Category Archives: Process

Field Trip: David Stearns’ Studio

Visiting the space where an artist lives and works has the potential to provide wonderful insight into the art created there, offering an opportunity to draw connections between both the artwork and the environment from which it springs.

Storm Cloud 20″ x 18″ ©David Stearns

Last summer I had the privilege of visiting David Stearns at his home studio in Bridgewater, VT. I feel quite fortunate to have been the recipient of this warm and generous man’s time, and to have been allowed a glimpse into the beauty of his creativity – both inside and outside his studio.

©David Stearns

David’s knotted tapestries are engagingly lyrical; smart pieces that are sophisticated in color and intriguing in their complexity.

Fade to White 25″ x 15″ ©David Stearns

They possess a depth and intelligence that are more fully revealed upon close study, impressing the viewer with his scrupulous attention to the subtleties of detail.

Fade to White, detail ©David Stearns

Within each work, there are elements that seem to develop an independent personality, breaking away from the main fabric of the piece, twisting and relocating to another section of the whole.

Capricho 28″ x 14″ ©David Stearns

Disparate and unexpected items such as bamboo sticks and metal beads are also incorporated, contrasting with the knotted, waxed linen, accentuating the rhythm of thousands of half-hitches while simultaneously conjuring an air of unpredictability. As a result, the pieces are quite musical.

Capricho, detail ©David Stearns

The weather on the day of my visit was lovely and it was impossible to ignore the setting surrounding David’s studio. I was swept away by the beauty of his garden — a masterwork of color and texture that manifests the depth that comes with years of care and evolution. One can’t help but notice the thoughtful placement of plants, such that they appear to be in concert with each other, first one carrying the melody, then another picking up the tune in its own voice.

©David Stearns

Layers of light, dark and texture are revealed through the prism of a neighboring plant, bringing to mind the offshoots that spring from the fabric of his tapestries, twisting and turning against the backdrop of the “mother”.

Meandering, detail ©David Stearns

Water-worn stones of interesting shape and color punctuate the vegetation with the presence of sculpture, and when considered with trees that have been pruned to reveal their intertwining trunks beneath the wig of their leaves, create a counterpoint of structure within and beside the flowing garden beds.

©David Stearns

Although the realms of knotted linen and a cultivated plot of land operate on different planes, it is apparent that David has discovered a way to bring together these seemingly separate labors of love so that each informs his work with the other. As a viewer, greater understanding of each comes via the experiencing of both. The mark of the same deft hand remains in both his tapestries and his garden beds, and one begins to realize that each is a different vehicle for answering the same questions.

©David Stearns

Meandering 21″ x 15″ ©David Stearns

Upon reflection, it drills home the strength and reward that is gleaned from finding a way to marry two separate disciplines so that they work together symbiotically, such that each raises the execution of the other to a higher level.

©David Stearns

If you would like to see more of David’s work and environment, and to hear him describing his his art, please watch this lovely short video created by his nephew, Jay Stearns of Handcrafted Video. You won’t be sorry, I promise.

©David Stearns

(Com)Mission Accomplished

This week I am feeling a satisfactory sense of accomplishment having completed, delivered, and installed a commission that has been in the works since July. I am now enjoying the luxury of being able to reflect on the process.

Drifting Solace, 24" x 46" ©2015 Elizabeth Fram

It has been a bit of a challenge to figure out how to weave this endeavor in with everything else that the past 6 months has encompassed, but the stretch was worth it.

Drifting Solace, Detail ©2015 Elizabeth Fram

First and foremost, I count myself tremendously lucky to have been able to work with a delightful and interesting client. My long-ago days in free-lance advertising and illustration taught me that is not always the case — to such an extent that I have since shied away from commissions. But when approached this time, I was so interested in trying to capture what she was looking for, that it seemed the time had come to step up to see where things might lead.

It has been a wonderful learning experience that has kept my feet humbly on the ground while also providing a fertile environment for growth. The following list includes several take-aways that come to mind immediately; I’m sure more will surface with time.

1. The importance of listening attentively, always with an ear for clues in client feedback for ways that the piece she is ultimately hoping for can dovetail with my working methods and means of bringing an idea to life. The optimal goal being that we both enjoy the process, as well as the end result.

Fabric Palette

2. Learning to plan ahead and to log my time. (And coming to the realization that every- thing always seems to take half again as long as I had originally thought).

Daily Work Log

3. The importance of “deep work” (as Cal Newport defines it) in making concrete strides.

Initial Fabric Placement

4. How to organize my days so that I can move forward steadily while honoring other commitments that were already in place and certainly weren’t going to disappear.

Organizing pieces for vertical strips

5. Appreciation for the boundaries that someone else’s vision puts in place – and in turn, the freedom that comes from that narrowing of overall approach. Structure can be a good thing.

Strips with piping inserted

6. To be fearless in experimentation.

Left Side

Right side dyed and painted; two sides brought together for first time

Embroidery in progress

Embroidery detail

I have gotten a lot out of this experience and the many ways it has helped me to stretch, bolstered by the freedom that my client allowed me along the way. But ultimately, two things stand out as highlights in the culmination of the project. The first was seeing her face, absorbed in her own thoughts as she looked at the finished piece on her wall, finally there ‘in the flesh’ after months of patiently waiting.

In Situ

And the second being the feeling, as I walked away from her apartment, that I had played my part in connecting ideas that hold significance for her with a tangible expression of those important thoughts and memories. As mentioned in quoting Salman Rushie in last week’s post, it felt like the universe had opened just a bit more.

Relaxing into Revision: Revisiting Process Part 2

When I run into a wall with something I’m working on, I’m not shy about entertaining the idea of drastic changes. That said, I’ve learned to be careful to think things through, doing my best to avoid any permanent adjustments before I’m pretty certain it’s the right decision. Experience has taught me that often the best solutions come from being willing to completely switch gears and let go of my initial plan.

One of the best tools in my so-called toolbox is critique.
I am lucky to know other artists who have strong opinions I value, and who are open to expressing them constructively. We discuss and question each others’ work, taking the info back to the studio to either build on, or (respectfully) disregard. No question, it is a huge help to get out of the confines of my own mind and listen to a trusted source’s response to the work.

With Ulysses’ Wave I began to think about whether the piece might not work better if I split it in two.

If I were to do that, each section would need to be fleshed out a bit further, so I decided to add more of the painted silk that I had originally inserted as a counterpoint, as well as a blue dupioni silk that reflected the same color as some of the embroidery already in place.

These are the possibilities I was considering:

Create two separate pieces?

One piece with it the extra fabric added on each end?

Or weight the additional fabric on the right?

In the end, this last option seemed best.
Then it was a matter of figuring out how to integrate the added sections so that they didn’t appear to be an afterthought.

By using Shibori techniques to dye the blue fabric, followed by embroidery that connected and pulled all the elements together, the piece fell into place.

In hindsight, this solution turned out to be the key not only to resolving the piece itself, but also to visually expressing the sense of gradual, yet complete change that we have all experienced — whether through a simple or more momentous shift in our lives.

And lastly, why the title Ulysses’ Wave?
When someone in my critique group asked what I was going to call this piece, I jokingly answered Ulysses’ Wave – referencing the ebbs and flows of the process and the long journey endured in finding a resolution. But in thinking about it seriously afterwards, considering all that went into its construction, combined with the deep red, undulating shapes created by the stitched-resist Shibori patterning, I couldn’t help but think of Homer’s “wine-dark sea”. Read it as you will — a journey through literature, through the creation of an artwork, or making our way through life — all joking aside, it’s a title that seems to hit the nail on the head.

And on a completely different note: as a gift for those of you who have stuck with me through the recounting of this process, I just discovered a really interesting podcast…it’s called Inspirational Creatives. You can find it on iTunes, or link to it through the website http://www.inspirationalcreatives.com. So far I’ve only listened to the first 2 episodes, but they were both full of interesting ideas and smart suggestions.

Expect the Unexpected: Revisiting Process, Part 1

This piece, Ulysses’ Wave, is about change — and more specifically, coming to terms with the aging and the loss of a parent. It seemed a worthy candidate for sharing a look into my process, which is largely intuitive and does not involve much preparation other than a vague idea of where I am headed.

Almost daily my dog and I walk the same path in the woods, and as a result I’m sensitive to the subtle differences I see from day to day. My observations have prompted me to think about the slow changes that occur as one season merges into the next, which in turn led me to consider the idea of such a progression in wider terms.

Even though one is fully aware change is coming, there can suddenly be a moment when the realization strikes home that the exchange has already occurred — almost like the silent flip of a switch. The most apt metaphor I can come up with is an invisible line that one day you are a bit surprised to find you have already crossed. In a nutshell, that’s the concept behind Ulysses’ Wave.

In my work, I’ve been developing a process for a couple of years now that brings together my interest in color, texture, and the organization and arrangement of shapes within an image. I aim to capitalize on the qualities that make working with textiles unique through the shifting of one’s focus between the surface of the work and the image portrayed. Along the way, I’m learning to become comfortable with the fact that no part of the process is entirely predictable; the final piece will evolve as it does, which is the result of lots of starts and stops along the way.

In beginning Ulysses’ Wave, I first dyed strips of raw silk in a gradual progression from a bright, clear green to a subdued, faded neutral.

Each segment was then stitched so that once the threads were pulled tight and the strips put in a second dye bath – each progressively more muted – the resulting shibori pattern created connections and continuity between the strips, but maintained distinct characteristics.

With the dyeing completed and the segments laid out in order, I realized a counterpoint was needed to offset the uninterrupted rhythm of the piece so far. I painted and inserted a strip of dupioni silk to provide some breathing room.

But as the process of embroidery began in earnest, something didn’t seem quite right…

The painted section was too wide and disruptive

And here it seemed too thin

Finally…a width that feels correct.

The next part of the process is one that I really enjoy — auditioning thread for color and placement. One of the great things about thread is that you can get your hands right into the color (it reminds me a bit of playing in my mother’s jewelry box when I was little).

Then comes the largely intuitive job of using stitch to play off the pattern, color and shapes created by the dye.

At this point the embroidery, for the most part, seemed complete. I had spent weeks on the challenge of harnessing visual movement so that it flowed around and through the piece, rather than traveling to one side and dropping off the edge. But unfortunately, it’s not uncommon to get this far and to discover after pinning the work to my design wall that I can’t get past a niggling feeling that part of it isn’t working. Thus begins something of a waiting game – one of holding back and taking time to consider, anticipating an eventual solution which will set me on the right path.

So this is where I’m going to leave you until next time — considering, as I did, how to bring this piece to a place where it could convey a sense of the transformation that comes with change, while maintaining, as we all must, some form of continuity.

Enjoy your week…