Wednesday, April 29, 2015

moon cloth

 
 
 
signal hill
st john's newfoundland

we are experiencing lovely thick fog
no horizon line
just the sound of waves against cliff
of birdsong

it is free-ing
looking at emptiness
it's like flying

Monday, April 27, 2015

cloud and earth

 
 
earth energy moves up through our bodies and minds

female energy is "drawing in" or centripetal
the centripetal force is irresistible, it is so powerful
a mother has this kind of energy
others want to be around this kind of energy and are acutely aware when it is gone

the earth's energy comes up through the feet
Navajo women wear skirts because this increases the body's access to earth's energy

(this is a note found in an old journal)

Saturday, April 25, 2015

not thinking

 
 
 
You can't think about things while you're painting.
The worst thing to think about is your SELF.
It gets in the way and you make mistakes.
Agnes Martin

Thursday, April 23, 2015

emotional

Tell me some stories he said.
blue eyes so hungry

so I start with one about Ned and the wood pile

I can't hear you
he says

Wednesday, April 22, 2015

fragile memory

 
 
leave a mark
leave a trace
small daily details
ordinary matter and materials

Tuesday, April 21, 2015

journal series

 
 
What is it to be human?

I want my body of work to ask that question

and answer it.

Monday, April 20, 2015

dotted indigo

 
Art saved me.
It was my ability to synthesize my life through my art.
I'm really lucky.

Jim Dine artist

Sunday, April 19, 2015

sky

 
 
the window must be large

so that my viewer can step into it

and be enveloped

Saturday, April 18, 2015

threshold

 
 
threshold

the passage from the profane to the sacred
from the outer to the inner
to the new world

the line of meeting of the natural and the super natural

threshold symbols are:
sinking in water
entering a dark forest
a door
a window
a wall

Friday, April 17, 2015

memory cloth

 
I work with the design wall not only to visualize the design better
but also to see how the fabrics are hanging.

Thursday, April 16, 2015

the moon and the sun

 
In effect there are five senses and thought is the sixth.
That is the best thing that humankind possesses.

Alighiero Boetti artist

Wednesday, April 15, 2015

intuition / tuition

 
 
An artist starts with chance and works towards order.

Not the other way around.  (starting from order, hoping to introduce chance).

How to teach this?
Can I teach this?

answer from Ben Shahn artist
It is not a built-in.  Intuition is not something with which one is born.  Intuition in art actually is the result of long prolonged tuition."

Tuesday, April 14, 2015

the experience

 
  
It's during the making.
It's not afterwards.
It's not because of a good review.
It has to do with ideas coming together to somehow make this greater whole where everything becomes clear.
It's quite a strange experience.
I think many artists would say there is a moment when that happens, in whatever medium they're working, and when it is a really good piece of art, it can also give that experience to the viewer.

quote from mike nelson interview in border crossings

Monday, April 13, 2015

 
 
You construct a thing and then you work in a sense of play.
To allow that play within a tight structure is a good thing.
That's the art.

You're being delivered an idea through a language of formal beauty.
That sort of alchemy or magic comes through the act of looking.

Through looking you get this emphatic sense.

Mike Nelson - artist

Sunday, April 12, 2015

silence

 
 
I reference the horizon line.
I want to work in a poetic way
I live quite far away from art galleries

being an artist who works with cloth is solitary
But that is who I am.

Saturday, April 11, 2015

an idea

 
 
the work of art
is not meant to be
contemplated as an object
but as an
idea

Friday, April 10, 2015

the world


"Embroidering is a meditative process and a sustaining journey.
I keep embroidering until the work tells me it is complete.

Embroidering is like a prayer.  It brought me in touch with my spiritual self, my truest self and connected me to a power beyond."

images are contemporary embroideries from south Africa.
text is by Ranjith Raman from India, who was profiled in summer 2014 Embroidery magazine

Thursday, April 9, 2015

desperately standing still

 
 
I'm comforted by the reminder that for centuries,
creative work has come from the most ordinary things.

Children, pets, fruit trees, seasons and the passage of time.
byron wolfe - everyday: a year long photo diary