Workshops in 2008

 

I've finalized my El Cielo schedule through August -- now all I need is to get the word out. These workshop-retreats are filling faster and faster, and that's good news for the studio and my larder, but I love doing them and hate to cancel, and hope that having the schedule published a bit earlier will let more people participate. So, all you loyal readers, help me spread the word by passing along a link to my schedule -- I'll post this all on the WORKSHOP PAGE within the next couple of days. I can accommodate out-of-town (meaning outside of San Antonio) participants on Friday nights even for the workshops that aren't two-nighters, that's one of the benefits of flying or driving in. Let me know if you have any questions, either on the comments here or in an email to susiemonday@sbcglobal.net. Here's the body copy, the borchure looks better, but I haven't had much luck attaching it here as a pdf. More learning to do!

Susie Monday leads workshops and artists’ retreats throughout the year at her studio near Pipe Creek, Texas, about an hour from downtown San Antonio. Designed to nurture the creativity of beginning artists as well as professionals, each participant comes away from a weekend with renewed energy, new  materials and techniques in surface design applicable to fiber, ceramics, jewelry, painting and mixed media work. El Cielo Studio workshops are designed with the needs of the participants in mind;  free time is scheduled throughout the weekend for reading, reflection and personal work in the studio. You are welcome to bring projects in process for Susie’s critique and for peer feedback in an environment of trust and respect. You’ll share meals, poetry and stories, mu- sic and advice for living an artist’s life. Enjoy the 25-mile vistas from the deck and strolls down the country roads. A spa and pool, and large screen media room are also available to participants. The fee for each workshop retreat is $160 for each  2-day event with $10 discount for early enrollment. Comfortable accommodations are available from $15 -  $30 a night . Some workshops offer a Friday night potluck option. Limited enrollment - 7-8 participants.

 ARTIST’S JOURNEY/ARTIST’S JOURNAL

January 11-12-13, 2008
Friday evening, Saturday & SundayThe new year is time to reflect, to reevaluate, to set new actions and new rituals into motion, to make new habits. This retreat will enrich your creative path through the year’s start, and, with some persistence, into the next. Designed for the fiber artist, book artist and anyone interested in journaling as a tool for creative growth, reflection and inspiration. Whether or not you consider yourself an “Artist,”  these projects in mixed media collage, a personal card deck, and an altered book will intrigue. On the optional Friday evening, mixed media artist Suzanne Cooke will guide us through the process of making a Coptic bound handmade paper journal, just the tool to take you through the first month of notes and sketches. This binding was invented in early Christian Egypt and its particular advantage is that the book lies flat when opened,; perfect  for writing or decorating as a journal.

THE HEART OF ART

February 9-10, 2008
Saturday & Sunday
Romance your creative self with a focus on heart energy. Try your hand at mixed-media valentines to yourself, chocolate as edible art, and heart chakra mediations and movement to inspire an art cloth scapular  as heart armor/amor.

CALLING ALL ARCHETYPES

March 7-9, 2008
Friday evening to Sunday
Explore the inner team that keeps you going, makes a difference and sometimes holds you back from your best life. Create a unique fiber art quilt altar to one of the archetypes. learning fusing techniques. Suitable for all levels, great for those  beginning an art journey. Note: Friday night is an optional evening potluck and stayover for a small additional fee of $10.

SOMETHING SPECIAL: Workshop in Tuscany

March 16-22 in Lucca, Italy.
Susie and Carol Ikard (director of the Texas Fiber Arts Museum and writer/researcher) will lead a week of fiber art and creativity in the mountains of Tuscany. Explore the colors, textures, natural history and traditions -- including a cooking class, visits to Florence and more. Email susie at susiemonday@sbcglobal.net for brochure, price and info. OR you can go directly to the registration site at  http://www.abbondanzatoscana.com  

WORDS ON THE SURFACE

May 9-11, 2008
Friday evening to Sunday
Experiment with different ways to use written language, letters and text on surface of fabric for application in  the making of art cloth, art quilts and art-to-wear. By putting your ideas and your personal vision into your work, you will deepen your own expression of your individual voice, finding words that are important to you. Using your story in a quite literal way can be part of personal expression and powerful art. This is a repeat of one of Susie’s popular workshop with some a few new exercises.

ALSO IN 2008:

WORDS FOR THE WHOLE  CLOTH

April 11-12, 2008
Friday evening  & Saturday
(no overnight stay)
Bring to the Friday evening workshop at Gemini Ink four or five photos of people, places, and experiences that are important to your life: images from childhood, a memorable vacation, vintage photos of ancestors, your quinceañera or bat mitzvah, anything that moves you. Led by Susie Monday, you’ll translate the photos into powerful moodscapes, capturing even intangibles that don’t show up in the pictures. Next morning, pack a sack lunch and join Monday at her El Cielo Studio near Bandera. There you’ll combine your photos and your writing with textile dyes, paints, photo transfers and other surface design techniques to create your own unique fiber art piece ready for hanging. Fee to Gemini Ink: $65/member; $75/non-member. NOTE: Saturday, April 12 fiber art workshop at El Cielo Studio is a separate fee payable to Susie, 10 am – 4 pm, is $70 & $15 supply kit.

SUMMER DATES:

CREATIVE JUMPSTART

June 21-22

FOOL MOON/FULL MOON

July 18-20

BURNING WOMAN WORKSHOP

August 9-10

WHAT PARTICIPANTS SAY ABOUT SUSIE’S CLASSES & WORKSHOPS:

“There was a good balance between thinking, processing and working ... you are good at letting people work at their own pace.”  
“Excellent accommodations; exquisite food!”
“I like the spirituality aspect--it drew the group together as a family for two days.”
“Great class, it was just what I needed right now. I have been in a creative slump, questioning what I do and how I do it. The exercises we did this weekend were freeing on the one hand, but will also help me focus.”
“Your workshops are ALWAYS money well spent.  I learned techniques I have read about but never tried ... I also now feel confident that I can make art quilts!”

Susie Monday can teach at your studio, guild or art center. Any workshop listed here can be adapted to your audience. Other topics available as well. She also accepts commissions and can plan private retreats at her studio for you and your friends. For more information, call 210.643.2128 or email susiemonday@sbcglobal.net

Letter from Tuscany

 

This art quilt is destined to hang at the Kerr Arts and Cultural Center -- an example of the kind of art quilt journey that my end-of-November workshop will inspire. It was fun to take my own course today, taking memories, journal pages, the color palette of the countryside and the architecture and turning it into this piece. Making it today let me relive a day spent in and near Lucca -- Lucca has a Medieval wall that surrounds the old city. It has been preserved as a park that features a 2 mile path perfect for bikes and hikes around the circumference. We rode bikes one morning, and this old villa was one of the sights. It seemed abandoned but grand, and I can just imagine what kind of meals and parties and family dramas must have once filled those windows.

Here's one of the original photos; followed by a detail of the art quilt.

 

 

AND, this is the town closest to where I 'll be teaching a workshop in March. The Italian Adventure continues with the course, co-taught with writer and creativity workshop leader Carol Ikard. I am still waiting for the "official" brochure to be completed, but here's what I know so far:

 DATES: MARCH 15- 22 --- This is spring break weekend here in San Antonio, and is the weekend before Easter, so one might want to add a week on to the excursion and spend Easter in Florence or Rome.

LOCATION:  Selva, a compound of restored farmhouses and gardens near Lucca, located on a 1000-acre estate owned by a Baronessa. Working vineyards, orchards and olive groves are part of the estate, as well as the rustic mountainous area where Silva is located.

Cost, all inclusive, except for transportation to either Pisa or Florence: €2150 double occupancy

 Here's the four fiber art classes, just part of the full schedule of activities (morning writing workshops, cooking classes, field trips almost every day, activities for spouses or non-fiber friends who want to come along for all of the fun,

Monday -- Field Guide to Tuscan Color" --
Color is the one of the first design elements we associate with Tuscany - the warm rustic hues  of old walls and stacked stone, the rich botanicals and jewel tones from the grapes, flowers and foliage, the natural siena and ochres that come from the very earth. Using modern low-toxicity dyes, and some simple natural dyes (onion skins, beets and rust), participants will create organic and textural patterns on silk scarves and quarter-yard lengths of rayon, silk and cotton textiles to use in the week's subsequent sessions.

Tuesday -- "Beyond the Terrace" -- The beauty of Selva's landscape and its grasses, leaves and trees will inspire designs for printing on our fabrics.  Using the natural world as inspiration for design on fabric and paper participants will try their hands at solar printing, direct leaf printing, and develop designs for stencils and stamps.

Wednesday -- "Etruscan to Tuscan -- Historical Imagery to Inspire" -- We'll design and create printing blocks and stamps using historical imagery, photos taken on the week's field trips, images from Etruscan and Roman antiquity, as well as our own sketches and collections from the Tuscan landscape. Printing on fabric (if I can solve the technical and shipping issues)

Friday -- "Layers of Tuscany" -- Using all of the materials and tools from the art sessions, participants will layer their imagery to make one-of-a-kind art cloth, then cut, fuse and hand-stitch a small wall hanging. Simple embroidery stitches, beading embellishments and the use of fusable webbing to create original designs will be included in this final session

The schedule for participants is tentatively designed to include the following.                                                        
Sat        Arrival in afternoon; welcome with sparkling wine & refreshments; Susie & Carol introduce the program; begin limoncello making process; dinner under the pergola  
Sun    08.00    Early morning visit to the shepherdess to see the magic of pecorino cheese and ricotta.    
    09.30    Brunch   
    11.00    Creativity Expanded: unpacking creatively; feeling art and responding; thinking art   
    12.00    Walk around the property to search out natural materials for later fiber arts sessions, photography  
    13.00    Lucca Antique Market (opportunity for more materials)   
    17.00    Fiber arts workshop: Field Guide to Tuscan Colors   
    20.00    Dinner prepared by Emanuela   
Mon    08.00    Breakfast   
    09.00    Creativity Expanded: The Committee and Drawing left-handed   
    10.00    Beyond the Terrace  Fiber Arts Workshop
    13.00    Lunch at Selva and break   
    15.30    Lucca:  fabric shops, weaving museum, private collections of antique fabrics, button shop, da Vinci exhibit, etc.   
    20.00    Dinner prepared by Emanuela   
Tue    07.30    Breakfast   
    08.00    Van to Florence: museum of silks, Renaissance archive   
    13.00    Lunch in Fiesole; Etruscan museum and Roman amphitheater  
    17.00    Leave for Selva   
    20.00    Dinner at Selva prepared by Emanuela   
Wed    08.00    Breakfast   
    09.00    Creativity Expanded: seeing designs and symbols 
    10.00    Fiber Arts Workshop: Layers of Tuscany   
    13.00    Lunch at Selva and break
    15.30    Return to Lucca to explore more fabrics and shops   
    19.00    Puccini concert   
    20.30    Dinner at Puccini Restaurant at Piazza Puccini   
Thu    08.00    Breakfast   
    09.00    Creativity Expanded: Enlarging art and enjoying mistakes, writing about ideas and art  
    10.00    Etruscan to Tuscan Fiber Arts Workshop
    1.00    Lunch at Selva and break   
    3.30    Tour of baroque villa with antique fabrics and tapestries plus fantastic garden   
    5.30    Begin cooking lesson with Emanuela   
    8.00    Dinner   
Fri    08.00    Breakfast   
    09.00    Creativity Expanded: 
    10.00    Fiber Arts:  (Felt, beads, embroidery)
    1.00    Lunch at Selva and break   
    3.30    Tour of vineyard, wine and olive oil tasting   
    7.00    Pizza with Eduardo   
Sat        Departure   

 Let me know if you're interested. The trip is limited to


 

Lush Celebration

 

Celebration Circle is my spiritual home -- not a church, but church like, we are a group of seekers and path-finders who come from a diverse group of religious and spiritual backgrounds. This little piece is for the group's annual altar silent auction at the Bijou Theater at Crossroads shopping center in San Antonio. It's on a frame provided by Celebration that is the shared format for all the artists who participate. We donate our work, with the option of keeping a portion of the bid price received by Celebration Circle. I consider this gift part of my tithe to the community. Since moving to the country, we don't make the hour trek into the city often on Sunday mornings, but in my heart I know that all my friends there would be at my side if I needed them and I honor my connection to the group and to all my friends who are part of it.

This piece uses a little sample drawing/painting I made in one of the classes I taught last year -- it is mixed media, including craft dimensional paints, Shiva oil sticks, oil pastel, stitching and machine quilting. The outside strips are pieced from a scarf that didn't quite work out -- beautiful silk charmeuse with textile paint screen printed with my pomegranates. The title is "Lush," and it is an altar/offering and celebration of  the lush abundance of the universe, as juicy as a ripe pear, as full of jewels as a ripe pomegranate. Gratitude sounds like such a mushy topic, but I find it the key to equilibrium and preserverence. (Dispite my last whining post.)

 The auction and reception will run Tuesday, Oct. 4  through the month, and you can bid during any of those days. The closing reception, plus a special screening of a film will be Sunday, N0vember 4. You can see examples of last year's altars on the CC website and when the show opens, this year's altars will be featured. (I'll be sending a reminder  and details of the event out on this blog, but couldn't resist showing "Lush" in this little preview, since I worked on it yesterday after the FASA meeting.)

Flurry

 

Sometimes I think that the only work that is done in San Antonio is:

Between September 1 and Thanksgiving.

Between February 1 and Spring Break (mid March)

Between last week of March and Fiesta (week of April 21). Yes. Because of Fiesta, San Antonio has an extra holiday week. And somehow, it just slides into summer because it starts getting hot then and well, the lake is calling every Friday afternoon and so why take on any thing new that won't get finished before the summer anyway.

The rest of the time we are either preparing for vacations, recovering from vacations, making sure we are rested for vacations, taking time off because we can't afford a vacation or whatever, not calling back because our email and voice mail is impossible, leaving messages because you can't reach anyone , or not really wanting to do anything because everyone else is on vacation.

That means that NOW is IT. It you don't get work done and make (even a little) money NOW as an artist you might as well go get that job at McDonalds.  Sheesh. Now there is a deadline on every corner; every gallery I even think about working with wants new work. The non-profit orgs want to get something done before the holidays. Every volunteer organiation is having a fundraiser and for some reason wants us artists to give stuff (now why aren'r they asking their lawyer/accountant/physician for free services? That I would  be happy to bid on and get for 1/2 the market price ) (at least some of them are offering the artists a cut of the silent auction bid!)

 Perhaps I sound like I am complaining. Well, yes. And no. I just wish it didn't seem to all hit at once.

I think I am also discouraged because a wonderful relative who happens to have once owned a successful gallery and who is a fabulous sales person tried for 3 months to get a gallery in California to carry some work of mine. The answers: No, no, no. I am either not local enough or not known nationally enough, or the one that really hurts, "it's craft"  ie not real art.  Ouch. So, anyway, there it is at the top of the listing, one of those crafts that just doesn't seem to fit anywhere. What do you think? Shall I give it all up for painting. In 10 years I might be happy with what I could do in that medium.

Guadalupe/Tonantzin 2

 

Sewing, sewing, sewing. Finally. Yes, I REALLY should be doing something far more nurdish, like balancing my checkbook and putting together a budget for the month, BUT.

Instead, I finished a commission piece that is past due, and I am sure the buyer will be happy that the process we started on at the beginning of the summer is coming 'round at last. First, she wanted a piece I had completed, but it was too large for the space. I promised this #2 and it's taken me all summer to make it work. I think I like it; I hope she will. While I wanted to make a piece that was quite similar in color and imagery, it's hard sometimes to change scale and have the composition work as well. This is same and different. See what you think:

Here'e the first, larger piece; #2 is at the top of this post.

Both pieces are inspired by Our Lady of Guadalupe and her predecessor Tonantzin, the Corn Goddess of the Aztec people. Our Lady appeared on the site of Tonantzin's holiest temple, and the comfort she offered the natives of Mexico took shape, form and energy from Tonantzin's presence and abundance.

I've actually had two inquiries this week for other work, and while that's exciting, I also feel a few new knots in my gut. But, here's to stepping out into the unknown. May both Ladies smoooth the path, watch my back and keep me on the right road.

Studio Marathon

So I did it. Spent 7 hours with only a break for supper in the studio on Saturday. Hello artist. Glad to make your acquaintance. Where you been?

OK, I used that sneaky strategy discussed in a previous post, did not start something grand and new and itching at the back of my eyeballs. Did not even start work on either of the two commissions that I have in the works. (Sorry, if you are one of the collectors waiting, but I did tell you my summer was shot.) Couldn't do either of those scary tasks just yet. But I could and did take on something swimmingly ready for completion: a collaborative art quilt by San Antonio children who attended the Botero Library Family Days this summer.

As one of the hands-on projects, I had grided a print of one of Botero's paintings, copied and enlarged each rectangle, make sketchy place-holder lines on tracing paper, then copied the lined images onto cotton backed with WonderUnder that I ran through the printer/copier.

 At each workshop. kids and parents added color with fabric markers and watersoluble crayons, then others added stitches and buttons and beads. Probably 60 or more children actually contributed to this art quilt. What was interesting about the process was that the boys were the ones who really were turned on to the stitching. I think sewing is so rare today that it has become "de-genderized." When I first taught, sewing was one of those things that most of the boys considered "girl stuff."  Maybe now the needle has a certain dangerous appeal?

Anyhow, I spent the day's work assembling and free-motion machine quilting, finishing the art quilt. Tomorrow it goes to the central library for display.

Was it the work I need. long, to be doing?  No. But it did the trick. I put in miles of thread on the new machine, quieted the critic who says, " hmmpf and you call yourself and artist, "  made peace with the studio walls and the silence of working on my own, took a stand against multi-tasking. And made something that is, if not beautiful, interesting to look at, and interesting in its process. And nailed the lid on the Botero Library project, too. That little task that no one would have known needed doing, except me.

"The Village," Inspired by Fernando Botero's painting of the same title.

Backed up in the Studio

 

Despite the recent posts, I actually have been back at work since the first week of June. The only problem -- its not been studio work. Several left-in-the-lurch consulting jobs, the Botero workshops in the libraries, a little weeklong gig at the King Ranch, here a little, there a little.

But I finally returned to my own real true self with an indulgent all day printing session. The impetus, to finish some submissions for "Alterations," an upcoming show in Tubac, Arizona -- a benefit of my membership in Art Cloth Network, a smallish group of art cloth makers. Who knows if they'll make the jury cut (Elin Noble is our esteemed and highly respected juror), but it was a treat for me just to get back to work after a 7 week absence. No matter how great a vacation is, it does seem to put me behind the 8-ball, schedule screwed and bank account empty.

These are  rusted, discharged, screen printed installation pieces, on  crinkle cotton gauze and silk broadcloth (the red).  They stretched me  in  size and technique, and while I am frustrated at my inability to take any good pictures of the work, I am happy with the actual work -- though I can see that I have further to push it.

Yikes

 

Here it is Thursday night, and my time in the studio devoted to art making has been not quite zip. This small art quilt is the only physical manifestation I managed all week.  The rest was business, art ed consulting (stuff like ordering a boatload of supplies, chasing down helpers, figuring out the first workshop), and general disorganizing.(OK, Shuffling the deckchairs around.) 

This is a commission piece, and one that has had its challenges. Here is the second try, the first having crashed on the image of the Virgin of Guadalupe. The woman who had requested that I make this piece in memory of a mutual friend turned out to have negative experiences and associations with that image. Who knew?

     

However, the altar has already sold at the 1550 Gallery show, and I think the second piece is really closer to the spirit of our friend. In both pieces, I incorporated pieces of clothing and tried to capture the energy and wonderful earthiness of this lovely woman we both knew and loved. She was gutsy and brave throughout her life, and kept her own counsel. As a native Minnisotan, she embraced San Antonio's color and vibrant life, but kept hold of her roots, her accent and her wry sense of humor. When I leave my body, I hope someone makes art from my clothing, cut up and stitched into something playful, bold and full of color. I really can't think of a better legacy, even more so than the quilts I hope to leave behind, scattered around on the walls of friends and strangers.

Art and Quilts and Art Quilts, Part 2

 

This is my life on wheels: stuffed full of papery piñatas, careening along, headed who knows where.
What is success for an artist? Or more precisely, what does success look like for me?

If I am not willing to make some definitions, to set some, dreaded word, goals, will I get "there?"  If I don't have a clue where  there is, is it enough to "follow my bliss?"

For a few years, charting a new path in the domestic dimension of my life has determined most of the path I have been trekking: selling a home, buying a new one, moving and balancing a new kind of daily life, different than my city life of King William. The rest of the time was defined by other almost-automatic steps, once the new house and studio were in place: starting my workshop/retreats here at El Cielo, closing Textures gallery. And the rest of my time has been taken up with the things that are on automatic repeat status: the teaching stints at Southwest School where I am an established adjunct, King Ranch Art Camp for a week in the summer, being an active member (now President) of FASA.

Then, last fall, two consulting projects came along that seemed a good fit for my life (and my rapidly diminishing savings account): Dora and Diego's Garden Adventure and the Botero Family Days at the branch libraries. My friend and partner in art ed stuff Zet Baer was available and off we went. And then a crazy plan to spend three weeks in Italy!

Now, mid April, nearly, all the chickens are heading home to roost. For the next four months my calendar is chock full of activity - weekends blasted, travel bleary, wild woman on fire. So, success. And money, at least a bit, coming in. And time squeezed in here and there in the studio. Even art in a few local and regional exhibits (but note, these opportunities to show my work came to me -- I didn't apply or send out a proposal or write any letters, I just said yes).

I figure I can either continue the mode of planning/notplanning that has gotten me through these last two years, or  imagine some active, precise images of what I'd like my life to look like in five years. I'll be 59 in about three weeks, 60 seems an almost impossible age to be, but I am counting on it!

Deep breath. It's scary to write outloud about goals, don't you know. "Someone" is going to think me big-headed. "Someone" is going to think I have a lot of nerve. "Someone" is thinking you gotta be kidding. And "others" are going to wonder why I would ever tell everyone reading this blog about my plans. And "they" are going to think I am some kind of idiot.  (Did you hear the Drudge report on NPR about "the someones" in Katie Couric's interview with the Edwards?) So, despite all that from the arena, here goes, 5-year targets:

Art/Quilts -- I will make more art and sell my art. I will see my work in a couple of national exhibits a year, including some of the prestigious juried shows. I will have a solo show in a good gallery somewhere. I will see my work published in national magazines and journals. I will earn $25,000 a year selling art. (NOW that's a leap, my inner critic is yelling.)

Teaching -- I will have eight successful sold-out workshop/retreats a year here at El Cielo. I will continue teaching at Southwest School of Art and Craft, but with fewer on-going classes. I will teach at three prestigious national schools, conferences or events each year -- places like Arrowmont, Split Rock, QSDS.

So what gets in my way? Fear. Saying yes to things that don't add up. Being disorganized with time and money and paperwork.

Intermission

Multitasking is too kind a word, and, to be truthful, inaccurate. I have been skipping/skidding/surfing/sliding and surviving different world-ways-and-means since my last entry:

Nose-to-the-sewing-machine production to meet exhibit deadlines (Anyone in the Kerrville vicinity in April is invited to see my work at the 1550 Gallery). (Note- the quilt "altar" in the photo below is one of the Borderlands series that will be featured at the gallery.)

Visiting the familial home  in Waco (including a tornado watch with my 80-plus year old parents, my sister, Linda, my niece home from Zambia Peace Corp service, the neighbor boy with two really pissed off cats and me hanging out for a couple of hours in the interior hallway stuffed with pillows and a mattress)

Texas springtime gardening involving the neighbor's Bobcat and very large rocks

 

Mingling at the Southwest School of Art and Craft All-School exhibit opening, a command attendee gratefully accepting an award as " teacher of the year" 

So, Part 2  of success saga story will just have to wait until I get my breath. Meanwhile, here are a few pictures from the former contexts-in-conjunction. 

Sirena: Falling or Flying

Art Quilt, 84" by 60" 

 

P.S. No tornado materialized, though conditions looked really favorable and the sirens were a-wailing 

Art and Quilts and Art Quilts, part 1

Lately I've been following some discussions about the field: the art quilt in the fine art world, the shortcomings and advantages of entering juried quilt shows, the path of the artist to success. These discussions (which I suppose take place among artists of all sorts) are certainly stirring my brain dust.

Principally, I have been following the thoughtful discourse on the blog of Lisa Call, whose quilt work and writing both I admire, Rather than recap her remarks and that of those commenting on her posts, I invite you to look in on the conversation. Perhaps you will find them as delightully disturbing as I did.

First,  I need to  tell myself (and you if you stay with me) my story as an artist. Warning: this may be far more than you want to know about me, but in order for me to get to where I am trying to go with this "success" discussion, I really need to succinctly chart where I have come from.

My path into art quilts is a bit odd. I was always an arty kid -- hand me a crayon and I was one happy kid. My parents enrolled me in an innovative and creative art/theater program at Baylor University, after I had won and had to leave behind a scholarship to the Houston Museum of Fine Arts school.  A bit later, I earned an art degree (B.A.) from a liberal arts university in the late '60s -- about the time that even conservative universities were throwing out some of the traditional curricula and giving students a rather freehand in their education. For my senior project I sewed a room full of paper bag sculptures -- no one really got it. And, as a young woman, I was still (in 1970) living in a rather patriarchal world where it seemed pretty impossible to be a "real" artist. (I never learned anything about how I might make a living as an artist at university!)

Continuing within the construct of an arts-in-education research and teacher training foundation (the outgrowth of that childhood theater program) I made art banners/tapestries. I was inspired by Martha Mood, whose work stirs me, and Becky Crouch Patterson, whose wonderful  fabric wall art dances in my memory when I sit down to work. I also ran into Sister Mary Corita (Corita Kent) though work with several of her students who taught me the  joy of found imagery, to cut rather than draw, and to make a mean alphabet stamp. My personal art work was mostly within the context of community art projects, collaborations with children, using a variety of media for installations, exhibits, art works and experiences -- Happenings, books, banners, and performance events. Some of which took place in quite prestigious settings -- the Smithsonian, the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, the Blaffer Gallery at U of H, to name a few.

 

Ten years after that art education career had morphed into journalism, and then to work as a designer of interactive exhibitsmostly for children's museums -- I found myself wanting desperately to make art of my own. I added art cloth techniques and a devotion to making it via study with Jane Dunnewold. Then I took a weekend workshop with Sue Benner and WonderUnder was the answer to a question I hadn't even figured out to ask. Jumping into the world of art quilts with the mentoring of Jane, of Beth Kennedy, of Judi Goolsby, of Leslie Jenison and many others who worked and talked and shared ideas and techniques at Art Cloth Studios, I have in the past 8 years slowly  but steadily found my voice in cloth, in art. Through conversations and our Complex Cloth sales booth I discovered the Houston International Quilt Show, that there was such a thing as an art quilt, and that maybe that's what I was making. Along the way I had joined Fiber Artists of San Antonio, (intentionally not-a-guild group, but still with some guildish qualities, like juried exhibits).

You notice, there is scarce mention of quilting or quiltmaking in any of this. And hardly anything about sewing, except that I had to learn to do it in order to keep the WonderUndered edges in place. I didn't even know it was called raw edge applique. So now, 13 years after taking that first complex cloth class, I find myself a fulltime professional artist and teacher. And not quite sure how to define success, or at least not the NEXT success.

 

 I haven't entered any national art quilt juried shows -- but, yes, have had work in local and regional fiber arts exhibits. I've been part of several invitational shows or exhibits put together at the sort-of co-op gallery that I was part of for three years. Part of my reluctance to enter the big time national quilt juried exhibits is that I really don't have the precise sewing skills that seem to be highly valued in such venues. To tell you the truth, I don't really care about burying my threads or making a perfect mitered corner (I avoid the whole binding issue by just edge-stitching around the edges.)

So, this is where I've been. Next, where to go? It seems I've gotten here without much planning -- I just knew eight years ago that I did not ever want to have to take a fulltime job working for someone else. I've managed that. But now I need to chart the next ten. And as I turn 59 in a couple of weeks, my sense of time is certainly not what it was when I was 35 or 45.

I still feel awfully new around here. Only since I've been reading some good blogs by quilt artists, have I even begun to fathom the pathways and pitfalls to "success" in this in-between art world. I still bristle against the capitol A Art World that, to me, has often worked itself into such an elite language, that the work fails in approachability. I see a place in the world for this level of visual art work -- but for me, and I think to many people, its relationship to where we live daily is the much the same as that of string theory or particle physics. Perhaps it's important that someone is doing that work, but it doesn't touch me much, and I'm not really aiming at being in a contemporary art museum anytime soon. I have a parallel and equally passionate devotion to the teaching part of my life (a vocation I have followed since age 12). I'm not sure whether I make art to have validity as a teacher, or teach to have viability as an artist. So where am I headed? Stay tuned for Art and Quilts and Art  Quilts. part two. And maybe, if you are an artist, you might try this same  map charting exercise. What got you here?

Art in Elgin

 

Here's a short heads-up. My art quilts arrived safely in Elgin for the TX Originals exhibit. If you are anywhere near Elgin (A bit outside of Austin, TX) on Saturday, March 24, I hope you will stop in to see the show. Texas Original artists will display ceramics, fiber art, jewelry, wood, sculpture, furniture, treenware, quilts and metal art.

The exhibit will be celebrated with live music, food and beverages at a reception at Kingfisher Fine Art and Music, 116 Depot Street, Elgin, Texas.  E Flat Porch Band will play until 6.pm. but the other festivities will be from 4 to 8.  The exhibit remains on display until Saturday, April 14.

For more information about the Texas Originals program, the artists and the event, click the link on the right hand sidebar.

Continuous, Continual

How do you work in a series? Or do you? Why or why not? And what makes it a series?

I see some individual works of art -- in many different media -- that intrigue and interest me, make me want a continuing conversation with that artist. But then, I look further, and I can't get a hold of what is going on. I can't find the path and I want more than one stepping stone for the journey. I strongly believe that commiting to one (or a few) clear paths is an important decision toward having one's work taken seriously out there in the broader art world.

And yet I know the challenge of working and reworking a theme or image or technique with the fear that someone will say, "Hasn't she done that already?"  or even worse, being bored with it myself or doubting my loyalty to a theme or direction that is played out.

My solution recently (say the last couple of years) has been to work in several series simultaneously -- each of which has its own direction, but has some distinction, some major differing factor, from other work. So far it works for me, though I'm not sure how it works for "marketing."   Some of what I do is about the medium itself: I still want to do some art cloth for art cloth's sake -- yardage that isn't about being cut up and used for anything, fabric that exists as form enough. Right now I am continuing to make my wooden frame shaped altares, each house shaped, but I still dip back and forth on subject matter. I have one series of smaller pieces that include photographic images of the Hill Country (the Borderlands series) and I still continue to explore the image of feminine sacred icons. And now, my mermaids are really taking flight (and falls).

 But what about you? How do you work in a series?

No Back Splash

I promised myself a day of work on a new quilt, even though the iggly piggly little nits and bits that plague the self-employed are heaped high on the desk. But My Artist Self is just a little kid, and if she doesn't get to play, she gets very ornery.

 So today, rather than great words of wisdom, we all get play time with color.

Not that the play is completely fret-free. This large Sirena has been hidden in a stack of dyed fabrics, scraps of embroidered dresses and a batt of cotton already top-coated with a layer of WonderUnder and she is a little cranky about showing up. I spent most of the day trying one shape, one pattern and then another, rescuing, undoing trying to balance the rather tricky orange and aqua. Being fearful that this was a big giant waste of good cloth -- boy. where does that come from?

This is one intermediate stage (note feet of The Artist standing on the cutting table):

 

And here's the next one --

 

I sure hope I don't decide I liked the larger pieces of Guatemalan belt better -- as you can see, what was a nice bold set of stripes is now a mosaic of little squares. This mermaid  is boating through a coral sunset, juggling the rising moon, and I wanted to get the sense and movement of reflection on water when the ocean turns pink and aqua, silver and gold.

So, I'm still not sure, but with the larger pieces ironed down, I'll leave the little bits and textures to settle overnight, and hope that I'll either like it all in the morning -- or, as can happen, tear it apart and start  again. But one thing is sure, we had our swim.

Kerrville

The day has ended as one of those brilliantly blue-skied almost October afternoons, surprising and glorious after a humid morning that couldn't decide its season. Just after noon a small group of us took off from El Cielo following the scenic route to Kerrville (Hwy. 16 to Hwy 173 north) for the opening of the Texas Invitational Art Quilt exhibit.

The show was hung in a renovated and repurposed post office, with high ceilings, good lighting and warm hospitality.

 Mary Ann Littlejohn, Houston, and Martha Grant, Boerne, were two of the other artists whose work marched around the room.

 Martha's piece, the puzzle-shaped one is titled "No border, no picture on the lid of the box, no box..."

Mary Ann's square of pieced original fabrics is "Neon Etude." 

 
Martha and Mary Ann both visited the studio  before we drove to Kerrville.

Here's what we ate before the opening -- a fritatta made with eggs from a local farmstead.  First preheat the broiler. Mix the following well:
10 beaten eggs
8 pieces of finely chopped sundried tomatoes
6 oz.feta, crumbled
2 T. chopped red onion
1/3 cup sliced fresh basil
salt and pepper
Melt 1/2 stick butter in a large oven proof skillet, preferably non-stick
Add the egg mixture and cook over medium hot heat, pulling away the sides to let the liquidy eggs on top flow under. When almost completely set, add about 2-3 more T of cheese, any kind, put under a hot broiler to toast and puff the top.
Slide out onto a warm platter, cover until serving and serve either warm or room temp.

And here's one of my two pieces in the exhibit. (I've been posting teasers, you notice!). If you'd like to know more about the processes that turn a stack of fabric into one of my art quilts, see this blog journal for Sept. 9.

"Our Lady of San Pedro." 2006 

Stamps

Have you bought your Gee's Bend stamps yet? These beautiful US Postal stamps transform every envelope into a work of art, and the story behind them is a counter-remedy for an entire network broadcast hour of bad news (at least). I assume those of you reading this as artists and quiltmakers know the storyline, and know that a new exhibit of Gee's Bend quilts is making its way around the country now.

The women who made the original quilts -- first elevated into the (capitol A) art world by collector and art historian William Arnett in 1998 -- have made new ones, and their children and grandchildren are piecing more still, some of the youngest generation using computers for design! The new October issue of Smithsonian magazine includes a lengthy and well written story about the quiltmakers and their journeys from poverty to museum walls, "Fabric of Their Lives," by  Amei Wallach. The story answers the questions many of us had about how the museum exhibits and acclaim have changed the lives of the makers, and provides insight into the creative process(es) that guide(s) their work. The article is not yet on the Smithsonian magazine site, it posts these articles only after a couple of months, it appears.

I've only seen pictures, and I did not get to Houston for the exhibit this summer, but I am planning a trip to Austin for the exhibit there. Reading the story of what this work has done for the women, for their community and for all of us, I am reminded of the work of the potters of Mata Ortiz. There, too, creative work, dreams and the longing of all of us for genuine and heart-true craft and art has transformed lives, brought change and new perspectives to the artists and their lives. Will the youngest generation's computer aided designs be as powerful as the original work denim and clothing factory scraps? Who knows? At least, with these powerful images, we see the power of creative work, of hands on fabric, of  the transformative power of individual voice and spirit.

Heads Up

If you are reading this and live within a recreational drive of Kerrville , here's a Saturday suggestion -- Two of my art quilts will be on the wall at the Kerr Arts and Cultural Center as part of  the "Texas Invitational Art Quilt Show." The opening is this Saturday, 2-4 pm and the exhibit will be on display through Oct. 22, Tuesdays through Saturdays, 10-4; Sundays 1-4 pm. Artists invited by curator Janet Ghio include  Ginny Eckley, Martha Grant, Sue Benner, Jane Bishop, Mary Ann Littlejohn, Carolyn Dahl, Kim Ritter, Susan Lewis Story and Vicki Hallmark. I made my very first art quilt in a workshop taught by Sue Benner, so I feel really privileged to be in an exhibit with her -- and all these other inspiring artists.

 

You are also invited to a celebratory brunch before the show here at El Cielo Studio, but send me a comment "RSVP" so that I can email directions to the studio (and have enough pan dulce, cheese grits and tequilla sangria on hand!) How's that for a bicultural menu? 

Tonantzin

.

"Tonantzin" is in.

 The juried exhibit SIDE BY SIDE will feature work of Texas fiber artists and open in Clear Lake, near Houston and Galveston, on September 26, with the show running through October 22. The exhibit is in conjunction with the Houston Fiber Artists Association annual show (thus the "Side by Side," ) and will be at The Arts Alliance Center at Clear Lake. One of my wall altars, "Abba Samuel, Orange" was also accepted. It's nice to get acceptance calls, isn't it? (Three of Laura Beehler's large art cloth pieces, from the same series as "Lambent Thoughts" will also be in the show.)

The juror, Amanda Clifford, is the exhibitions coordinator at the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft. Prior to this, she was the Exhibitions Coordinator at the Wood Turning Center, Philadelphia, PA and assistant Curator for the Everson Mustum of Art, Syracuse, NY. 

"Tonanztin"  is a 36" by 55" art quilt that stirs together symbols of Our Lady of Guadalupe and of the Aztec Corn goddess, the iconic stance of Our Lady, the corn and villages of  Tonantzin, the moon of both. The lady of compassion and the goddess of sustenance are surely soul sisters, if not one and the same.

Other titles that seem to be related to this goddess are:"The Goddess of Sustenance", "Honored Grandmother", "Snake": Aztec Goddess of the Earth. She brought the corn, Mother of the Corn and she was worshipped during the moveable feast called Xochilhuitl. An idol attributed to this deity is described as being made of wood and in the image of a young woman of about twelve yeas old, wearing red. A tiara of red paper was on her head and her neck was adorned with a necklace of corn and tied with a blue ribbon. Her hands held ears of corn and her arms were open.

Our Lady of San Pedro

People ask me all the time how long it takes to make one of my art quilts. Who can tell? Do I get to count dyeing and screen-printing the fabrics? How about cleaning up the studio and resorting those scraps? And what about the search in my favorite thrift stores to find the Mexican dresses and Guatemalan fabrics that I can't resist? Let's not even try.

Howsoever,

here she is, about 8 hours in

the cutting and pasting and

staring into space stage:

Our Lady of San Pedro.

The process:

• Audition a bunch of fabric, by color. This includes commercial fabrics, ethnic textiles, scraps of new silk and a couple of my scarves that haven't sold (the green cross), vintage table cloth dyed, discharged and screenprinted for the orange background.
  
• Decide the size, in this case, as a companion piece I wanted her to be about the same size as Our Lady  of Nopales.
• Start with the face, from a embroidered yoke of a dress made in the San Antonino village in the state of Oaxaca. I find them in thrift stores or the closets of friends. I first started making these angels and saints when I could not bear to keep my wedding dress (the marriage long over), but couldn't bear to throw it away either. And that Lady has given birth to a tribe of relatives.
• So next, find her shape.
  
• Add layers.
• Listen to what is going on and find the right ways to give her voice and presence.
•  With this piece, I was still taken with the thermofax I had made by tracing an old lithograph image of a rooster, the crowing cock that is a symbol of St. Peter, so it seems she became his Lady, a kind of comforting presence to all of us who have ever betrayed ourselves, and the love of others.
  
•  Fuse it all together with Wonderunder.
• Add a few hieroglyphic squiggles to tie the surface together and add energy.
• NOW, the sewing begins, the rather tedious part that I try to look upon as meditative. But it adds a delicious line that's almost a secret -- you have to look closely to see how it's a layer of drawing.

Fear & Commitment

David Bayles and Ted Orland in ART & FEAR have this to say:

"Making art can feel dangerous and revealing. Making art is dangerous and revealing. Making art precipitates self-doubt, stirring deep waters that lay between what you know you should be, and what you fear you might be."

Here I sit with fear -- which shows up most often in my world as procrastination -- trying to complete a companion piece to "Our Lady of Nopales" to send to an invitational exhibit in Kerrville that opens at the end of the month. I am in awe of more than a few of the other Texas artists whose work will be included, and I keep finding everything else to do.

Bayles and Orland continue:
"Yet viewed objectively, these fears obviously have less to do with art than they do with the artist. And even less to do with individual art works. After all, in making art you bring your highest skills to bear upon the materials and ideas you care about. Art is a high calling -- fears are coincidental."

And: "Artists get better by sharpening their skill or by acquiring new ones; they get better by learning to work, or by learning from their work. They commit themselves to the work of their heart, and act upon that commitment."

So ...Leap, girl. leap.