred years ago in college and it took some time to get used to the messiness and loveliness of working with charcoal again. Each week we had a different model, all shapes and sizes and drew for over 2 hours.
I loved it. I’d leave each class covered in charcoal dust. I do think it was helpful for me to do something away from fabric and get back to looking and drawing again.
I have some ideas brewing on how to integrate elements of these drawings into my next fiber piece…we’ll see.
I’m digging through my stash, rediscovering some buried pieces of lovely silk I dyed and putting together a group of little creations. These 10″ x 10″ pieces will be mounted onto 12″ square black gallery wrapped canvas. I’m hoping to create at least eight and they all will be available at the upcoming Brattleboro West Arts annual first weekend of December show.More on that later!
Working at such a small scale gives me space to play with new ideas. Like did you know that embroidery thread can be curled on the edge of a scissor blade -like ribbon on a present??
The opening of my solo show at Mitchell Giddings Fine Art gallery is 6 weeks away. Despite trying to balance my day job and my elderly Mom here for the summer, I find I’m being much more productive during the precious minutes of studio time I can carve out.
detail-in progress
No dilly-dallying! No endless indecisiveness and tortured second guessing! It all feels a bit scary but so satisfying!
The first two large convex seeds are mounted (with rigid rug padding inside) and the third one is mostly finished. I’ve also simultaneously begun working on several smaller pieces for the show. This is all such a revolution in my usual only-work-on-one-piece-at-a-time style.
Once the show is hung and my mom has left, I wonder if I can somehow keep myself creating in this way…
I’ve decided that these new seed creations would each have a gentle convex shape that would emphasis it’s design and structure.
I toyed with the idea of using wire mesh underneath to create the form but I felt I wanted to keep things soft. So using wool batt, a form was made. Then came the (for me) tough problem of how to insure this form would push out the front and not the back! I mickey moused a solution. I’m sure there’s some professional way to do this (if you know please clue me in!).
I’m in the process of dyeing a piece of background charmeuse silk for each seed. A color is auditioning to the left. I’m planning on heavily stitching each background piece and then hand sewing the seed on.
And I have sketches for the third seed shape.
On a roll!
big seed 2 detail
I’m on to working on the second large “dreaming seed” and really enjoying the process. I’m hoping to have at least three ready for my upcoming solo show at Mitchell-Giddings Fine Arts (in August-stay tuned for details!).
Each seed has a unique interior dream going on but they will all share a similar color pallette. I’ve never before attempted to create individual pieces that also have a close connection with each other and that will (hopefully) together have a larger visual impact.
Lots of decisions looming, though, about how to mount and hang these. So I’m completing each seed first.
Will I mount each one on stitched fabric or on rigid frames or plexiglass or perhaps bowed out on mesh armatures or…lots of ideas! The brilliant folks in my Art Crit group and in my Fiber Crit group (yes, I’m blessed with two!) all have showered me with a dazzling amount of wild ideas! It’s all percolating and I find myself trying out ideas in my head at odd times during my days-my usual laboriously slow decision process.
I’m working on a continuation of my Seed Dreaming series with some new twists. These will be large stand alone seeds which will then be mounted (somehow…working on lots of options at the moment) on a fixed silk covered frame for hanging. I’m hoping to have at least 3 or 4 done for my upcoming solo show at Mitchell Giddings Fine Art in August.
Here’s a detail of the first completed seed:
new seed- detail
It seems I often grumble about how difficult it is for me to gather enough clarity and confidence to actually jump in and start a new piece. So for a change, I thought I’d focus on the sweet place of being in the middle.
seed construction zone
Lots of ideas a poppin’. Every time I walk past my design wall (which is in my bedroom!), I want to try a new placement or color or fabric or juxtaposition. Nothing linear here… Just lovely chaos!
And though I will still have moments of doubt, the general feeling is one of excited possibility.
This is why I keep at this art thing.
…but unlike Frank, I have way too many to mention!
Sometimes, when looking at a stunning work of art, I am amazed at the sureness of hand and clarity of vision of the artist. My (hopefully wrong) assumption is that she or he moved forward step by step in an enviably linear fashion to arrive at this balance of line, color and composition in front of me.
My process is messy. Full of confident, full of beans decisions that result, days later, in ripped out stitches and frayed fabric (and confidence). These false starts often do result in new ideas that I’m happier with but I rarely remember that as I’m ripping those stitches out. Years later, I can look at one of my pieces and still see places where I should have headed in some other direction.
A highly valued tool!
Scott Adams (of Dilbert) said:
“Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep.”
That second part’s a bear sometimes. Am I right?
“The plant is the dream of the seed.” Australian Aboriginal saying.
This quote has inspired me in the past…
Seed Dreaming I
…and is inspiring me again. Large seed shapes are taking root in my studio!
New Seed
Stay tuned.
Karen Kamenetzky Fiber Art 