thelmasmith

Kate Lenkowsky and I met at the International Quilt Study Center in Lincoln, Nebraska, in 2003. Lots of star power quilters to interview. The result is stunning.

This arrived by courier this afternoon. I have not had time to study more than the Table of Contents. The last quarter of the book, A Guide for Buyers & Collectors, is information that has never, to my knowledge, been put in one place. The information is extensive. Lenkowsky covers care, insuring and appraising as well as a long list of other topics in the guide.

Contemporary Quilt Art, An Introduction and Guide, by Kate Lenkowsky is published by
Indiana University Press. Extensive author’s commentary accompanies the large color photographs. The quality of the printing and binding are lovely. IBSN 978-0-253-35124-1

Pictured above are Sonji Hunt and Rhonda Blasingame. Do go to Sonji Says for a much more complete description of the class. Rhonda, please contact me; I’m unable to find how to email you.

Among the things I firmly believe is the idea that textile art is not well served by being kept to itself. We use the words art quilt and wonder why no other artists are interested in our work.

I went to the Tougaloo Art Colony in Jackson, Mississippi, last week because the words said art colony. I have never spent a week so joyously.

Ceramicists, painters, enamelers, textile workers, all noted and acclaimed instructors, most who were professors at other institutions came together for a week of very intense study. Very intense study was combined with very intense discussions, meals, trips out here and there.

Adding to the mix of intelligent conversation and hard work was the multi cultural aspect of Tougaloo. Above are Debbie, Sonji half hidden, and Annie from Chicago. Sonji will have much better pictures and more details.

I think this was about the point when we had all painted yards and yards of fabric and were beginning the next step in Sonji’s process.

It was quite interesting; each of us immediately had a recognizable painting style. We were creating layer after layer of painted fabric. Each layer from the big stack related to the painting before it.

Rosalind, our teaching assistant, is backed by Rhonda’s rust dyed works just behind Rosalind and on the left. The bright multi colors to the right are all Sonji’s brought to give us some idea of what and how the process goes along.

Do not be fooled by Rosalind’s seemingly plain pink fabric; when done it was a gorgeous blue fabric with pink underlays.

I’ll be more on my game tomorrow and the next few days. In the last eight weeks I have made fourteen separate flights. The airlines are fourteen for fourteen. Every flight was either delayed, double booked, canceled, delayed for mechanical problems, delayed for lack of crew, or delayed by weather. In spite of the cost of fuel I think next time I will drive.

That means I plan to go back to Tougaloo next Art Colony. It will be an entirely different group of professors. I have no idea what I will sign up for. I do know that I wanted to get my hands in to every medium that was taught next week. I’m hoping they will extend the Art Colony beyond one week

Valarie James is both an artist and an activist. She takes no verbal stand. She just shows you, with her art, what she sees.

Her work is progressing far beyond this La Madre, which was shown in 2006 in the exhibition Changing the World One Thread at a Time. She speaks of secrets we will never know. She collects precious, heirloom quality, hand work on textiles in the Spanish language.

A documentary, called The Trail of Thread is in process.

The textile arts are a varied lot. They show up in the most unexpected places. The image below is copyright by two entities and the artist; it is published here according to the fair use for educational purposes section of that law.

Notice that Untitled, by Joyce Melander-Dayton, is of acrylic, cotton, wool and beads on linen. The very definition of textile art. This advertizing popped up on page nine, more or less, of the May 2007 issue of art & antiques. Copyrights are held by Melander-Dayton, the June Kelly Gallery in New York City, and by arts & antiques.

I like the fact that textiles are popping up in unexpected places. These places that are geographically removed. Those of us who practice the textile arts should be an encouraged.

I read arts & antiques monthly; quite honestly it’s more wallowing in the luscious glossy printing of high quality photographs. This magazine gives me a window on all sorts of visual art from many centuries. I find it is a very pleasant way to add to my knowledge. I see things I would never see in a venue restricted to textiles. I think that is important.

I finally cleared off the rest of the detritus from the six foot long work table that has my Juki set flush into the top. I’m looking for a 1960s vintage, sturdy, typing table with locking wheels. I need a task specific table for the Pfaff Smart 350. It’s a needle felt machine that is newly in the marketplace. Until today my only experiments were to darn my wool socks.

I decided to do some experiments. Yesterday I had torn eight inch widths of muslin, cotton flannel, cotton sateen, and a fairly heavy silk.  I decided to work both with hand dyed wool roving and with scraps of red matka silk. Here’s the sample with the cotton sateen face.

There is red-orange, black and a purple brown wool needle punched both as cobweb felt and as disciplined, controlled lines. The red matka silk was manipulated in the middle swath and just needle punched on the lower right. The dupioni silk was a scrap; half of it had fuseable web on the back.

The three layers took the felting well. I think if I decide how and when and were I’ll do this sort of work with a design rather than random testing I will either lay the face fabric on the flannel or just felt on the base fabric. The needle punch holes are quite apparent.

Here is the sample I laid up with a muslin base, cotton flannel, and a heavy silk.

Same materials, handle slightly differently. The purple silk ravelings took the punching nicely although they drew up a lot shorter than they started. Do click on the thumbnails as the needles I am using are too coarse and have damaged the fairly tightly woven silk face. I am in the process of ordering some size 42 triangular needles. I suppose while I am at it I should inquire about size 44, too. Back is as boring as the front.

I’m encouraged. Even though I damaged the silk sample the process shows a lot of hope. I’m particularly interested in the cobweb silk. If I can solve the fineness aspects of the needles I have some lovely space dyed roving here.

There is still almost the full width of the samples I made up. So I’ll lay them on top of the wool box. That way maybe I’ll be able to find them when I have more experiments in mind.

As an afterthought - here’s the task specific modification of an old typing table that holds the Bernina. It’s particularly useful as it’s the same height as all my card tables. I can extend it to side or back simply by wheeling it out away from the wall.

Another beautiful day in sonora.

I worked almost all day and finally came to the desk about three.  Got the winter clothes sorted out of the closet and put away.  Dumped out the donation bag of widows weeds for Valarie James Las Madres project and added some summer clothes and reconsidered and removed others.

Got black clothes washed, dry, hung up.  Same with whites including my towels.  Also a piece of the peruvian pima cotton sateen.  I have decided that the brown back on my fancy banana leaf pillows though beautiful is distracting.  So I’ve a piece of sateen in a green dye bath.

All the Left Turn Lane came back from the Pomona Downtown Art Center.  They had been there since December.  Since they were in the community conference room and the art center is associated with Pitzer etc.  I wonder if I can legitimately call it a solo exhibition.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claremont_Colleges

Anyway, the dye board was set up in the garage and I got everything unpacked (bulk packing) and individually rerolled and wrapped and put away.  While I was at it and had the ends off the storage tubes I decided to get rid of some of the space wasters.

I did my best with the cat bat.  When that storage unit was in the house it had no ends and was tunnels for cats.

While I was at it I rolled all the rest of the sateen off the core and folded in by the yard.  There was ten yards before I had to get it back out of the closet and tear the pillow length.  I think it’s nine and a half now.

I’ve been rereading the paint and dye books.  The Tuckman & Janas Creative Silk Painting keeps talking only about “new” instant set dyes that need no steaming. They never mention a name or a brand; it is most frustrating.  The stretch or not stretch page is followed with a stretch with tape over stretcher boards.  Stabilize with freezer paper, loose stretch (over an open cardboard box), stabilize on adhesive boards, stabilize on a smooth flat surface.  Aaarrrgggg  -  they do mention the complete book of silk painting at only $27.  Since the book in my hand is more than ten years old I should be able to find it second hand.  Do I want it??

Kate Broughton’s textile dyeing makes references to acidic mediums and acid dyes almost as an afterthought.  It gives several different ways of working.  Including laying silk on washed, ironed, white canvas, doing the dye painting, letting everything dry thoroughtly, peeling the two apart, touching up the mirror image on the canvas, and steaming the whole shebang.  The particular artist then makes totes out of the canvas and I’m not quite sure what with the beautifully hand painted silk.

Another artist in the same book talks of acid dyes, wet in wet like watercolor.

Even dharma says very little of particular use.  There is something “everybody” knows that I’m not getting here.  I have dupont dyes, untouched.  Single sentences about water and alcohol.  Asides about vinegar or citric acid crystals.  Even the “recipes” from each artist’s paragraph may mention vinegar but no one ever says, “Do this with the vinegar.”

I’ve got to go fold white clothes.  Obviously I’m not going to start painting on silk in the next day or two.  However, I do have three quite large bunches of what I would call silk broadcloth folded up and in a marked container.  I have to figure this out sometime.

Textural Rhythms: Quilting the Jazz Tradition landed in my mail box. I’ve just begun reading the text having fallen into and through the images several times already.

Here’s a look at the work from another direction, Kyra, talks about how the book captivates her. Here’s Sonji Hunt’s lovely review of the opening reception.

The most amazing thing I have learned about myself from Dr. Mazloomi’s writing:

“Jazz speaks for life. The Blues tell the story of life’s difficulties, and if you think for a moment, you will realize that they take the hardest realities of life and put them into music, only to come out with some new hope or sense of triumph. This triumph is music.”

Now I know why my series, The Blues, is languishing. It has finished itself. I have found that triumph of new hope. I want to thank Dr. Mazloomi for putting it in words for me. I really needed to see that in print so that I could see into my own spirit.

You can get the catalog here. Keep an eye on Dr. Mazloomi’s website for information about the travels of this exhibition. Be sure to see it when it comes within a day’s drive. The catalog is spectacular; the exhibition is even better.

I also received my copy of Threads of Faith. This is another magnificent catalog with lots of text. The traveling exhibition has closed but the book will transport you there.

Many thanks to Dr. Carolyn Mazloomi for permission to use her copyrighted dust jacket images of the book.

Today I’m basting the turn under on the Debian spiral. About one third done I decided to sit down and take a break. I thought that I could sit in my easy chair and do this task. UM. no.

I’m standing at the ironing board with surgical tweezers, a pressing cloth to make sure the fusible reinforcements do not get on the iron, scissors, ivory silk thread and a number eleven straw needle. The trifocals go on and off depending on the demands on my vision.

A close up of the inside and outside corners.

Then a look at Mr. Lincoln and Peace. Early spring mornings in Sonora are the best.

Today’s work on the small Debian quilt was slow. I worried until I went to sleep last night about how I was going to assure accurate placement of the logos detached parts. So, this morning I put the big, pattern copy on the copier and put transparencies in the tray. It will work.

There is one problem with transparencies. You must not let them stack up in the print tray. Senora Rosita Gordita is sitting on the evidence.

A nice bit of evidence, too, The Epoch Times. I picked it up at the Seventeenth Street Market. It says, “began as a weekly Chinese newspaper, Da Ji Yuan, for Chinese people living outside of China.

The English edition launched in September 2003 on the web and in print in 2004 in New York. It is currently published in eleven cities, and in ten languages in thirty countries.

I’ve been telling my friend and website administrator, the Spider, that I would make use of the debian logo he sent me more than a year ago. Debian is the open source software that is the basis for Ubuntu, and myriad other open source software systems. Here is the logo as I received it.

The smaller of two enlargements, getting parallel lines marked so that straight of grain can be maintained. There is one almost twice as large that will go on an ivory background and will have the debian of the logo added at the bottom to balance the design.

The red silk for the logo, itself, fresh from the washer and dryer.

The silk in a macro image. It appears to be hand spun and hand loomed but I do not know if that is true. Look at the interesting weave that shows before ironing. As I got it ironed I let it flow into my old leather armchair. Next time I looked that way Little Smoke Cat had made herself at home. I hung the silk on the coat hook on the workroom door.

The beginnings of placing the image on the batted quilt ground prior to beginning appliqué.

The placement of the mirror image, freezer paper, pattern on the ironed silk.

The rough cut pattern adhered to the silk. The pattern is mirror image and on the back.

The right side of the silk logo. It is still rough cut with the freezer paper on the back.

The pattern with almost all the freezer paper cut away. Bridges of paper remain to hold detached bits of silk to appliqué in place.

This is the point where I need to turn the extra under. In fact it will be pressed over the back of the freezer paper in as many places as possible. The silk is prone to raveling. It is too late this afternoon for me to decide whether to add fine fuse to the points and sharp turns to help control the raveling.

FineFuse is a tool that is a mixed blessing. It is probably the softest of the synthetic fuseables and no longer on the market. As soft as it is I question whether I want to use it with a fine straw needle and silk thread. So, I’m shipping this blog and thinking the situation over.