Summer Stories Archival Sale

Here’s the reality:
As one moves through a creative career, a lot of work is made and exhibited. Much of that work finds a home along the way, but some doesn’t. As one’s practice evolves, older work naturally tends to get sidelined in favor of newer pieces. Yet those older works never lose their value. They are markers of time and place and of processes that form the building blocks of an artistic journey.

Autumn Leaf on Wet Stones, detail Quilted and embroidered textile collage

With that in mind, rather than holding a “flash-in-the-pan” sale in my search for new homes for older works, I’ve decided to do something different here at Eye of the Needle — a project that will encompass the whole summer. While I will continue to share peeks into what’s currently developing in my studio, I mainly plan to center the next 5 posts on revisiting and sharing the stories of select archival work. I will highlight 5 different pieces in each of those upcoming blog posts throughout the summer.

One Mossy Stone, detail Quilted and embroidered textile collage

The five pieces highlighted in each post will be available in my web shop at a 20% discount for one week from the day each post is published (Thursday through the following Wednesday), starting June 27th. If you see something you like, don’t tarry as at the end of that week those particular pieces will revert to full price. However, a different 5 will be discussed and placed on sale in the next post — and so on throughout the summer, totaling 25 pieces overall. The last post of this project will be August 22nd, so the sale for the final five works will end on August 28, 2024.

Riffle, detail, appliqué and quilted textile collage

Revisiting older work is a window to understanding how an artistic practice evolves. It’s been fun for me to see that these works haven’t lost their “oomph” with time. They were a proving ground for the development of a visual and technical language that I rely on today, while still maintaining their relevance.

Hindsight is 20/20, and as I’ve sorted through these pieces in anticipation of this project, it’s become apparent how interconnected my art has remained over the past decades, regardless of the differences that have surfaced through the exploration of new materials and processes. For example, despite evolving from a mostly abstract sphere into a figurative realm, subject matter that celebrates the ordinary and a continued reliance on hand-stitched embroidery has remained constant.

Sunlight on the Forest Floor, detail quilted and embroidered textile collage

I hope you will enjoy reading the backstory surrounding these pieces and that you will perhaps find a moment of connection between them and your own stories. I would be honored if, as an honored reader, you might consider snapping up one of these works at the sale price to add to your own collection.

That First Peony, detail quilted, painted and embroidered textile collage

You can preview the first 5 works I will discuss in my next post (June 27th) in the Japanese Gardens section of my web shop; please come back in a couple of weeks when I’ll uncover their secrets. As is often the case, the thumbnail images on the Japanese Gardens page are automatically cropped into a square, obscuring a full view. If you check a work’s individual page you will see the work in full…or stay tuned for my next post where all the work will be displayed in detail.

As always, I am grateful for your interest and the time you choose to spend here with me. See you in two weeks!

Embroidered and watercolor portrait work in progress

I have been juggling this WIP alongside working through the many details of my upcoming Summer Stories Archival Sale. Each new step uncovers more questions and challenges regarding the direction I want to take with new work. I’m counting on figuring some of that out in the weeks ahead.

Garden Brain

“If you look the right way, you can see that the whole world is a garden.”
― Frances Hodgson Burnett, The Secret Garden

We’re back from nine days visiting family in CA & HI, and as I look over my photos, notes and sketches from the trip I can see that, subconsciously or not, plants and gardens took center stage. Part of that has to be because once the snow melts and May arrives, we all become a bit garden-obsessed due to Vermont’s short growing season.

The lush arboreal view of many colors, outside our aerie-like airbnb window in Berkeley

Our local hardiness zone is 5 (up from 4, due to climate change). But in Berkeley, CA it’s 10a, and Kailua, HI is an even more exotic 12b. Needless to say, the flora in both locales was a welcome sight and inspiration for winter-weary Northeastern eyes.

Here’s a bit of plant kingdom goodness I brought back to share with you:

The colors, shapes and textures at The Dry Garden on Shattuck Ave in Oakland were swoon-worthy

They also had a selection of hand-made tiles that, but for the fact that I was limited to carry-on, one or two would have found their way home with me. Apologies to the artist for not getting a name to credit.

I follow @gollyokate on Instagram because I love her perspective on embroidery, libraries and her quirky discoveries on walks through her Oakland, CA neighborhood. What a delight to feel I was stepping into her world (albeit up the street a bit) while rambling one morning, enjoying the street-side gardens in Berkeley. This one’s for you Kate!

And just a bit later, the sun came out over a different viewpoint. Such color inspiration — look at those incredible purple spikes, offset by the gold of the grass – all framing an azure sky over Tomales Bay.

The sculpture garden of Oahu’s Capitol Modern (formerly the Hawai’i State Art Museum) is a quiet retreat in the heart of Honolulu. This museum exhibits the work of contemporary Hawaiian artists both inside and outside the building. Considering the theme of this post, I’ll stick with its courtyard sculpture display.

Gaea (Mother Earth), detail, Bumpei Akaji, 1984, Copper Many of the pieces not only sat in the garden, but referenced nature as well. The curves of Akaji’s piece frame a view to the central lawn area.

The smooth, hard surfaces and rounded forms of pieces like Gaea, above, and Ceramic Tree, below, create an apt counterpoint for their organic setting.

Ceramic Tree, Toshiko Takaezu, 1990 Handbuilt ceramic, This work was inspired by trees that had been damaged by lava on the Big Island.

However, it was the humor of “Mr. Chickenpants” and the dogs of “Jax Bench” which stole my heart.

Mr. Chickenpants, May Izumi, 2018, Bronze

Mr. Chickenpants

Jax Bench, Fred Roster, 1990, Bronze

The Honolulu Museum of Art’s treasures reflect the rich multi-cultural make-up of the islands. Its architectural design, including lush open-to-the-sky interior courtyards and restaurant garden, are an ever-present reminder of the connection between art and nature.

Bark Cloth-Style Aloha Shirt, Tori Richard, 1960 Our visit coincided with “Fashioning Aloha”, an exhibit of aloha wear from the 1930s onward. This shirt was inspired by the traditional Polynesian practice and geometric designs of Pacific tapa (bark cloth), a non-woven textile made by pounding the inner bark of the paper mulberry tree into sheets, then decorated with designs.

Spring to Summer, Kanō Kōi, Edo period (1615-1668), Ink, color and gold on paper

This lovely pair of six-panel screens were created by Japanese artist Kanō Kōi (died 1636) who produced paintings for elite samurai at a time when they were seeking to revive the courtly grace and refinement of the Heian period (794-1185). It’s hard for me to think of anything more refined than a Japanese garden.

Late Summer to Autumn, Kanō Kōi, Edo period (1615-1668), Ink, color and gold on paper

While not technically garden-oriented, I can’t help but include this amazing piece by Noah Harders, made from fruits of the sea.

Looks Can Be Deceiving, Noah Harder, 2022, Ola, Hawaiian Spiny Lobster. Harders makes intricate sculptural masks and headdresses from found or gifted organic materials, reflecting his deep ties to the environment of Maui.

Looks Can Be Deceiving, detail

Finally, my artist mother-in-law has a wonderful art library and she never fails to introduce me to exciting global creators of all stripes. This visit it was the work of the Brazilian landscape architect Roberto Burle Marx (1909-1994) who was known as a modern nature artist and public urban space designer. Lots of inspiration for our humble garden here at home.

Roberto Burle Marx book

While it rained every day of our Hawaiian visit, it didn’t dampen our spirits since we used to live in Kailua and have logged our share of sunny days there. And the upside was the inclement weather allowed more time for museums, art supply stores and sketching.

I had a nice little studio set-up to work from most days.

We finally made it to the beach one day for a walk. It was grey and cloudy so the palette I used was definitely different from what I’d expected, but no worries, I still had exactly what I needed.

The little sketchbook I made beforehand worked out beautifully. It offered plenty of space for drawing and notes (24 “pages”, using both sides), yet it folded down to fit compactly in my small travel purse. I will definitely make another for next time.

Sketchbook

And now it’s back to my own patch of earth to tend and nurture. Here’s to a wonderful garden season ahead for all of us.

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On another note:
One link leads to another….can’t remember how I ended up here, but thought you too might enjoy this article about sitting for Alice Neel in Katy Hessel’s Substack The Great Women Artists.

Shaken, Not Stirred

I mentioned in a previous post, that I’ve been following children’s book illustrator Emma Carlisle on Patreon since the first of the year. Doing so has opened a whole new world for me in my sketchbook by shaking up my approach rather than just stirring around what already works.

I am being introduced to all sorts of different portable drawing/painting media, such as acrylic markers and Neocolor II water-soluble crayons. What I enjoy most, and am trying to learn to push further, are the diverse range of textures and marks that can be achieved.

©2024 Elizabeth Fram, Brush pen, Colored pencil, Acrylic marker, Gouache. I’ve written before about how much light and color represent any locale. When pulling together an art kit before traveling, practice drawings from photos of a specific destination help with deciding on a color palette.

In general, I love the effect of seeing the hand of an artist in their work. And now I feel armed to push against my natural inclination for polish in favor of letting those marks shine. I also can’t help but enjoy the similarities with hand stitching.

What feels most enlightening is that Carlisle drills home by example the notion that there’s practically no limit on the ways that media can be layered and combined. Because I never learned much about the specifics of art materials beyond the basics in school, I am loving this opportunity to explore how they perform and interact, backed up by outside direction.

I have a trip coming up, so have been sorting through what I want to bring with me. Some of you will understand how much fun that can be. Ultimately, it’s involved a lot of paring down and then paring down again, but at this point I think I’m pretty well set.

I made a sketchbook from a piece of 19.5 x 18 inch Fabriano Artistico paper using this method: accordion-sketchbook-folding-pattern. My little book is about 5″ x 6″ & has 22-pages. It fits easily into my purse. I swatched all the colors/materials I’m bringing on the front cover, making for easy reference both while I’m away and after I get back.

I have a selection of watercolors, colored pencils, gouache and, in an act of supreme self-restraint, only one brush marker. That may sound like a lot, but my kit is pretty compact. As an FYI, I’m leaving acrylic markers at home for fear that TSA might confiscate them.

Anyway, I’m looking forward to seeing how it works out. I’ll get back to you.

You Just Never Know

As I’m sure is true for you, a lot of email newsletters fill up my inbox. I can’t read them all “cover to cover”, but I do try to skim most because I never know when the next unexpected gem will turn up.

For example, Fibre Arts Take Two is a mixed-media/fiber arts learning platform. Admittedly, I’ve never taken any of their courses, but I do regularly check out their “Friday Featured Artist” emails which have introduced me to countless creators I might never have known about otherwise. Every now and then they interview someone whose work absolutely blows me away.

Séverine Gallardo

With that thought in mind, you HAVE to check out the French artist Séverine Gallardo’s felted, knitted, crocheted & embroidered sculptural headpieces. How do I describe such richly imaginative amalgamations of history, place, culture and textiles? It’s best to just go to the source to see for yourself.

First, enjoy a taste on Gallardo’s Instagram and Tumblr pages. And then, click below to learn more from Gallardo herself in her interview with Tara. You will be enchanted.
FYI there are plenty of other artist interviews on the Fibre Arts Take Two YouTube channel.

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Meanwhile, I just finished my latest “Full Bloom” piece – and like much of Séverine’s work, it carries with it a touch of wanderlust. Thoughts of curiosity, restlessness, daring, and transformation led me to call this one “The Adventurer”.

And a detail…

So…what will you discover today?

Time & Space

Within hours of the total eclipse (which was all that we’d hoped for and more!), my husband left on his merry way for a much-anticipated 10-day mountain bike adventure with buddies. About a nanosecond after the door closed behind him, I got out my day planner/journal to brainstorm for an extended stay-at-home “art residency”. When have I ever had such an impressive, relatively chore and commitment-free span of uninterrupted time to spend totally immersed in my practice – not to mention giving myself permission to ignore pretty much everything else?
Exactly never.

It’s been a wonderful 10 days!
I’ve made serious progress on a new “Full Bloom” piece, worked daily in my sketchbook – including life drawing sessions on Emma Carlisle’s Patreon – and have made a point to write every morning à la Julia Cameron (if you only knew how many years I’ve been meaning to try that).

I finally tackled Rick Rubin’s The Creative Act, visited 4 exhibitions, and had some lovely one-on-one time with several friends. I was able to take a serious bite out of my much-needed website update and began the initial experiments for a couple of new projects that I’ve been mulling over for weeks.

In the evening, I watched art documentaries: The Woodmans, Georgia O’Keeffe: By Myself, and several Waldemar Januszczak episodes on the Renaissance. My 4-legged studio assistant kept me on the straight and narrow by making sure I got out for two walks every day, rain or shine. And there has been time to just think!

Figure Drawing Luminance Pencil Faber-Castell Marker

It’s been a very sweet experience with the huge gift of a wiped-clean schedule that gave me the freedom to do what I wanted, when I wanted, for as long as I wanted. It’s crazy how liberating that can be.

Glorious Clutter

Even so, I doubt I could keep up this pace forever and it will be so nice to have my husband home again tomorrow. But if you can swing it, I can’t recommend this experience enough. The benefits of a traditional art residency are many and I totally get that often, for many, the only way to achieve this kind of time and space is to leave home – which admittedly also carries the stimulation of being in a new and different space. But if the circumstances allow – even if for just a weekend, I would definitely encourage you to consider setting up a “residency” for yourself at home some time. You’ll love it.

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Here are several things worth sharing that crossed my path this week:

Maine Calling’s podcast episode on The Role of Art in Community. Be sure to check out Pamela Moulton and Peter Bruun’s websites to see their work.
We lost a shining star last Saturday when Faith Ringgold died at 93. Having only known of her painted art quilts, I was amazed to learn of her powerful early-career work. Holland Cotter’s April 15th NYTimes article “Faith Ringgold Perfectly Captured the Pitch of America’s Madness” highlights what a titan Ringgold was. This is a gift link so you should be able to access the article without encountering a paywall.
And finally, the two exhibits I’ve been part of: “Up & Down, In & Out: Embroidery and its Kin” and “Visions of Totality” are closing this weekend at Studio Place Arts and the Highland Center for the Arts, respectively. If you haven’t have a chance to visit in person, the following reviews will give you a nice flavor of both.

Seven Days, by Pamela Polston, April 10, 2024

7Days SPA Review

The Barre Montpelier Times Argus, by Mary Gow, April 6, 2024

Times Argus Banner Times Argus Visions of Totality Review

Feeling With The Eyes

After reading Gretchen Rubin’s Life in Five Senses last year, I often find myself tuning-in to more than just one sense in a given situation.

Tomita Mikiko Porcelaneous stoneware with gilding

Tomita Mikiko, Form of the Progenitor, 2019, Glazed and enameled porcelaneous stoneware with gilding

Visiting the Art Institute of Chicago a couple of weeks ago was a perfect opportunity to look beyond merely the visuals of the two exhibits we saw, considering them in terms of touch as well.

Hattori Makiko, Wandering, 2012, Porcelaneous stoneware

Radical Clay: Contemporary Women Artists from Japan is a grouping of work by 36 ceramicists — significantly, as noted, all women. The pieces are from the collection of Carol and Jeffrey Horvitz.

Ikake Sayuri, Breathe, 2015, Pigmented clay

Customarily under-recognized within a country that long excluded women from the creative side of clay, this show lends focus and acclaim to both leading and emerging female artists in the field.

Shingū Sayaka, Erosion No. 4 (Eroding Flower), 2021, Glazed and unglazed stoneware

Their work bursts exuberantly beyond the boundaries of traditional pottery, proposing wild and unimagined possibilities within the medium.

Tanaka Yū, Bag Work, 2018, Glazed Shigaraki stoneware

So much about the work is unexpected. It is curious, delightful and often somehow relatable despite the many unidentifiable and fantastical forms.

Konno Tomoko, Liberation (detail), 2022, Porcelain

Beyond that, the overall gathering point for me was texture – in all its pockmarked, frilled, spiked, gathered, ribbed, shaggy and even occasionally glassy-smooth glory.

Inaba Chikako, Leaf Vessel, Glazed Stoneware

Inaba Chikako, Leaf Vessel, 2017, Glazed Stoneware

Revisiting this exhibit through my photos has led me to realize I wasn’t just seeing it – I was feeling it with my eyes.

Ogawa Machiko, Red Vessel, reduction fired stoneware

Ogawa Machiko, Red Vessel, 2021, Reduction fired stoneware

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Moving from clay to textiles, next we visited Threaded Visions: Contemporary Weavings from the Collection. Relatively small in terms of the number of pieces, it is nonetheless mighty in impact, pushing one’s multi-sensory buttons. The works definitely have the expected tactile appeal associated with textiles, but it is the marriage of texture with dimension that most intrigued me. I didn’t so much want to run my hands over the work as I wanted to drop into the space each artist created.

María Dávila and Eduardo Portillo, White Dwarf, 2016, Silk, moriche palm fiber, alpaca, ad metabolized synthetic film wrapped thread; multilayered plain weave

María Dávila and Eduardo Portillo’s piece White Dwarf, from their imagined cosmos series, refers to a collapsing star. It is a dimensional piece with silvery metallic coils hovering above a grid of deep tones that, to me, evoke the shimmer and movement of moonlight on dark water. Read about these artists’ process and journey in Part one and Part Two, posts on Browngrotta Arts fabulous blog, ArtTextStyle.

Olga de Amaral, Alquimia III (Alchemy III), 1983, Linen, cotton, gesso, gold leaf and pigment; plain weave joined by knotted weft fringe

This glittering piece by Olga de Amaral is part of a series on the subject of alchemy. The masses of loose-end threads emerging from a background of gold leaf suggest a balance between order and chaos.

Olga de Amaral, Alchemy III, detail

Ethel Stein, Portrait, 1999, Cotton; warp and weft resist dyed, satin and twill weaves

The varying weave patterns of Ethel Stein’s stunning Portrait lend an abstract sense of rhythm to the figure within a static background. Zoom in on the above photo to see how the complexity of one area/pattern abutting another incorporates a sense of dimension within an image that essentially presents as flat.

Lia Cook, Facing Touch, cotton with rayon lining

Lia Cook, Facing Touch, 2011, Cotton’ woven on a digital hand loom; rayon lining

Finally, and perhaps most interestingly, Lia Cook addresses the idea of texture directly, as noted on the information card accompanying her piece:

“Lia Cook has long been interested in how the human brain reacts to the desire for touch. In the early 2000s, she began to work with neuroscientists to compare the brain’s response to viewing a woven image of a face versus a photograph of the same face. They discovered that seeing the woven image triggered greater activity in the part of the brain most affected by touch. Facing Touch illustrates this experiment: in it, a girl wearing a cap with sensors attached reaches out to a woven portrait also by Cook, Binary Traces: Young Girl, from 2004.”

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If you have a moment, enjoy this quick and uplifting “Stuck in Vermont” video about Hannah Miller’s quest to read, write and knit in all of Vermont’s libraries during her year-long sabbatical. Follow Hannah’s joyful journey on Instagram: @handknitbyhannah

A Thick Slice of Cake

If you’ve subscribed to my periodic newsletters, then you will already know that my latest Full Bloom portrait is finished.

This one was a challenge for several reasons: the glasses, the full-face angle and the need to subdue any competition between the model’s subtle skin tones and silver-ish hair vs her colorful clothes. That said, I’m very happy with the results — especially the way the subject and the stitched background ended up working, both independently and together.

Measured Response in process

After roughly drafting in the head, I sat with it for several days. There was a quality about it that, although incomplete, seemed to have a lot to say in a ghostly, disembodied sort of way. This is a great example of a point in the process when ideas start to flow for possibilities in future work.

Measured Response Watercolor Embroidery Stitching

Measured Response, detail

What was it about this particular image that made me hesitate in moving forward? Was it the straight-on stare speaking volumes on its own? Or perhaps simply that I tend to be drawn to art where elements of the underpainting/drawing remain visible? I find a sense of poetry in work where the hand and thought processes of the artist are laid bare.

Plus, backgrounds are a bit of – I wouldn’t exactly say nemesis, but definitely a puzzle for me, requiring another level of consideration because of the stitching. I want to create more than a mere backdrop, yet avoid having the piece appear overworked.

Measured Response Angle Watercolor Embroidery

There’s nothing like an angle shot for bringing out the texture of the stitching

In the end, I placed her head firmly on her shoulders, integrating her within space – although admittedly somewhat nebulous space. By pushing the color and pattern of the stitching while keeping it relatively sparse, I was able to hold onto the qualities that had stopped me in the middle, yet reach a satisfactory and full resolution. And, trite though it is to say, ultimately finding a way to have my cake and eat it too.

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While some of you live where your gardens are already coming back to life, those of us in Northern New England have a while yet to wait. But we can dream and plan. Here are a couple of ideas if you too are ready to get back to your plot of earth, but it’s not quite ready for you.

First, a shout-out to my mother-in-law who recently recommended Monty Don’s 3 episode series Adriatic Gardens on Amazon Prime or Acorn TV…it’s wonderful, so check it out.

Alice Fox Wild Textiles Book

And secondly, during the Surface Design Association conference in late January, UK artist Alice Fox spoke inspiringly about her practice using natural processes with found, gathered and grown materials. She made me long to collect the spent daffodil, iris and garlic leaves from my own garden to start creating with them. Granted, it will be a while before that can happen, but in the meantime I purchased a copy of her book Wild Textiles to learn more and to start the creative juices flowing while there’s still snow on the ground.

Embroidery Deep Dive

I fell down an interesting embroidery-related rabbit hole while reading the book Fabric of a Nation (recommended in my last post). It reminded me how interconnected a practice can become over time. While most of the works included in the book are quilts, one is an embroidered bedcover made by Marguerite Zorach as a commission in 1925-28. I still can’t get over how contemporary her stitched patterns and marks appear.

If you aren’t familiar with her, Marguerite Zorach (1887-1968) was a painter and textile artist who was married to the sculptor/painter/printmaker William Zorach. I’ve been aware of her for what seems like forever because she was a Maine artist, but I’m embarrassed to say I never took the time to learn about her work. Rather, I was much more tuned-in to her artist/illustrator daughter, Dahlov Ipcar, who created vividly colorful images of animals within lushly stylized flora. They were, as you might imagine, very appealing to a young person.

However, seeing Zorach’s embroidered bedcover and finding other examples of her work on the web all these years later, I’m only now realizing just how much I’ve missed by not learning about her sooner. In hindsight, I’m devastated to see that I missed the Farnsworth Museum’s 2017-18 exhibit “Marguerite Zorach — An Art-Filled Life”. C’est la vie.

Trained as a painter at the turn of the 20th century, like many of us, Zorach turned to the needle in order to maintain and balance a creative practice alongside motherhood. She was prolific, with her resulting textile pieces similar to her fauvist paintings in both color and imagery. These modernist textiles were very well-received, earning her wide recognition and a crucial means toward supporting their family financially. Yet, while her work helped to break down barriers between art and craft, critics still considered embroidery “lesser”, so in time her work fell out of favor in an early instance of the seemingly immortal Art vs Craft divide rearing its head.

I’ve been playing around with embroidery since I was 10-ish or so, continuing through high school and only moving away from it in college when formal art studies took center stage. After our first child was born though, I gravitated to making art quilts as a more child-friendly medium than the pastels and paint I had been working with pre-pregnancy. From the very beginning, embroidery was an important enhancement to each quilted piece.

Celebrating the Stitch

Unfortunately, at that time I was ignorant of the richly stitched legacy that artists like Zorach had laid out more than a half century earlier. There were, however, plenty of contemporary artists to learn from and to follow. Barbara Lee Smith’s seminal book Celebrating the Stitch, Contemporary Embroidery of North America was a benchmark for me as I forged a path forward with stitch.

At the end of January I showed you the beginning of my invitational eclipse piece. Many hours and stitches later it’s finished. I can’t get enough of the embroidery’s texture as it catches the light.

All these years later I consider embroidery a versatile mainstay of my work. Given time, it’s no surprise that any artist’s practice circles back over itself, re-incorporating much of what was picked up along the way. My current pieces include embroidery on cloth, as well as stitching paired with painting on paper. You can see examples of both in two shows opening this month:

Up & Down, In & Out: Embroidery and its Kin
Studio Place Arts
March 13 – April 20, 2024
Artist Social: Saturday, March 16 4:30-6pm

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Solar Eclipse
The Highland Center for the Arts
March 23 – April 21, 2024
Opening Reception: Saturday, March 23 5:30-7pm

One last note: when we visited the MFA, Boston in January, I was beyond thrilled to come across a piece by Renie Breskin Adams, whose densely embroidered work initially caught my eye in Smith’s book. It was the first time I’d seen her art in the flesh.

Being able to study this piece up close was like finally meeting an old friend/mentor in person. And now that I know about Zorach’s history and her pieces in the MFA’s collection, I can look forward to seeking them out too, to learn and to pay homage on a future visit.

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My three pieces in this show: Left: Poseidon’s Garden ©2016, Dye, discharge and embroidery on silk, 26″H x 22″W Upper Right: Mussel Memory ©2022, Stitched-resist dye and embroidery on silk, 12″H x 16″W Lower Right: Caught Red-Handed ©2019, Stitched-resist dye and embroidery on silk, 18″H x 24″W

If you can get beyond the mud on your road, there’s no better way to brighten up a drizzly, gray March day than with a healthy dose of color and the warm tactile beauty of this fiber art exhibition. There are only 10 days left for “Trichromancy”, which closes on March 16th.
Chandler Center for the Arts Gallery, Randolph, VT

Small Bites

In the spirit of working with what is available, there’s a lot to be said for short bursts of time — the long haul isn’t necessarily always better. I’ve learned that regular, quick drawings and paintings in my sketchbooks are one way to keep the wheels greased when working around the edges of busy days. And that goes for reading too.

This, and the image below, are an example of just a couple of sketches from the last week. Short and sweet, a half hour of drawing during the day helps to balance the long hours of stitching I’ve been devoting to my eclipse piece (more on that work in my next post). Even a short sketch helps to keep the drawing muscles in shape.

When our kids were little and there just wasn’t time to read more than a couple of novels a year, I developed an appreciation for short-form writing. At that time the interruptions came faster than the length of the shortest chapter, so I really appreciated the luxury of being able to finish what I was reading in one brief sitting. Short stories and magazine articles became a mainstay.

Trench Sketch

I may have plenty of time to read now, but I do still value finding something that I can pick up and put down without disrupting the continuity of either the writing or my train of thought. With that in mind, let me recommend the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston publication Fabric of a Nation, American Quilt Stories. As a companion to their 2021/22 exhibition of the same name (which I did not see), the book includes 58 stunning quilts with numerous detail images. Accompanying each quilt is a bite-sized essay that delves into the provenance of the piece, framed within the historic and political context of the time in which it was made.

Fabric of a Nation

For one who isn’t drawn to scholarly history tomes, I am so enjoying this book! It’s a richly informative and fascinating look at American history, told through the narrative of each creator’s needle. Plus, it has the added benefit of being written so that it can fit into anyone’s schedule…win/win.

Re-Balancing

One of the things I most enjoy, and am very grateful for in my day-to-day, is that my well of projects never runs dry. Still, balance is necessary to keep things in sync and moving forward smoothly. January was packed with administrative chores and various commitments, both art-related and otherwise, which took me away from studio work more days than I would have preferred — and I’m feeling the pinch.

Let’s hear it for sketchbooks – a space to work through ideas, experiment with materials (as with the Tombow brush pens used above), and to find sanity when computer chores feel overwhelming.

However, for the month of February I’m shifting weight, so to speak, and will spend less time on outreach and more hours just making work. That includes here at Eye of the Needle too. Rather than writing and rewriting as usual, I’ll just share a few recommendations below that I’m sure you’ll enjoy, and then will turn away from the computer in favor of my needles and brushes.

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Trichromancy Poster

Last Saturday the group show Trichromancy: Color Divination opened at the Chandler Gallery in Randolph, VT. I have three pieces on view, including “Poseidon’s Garden”, shown in the upper left of this announcement, The event was well attended and spirits were high. I was having such a good time with friends, meeting new people and running into folks I haven’t seen for a long while that I never even thought to bring out my phone to take pictures of the work on display. Bad form for a blogger, but a lovely indication of the convivial evening, and perhaps an impetus for you to go see the show for yourself.

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I really enjoyed this interview with Sandi Hester on Maria Stoljar’s “Talking With Painters” podcast.

Hester, whom I’ve recommended before, is a hoot. She always shares generously about her practice and, in this particular case, talks about approaching it with joy, authenticity and especially without taking herself too seriously. Wise words for all of us. Consider giving it a watch — there’s something in there for just about anyone.

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Finally, good art writing is hard to find. Quite often it’s a slog through erudite art-speak that encourages napping rather than digging deeper to learn more.
Not so with Dian Parker! Parker is a Vermont artist who has written extensively about color and contributes to a wide assortment of art publications. Her reviews and essays about individual artists are succinct and enlightening, always encouraging a desire to look further. Check out her review of Celia Paul ; I can almost guarantee you’ll be Googling to find out more as soon as you finish.

I sketched SDA conference presenter Nnenna Okore while she spoke about her use of bioplastics in her efforts to bring awareness to sustainable practices in art. There is a theory, which I believe whole-heartedly is true, that one hears better while drawing.

That’s it for this week. And here’s to finding that sweet spot of balance in all our practices!