of Cabbages and kings-nonce words and neologisms-and multi tasking

"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes—and ships—and sealing-wax—
Of cabbages—and kings—
And why the sea is boiling hot—
And whether pigs have wings."
—Through the Looking-Glass


Slight correction
There’s got  to be a morning After part b




There’s got to be a morning after part A
Making a small correction to the Tapestry Topics 2013 Fall issue. Part B was not in the Firestorm Exhibit. The confusion happened when I sent the two jpegs of the pieces to Tapestry Topics for the article I wrote on weaving tapestries in series –A Series of Studies on Changing Light  and  an exhibition review  Cheryl Rinker--Woven Together Firestorm. The two pieces  were conceived as a series, but part b was not finished until after the deadline so only part A was submitted and was in the exhibit. They were both used to illustrate the Review of the Firestorm exhibit.
  Due Diligence-really!
I should finish this piece by Friday.(editorial comment-I lied. It probably won’t be finished until I get back from Alaska-too many annoying  details conspired against my having any weaving time this week. Even this blog has taken 3 days longer then it should have. )   It feels like I have been weaving on it for ever. Well, maybe I have. I guess it depends on the def. of forever. Long enough-anyway. It’s fast approaching the rank of a “Dog on the loom.” My only is excuse is I used the time to finish my remodel and write a legal proposal for ending certain provisions in my Dad’s estate .. .Sounds a little like the dog ate my homework, but even Chene wouldn’t eat this piece. There’s only 2 days left of having contractors all over the place. The fence is done.  New sign is up. The roof is one-ones soffit with vents and a drain pipe to go.  All done before the autumn rains set in. Even though every time we tried  to do  work that shouldn’t get wet… The rains poured in torrential record breaking amounts.  We even struck water when digging the post holes. It’s raining again so one day after I come back and they’ll do those and add the two new gates to match the ones I already have. They are being built for the space to match the two that were made by a women welder in Silverton, Or.  whose name over time has been forgotten. Only what at the time  that I purchased the was remembered was the uniqueness of a women creating and welding whimsical metal gates. How sad to be only remembered by your craft and gender.
My dad’s estate is over and done with. Sunday I leave for my 45th wedding anniversary cruise that should have happened in Je, but was just too busy to take.  Enough with my excuses for being so far behind in my weaving. Life happens. All that said the piece still isn’t done! I need 3 days more.

I have been having a lot of fun with symbols and cultural Icons-first the broken puzzle, maze, the the 7x 7x7x7x7…, feathers, The scientific formula in the background, the rock wall, etc.
But,  one of my favourites-- is this symbol.
According to one page  source on the internet on iconic symbols in modern comic books it defines the moment of death, or of passing out of an idea,  when drawn over the head of a comic strip character. It is an ideogram or icon used to convey an idea, a phantasy, or a wish a dream that is suddenly annihilated or destroyed by an instant awakening or realization or perhaps an AHA moment.
With this piece I wanted to use more silk and rayon. I was looking for-  hoping for a little bit of a shimmer-Different then the way the cotton threads reflected or inter-reflect light. I also wanted to see if I could find away or a bobbin that would make the process easier. Well, I can tell you it certainly isn’t easier with using European style bobbins or bones. I Still end up with this-SO I am back
So I am back to tying over hand knots  every 8 inches in the weft bundle. It’s a clumsy system as the hanging silk/rayon wefts tangle. It cuts down on speed as I sort through to find the one I wish to use. I have also discovered that I should always cut the loops of the weft bundles where I double back or fold the strands when doing the colour bundles. The loops catch and tangle everything I have tried  wrapping the bobbin with the wefts that are knot, but they always make a mess of the silk or rayon when they unwind when I use my over the know trick so the bobbins don’t escape. (see page 30 in Tapestry 101 for how to use a bobbin)

I am  trying to use these Japanese  tapestry shuttles instead of the Swedish bobbins I prefer to use in my weaving.. They are taking a little time to get use to, but perhaps they will work on the rayon and silk weft bundles.  They just feel awkward because I am not used to using them-yet. 

Cheri White one of weaving buddies who comes to the studio just finished this tapestry. It’s fast becoming one of my favourite tapestries.Here  it is just off the loom-not it’s official portrait-yet. Just a snap maybe some day she’ll write an explanation that I can share with everyone. I am totally in love with the imagery.


It’s fire weed season. I have decided to plant some in my yard.  Fireweed always makes me thing of Edith Miller. I did a small wool tapestry of this in 1979(20x30inches and sold it to Edith Miller along time friend. She  is the last person left alive in the group of 20 on going   students from the 80’s  that I taught in Corvallis for years and years starting in 1982.  She’s now in her mid 90’s.  She was also one of the original founders of the Corvallis hand weavers guild in 1948 the year I was born. She is now in a nursing care center for Alzheimer  patience.
Astoria Coastal Fiber Exhibit 2013                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   Pax Chene received an ATA award of excellence in the Astoria Coastal Arts Textile Exhibit this summer. It as one of two pieces of mine that were in the exhibit. The other was “And He…” These photos were some I snapped at the opening. They are just meant to give the feel and  general layout  of the exhibit-not highlight specific works. There was one wall that I was unable to photograph I couldn’t get a shot of the two walls of the structure  my pieces were hanging on. The opening was well attended.  I could never find a space clear of people so that I could take a photo.  There were some amazing tapestries in the exhibit. Jan Austin, Rebecca Metzoff, Su Eagen, Audrey Moore, Nicki Blair, Terry Olsen, Diane Wolf and several other tapestry weavers whose names I know I missed.  One of the major awards went to a tapestry weaver from back east whose name I failed to write down. But, They are just to the left of my birthday scarf from Pat Scarf t which was also in the exhibit.  
 

So this is a pet peeve and a rant. Ignore it if you wish. I am grateful that this show was done and acknowledge the amount of great work that went into it.   It’s not just  this exhibit but it seems to be a standard practice in every show I have been in in the last few years.  Both my pieces were mounted  in “Salon Style”and in away that did neither of the pieces justice. Every small format tapestry in the exhibit was hung one above the other.It always feels so disrespectful of the work. It made it really difficult to view some spectacular Small Format work that was in the exhibit. While larger pieces were given a space and hung in away that made them much easier to view and not double hung.  Art work should be hung at eye level for the best view of a work of art. Not so high it can’t be seen or so low you have to stoop to see it.  The argument is always it’s away to crowd more work into a smaller space. SO why do the small format pieces have to bear the brunt of crowding and bad spacing?  I think its like saying the small format tapestry work isn’t important enough to have it’s own space. So be grateful  it’s in the show no matter how it’s hung so we can have a proper look for the large format work.  It feels like “ yeah, you can participate, but the small format work isn’t deserving of being viewed properly and so  go sit in the back of the bus.”   It always feels so disrespectful of the work-not just mine but all small format tapestry weavers.

One of the  many wonderful things I got to do this summer was visit the Cloisters after I taught at MAFA. I have around 200 detail shots of the tapestries not just the Unicorn tapestry. I am doing a lot of studying of those details and gleaning a lot of useful information from those shots.  I am hoping to start organizing the materials in my journal when I get back  from My Alaskan cruise.  Those things that look hatches and hachures are not. They are woven i n the direction the warp travels. The tapestries were turned sideways when woven creating a sort of vertical hachure. Now that my remodel is done I am going to be offering classes in the studio. The first one on “Soumack and friends” will take place on November 2-4th of this year. The second one will be on Jan31-February 2 will be on colour blending and the use of Hatches, Hachures and their Cohorts.
Here’s a few of my favourite shots and details.


I have a plan for I am weaving next. I wanted to be free to start the pieces when I got back from Alaska-one involves a truck not making it through an under pass 2 blocks from my home with crochet  lace and Jacob roses. What could be better a turquoise truck to match my fingernails.


The other incorporate black tree branches that looked lace in several pictures that I took near Hardin, Montana and photos  that Trish Heath took that evening generously said I could use in my colour studies took  of a smoky sunset in Albany with incredible colours  that you don’t often see in Albany Sunsets. My camera was  still packed at the time.
Montana sunset in the area Custer battle’s took place.

Still working on my research on soumack--
I have been scurrying through all my books and notes again because of a statement by a member of a list I am on.  His comment was to the effect that the raised outlining and surface texture on many Coptic weavings was actually needlework that was applied after the textile was woven.

SO I quickly went raced back  to several of my  books to see if it was possible I had made a mistake. When I was teaching myself to do it  I studied 4-5 fragments in the OSU collection and decided it had to be done as woven because the wraps never pierced a warp or weft and it always seemed to be controlled by the placement of the warps.  The our other names for the flying shuttle technique are French Arrondiment and Ressaut or ressort. One book called it ressort and related it back to crappaud(Mary Rhodes book Small Woven Tapestries). All of the other books-The Coptic Tapestry Albums by Hoskins, Woven Structures, by Mallert and a new book The threads Course in Tapestry by Mette Lise Rossing.
I first read about the technique in Tapestry Mirror of History by Thomsen in the late 70’s  and have had an ongoing fascination with it every since.
My research and theirs seem to verify that it was done by wrapping around warps as woven. Of course , they are mostly makers and not not museum curators.  What I did note was that several major museums referred to it as an embroidery technique, but never said if the embroidery was applied after or as woven.

Flying Shuttle- The technique of carrying an extra weft thread of contrasting color on a supplementary shuttle, to create fine internal lines or pattern details. The flying shuttle thread is secured at intervals by catching it under a warp thread. A technique that appears unique to Coptic weaving.
Soumack: A supplemental, decorative stitch used for surface decoration and texture on Coptic tapestries. The soumack thread is wrapped around each warp, or group of warp threads, usually on a diagonal. Used to define lines, or create outlines.


I have run out of time again. So, hopefully, in 2 weeks I’ll  be able to do another blog entry and have more information on my research into soumack and it’s friends and my new woven samplers. The two pictures are from a recent day trip to eastern Oregon. The mountain in the background is Mt. Washing a mountain I climbed many times when I was much younger. My Fascination was to climb the rock cliffs to the top and and boot ski the scree to the bottom. The there is a photo of Chene as we tried to convince him to get out of the air conditioned car to walk on the pumice beds. Finally ended up packing him around. Smart dog! It was really hot that day. I ended up with blisters.


Cheers and all,
Kathe



























































Kathe

In Search of UFOS(unfinished objects in studio)

Sometimes event(s) conspire to create storm and debris surges and an overload of UFOS’s. Believe me there has been more then enough of this conspiring going on for the last 9 months in my life.
What is a Storm/debris Surge?A storm surge is a mound of water produced when a hurricane moves across a large body of water. Driving wind “pushes” the water and debris so quickly that it “piles up” on the water in front of it, producing a mound of water and debris that is higher than normal sea level. An apt description of my last months 9 months. 
The storm surge can be pushed up the beach and deep into inland areas carrying everything in its path to places that seem or have seemed impossible to be. It arrives as a rush of water or an event and can be capped by large, strong, pounding waves. Storm surge flooding is often the most deadly and damaging impact of a hurricane that and what it leaves behind…
reality and what it actually isn’t, but feels like
Storm surges always lead to events such as UFOS an acronym for  Unfinished Objects in studio.
“Anecdotal studies” by this - - - - - - (-please fill in blank--researcher, me, weaver, instructor) have established that the majority of UFOS observations are misidentified conventional objects or natural phenomena and are most commonly interrupted needful projects put on the back burner by debris and storm surges with a small percentage even being hoaxes.^[8] After excluding incorrect reports, however, most investigators and seekers have acknowledged that between 5% and 20% of reported sightings remain unexplained, and therefore can be classified as unidentified and unfinished in the strictest sense. Many of these reports are deduced visual accountings from observers. Some involving simultaneous sittings by trained(?) observers-husbands, co-conspirators, other involved partners, arm chair quarter backs and sideliners.  Proponents of the extraterrestrial hypothesis suggest that these unexplained reports are of alien UFOS’s though various other hypotheses have been proposed.(with a little help from Wikipedia and my vivid imagination)

There has been some debate in the  home, Calapooia Brew Pub, within cars and other unnamed places about whether any scientific investigation into UFOS sightings is warranted, but all agree they  should just be termed hazardous materials and disposed of in a safe way.

SO what have I been doing since I last wrote. There have been Workshops and trips to Seattle, D.C.  and now  in a few hours MAFA in Pennsylvania and  a week later a trip to Montana. I won in honorable mention in National Fiber Directions, I finished a piece for the Firestorm exhibit and I am finally ready to finish up “And He.. that will be  in the NW Coastal Fiber Arts 2013. and a Piece in the ATA small format exhibit opening in Tacoma. I have finished all the paper work on my Dad’s estate and attended Troy my oldest Grandson’s high school graduation and have become involved in the Calapooia arts Gallery a co-op Gallery in down town Albany, Or…I now own one of my favourite tapestries by Linda Rees. Spent a whole day looking at 4-5 tapestries in the national art Museum and taking photo’s for future use.








I finished
Part B of “There has got to be a Morning After!” Part A of course was the  fire piece.



Of course, I would love to show them together sometime, but for now I am just really glad they are finished and at least one is showing in the Woven together Firestorm Exhibit in Colorado Springs.  .
Which Again leaves me seeking more UFOS in my Studio!
I have managed to weave about an inch more in the last month of so on this piece. It seems to be the biggest most outstanding UFO in the studio.
After I come back from from Montana my plan is to work a week or two and then head for Santa fee to do some weaving with my friend Diane and maybe a couple of other things that haven’t been planned yet. So this will be my constant companion until finished.

Alternative reality Theory. The Losers [1.4] Marshall Teller: Eerie, Indiana, day 94. You wouldn't believe how easy it is to lose stuff here. I mean stuff that was there a minute ago would just vanish the moment you turn your back. Gone, disappeared, lost forever. I figure, Eerie is caught in some electromagnetic vortex that messes up the tracking system we humans use to find stuff. Funny, but it seems to be hitting Dad the hardest. Marshall: Without warning I was on a bumpy slide to the centre of the Earth. I was ready for anything... except what actually happened. Marshall: I had no idea what hole I'd fallen through to land here, in the Bureau of Lost. But this made Alice in Wonderland look like a day at the beach. Wikipedia-synopsis of Eerie. Indiana series

Somewhere in the last several months. I have been or have decided to find a way to challenge myself to try and adapt patterning and more different kinds of back ground into my work. I have been perusing the Zen Tangle designs and using them as a text book to help me learn to doodle and be more playful and fill up space. While journaling I have sort of discovered that I don’t really know how to just sit and play with drawing for the last several decades my drawings have always been very directed and driven to end goal.  I have been spending about an hour a day for the last month just trying some of the design elements-mixing and matching. I have found some almost impossible for me to do because of my Dyslexia. Angles and repeated  angled things have a tendency to be difficult for me to draw-reversing and dancing away in the wrong directions. I also have a tendency to skinny things up and not make ends meet together. Here are a couple that I copied and adapted a little from several Zen tangle books. I would not really call anything-the drawings I have done original art work. They are strictly derivative of 2 or 3 Zen tangle books. Just a prod towards a slightly different thought pattern
I am not sure where I am going with the idea, but I find them relaxing to do. Of course,they sort of remind me of backgrounds used by many Art Nouveau artist in back grounds etc. and on book covers that I have laying around my studio.
Of Soumack and Other Things-
For those of you who keep asking me about when I am going to teach another Soumack and Line  class in the NW. I am going  to teach one in the studio this fall. It will be a 3-4 day workshop. This is a class I love teaching. It’s being changed up a bit. I am adding more techniques that are in the soumack family, but aren't necessarily called soumack-rya, Cicim, brocading, Zilli. I am also beginning to emphasis background and design that these techniques float over and around. I am Adding bobbin blending and hatches.
If anyone is interested please contact me. I will in the next month begin adding  tapestry classes that I want to teach in my studio and accepting more private students.   This is something I had hoped to be begin doing in January, but life got in the way.
Have to go pack. Before I run out time. I am leaving to teach at MAFA in about 6 hours. I am spending 3 days after the conference to go see the cloisters and then race back down to DC to visit with  my Grandchildren. Twice in two months. I am blessed!
More later,
kathe
 

Apophenia

Apophenia /æpɵˈfiːniə/ is the experience of seeing meaningful patterns or connections in random or meaningless data.Wikipedia
'The rule is, jam to-morrow and jam yesterday--but never jam to-day.'
'It MUST come sometimes to "jam to-day,"' Alice objected.
'No, it can't,' said the Queen. 'It's jam every OTHER day: to-day isn't any OTHER day, you know.'
'I don't understand you,' said Alice. 'It's dreadfully confusing!'
'That's the effect of living backwards,' the Queen said kindly: 'it always makes one a little giddy at first--'
'Living backwards!' Alice repeated in great astonishment. 'I never heard of such a thing!'
'--but there's one great advantage in it, that one's memory works both ways.'
'I'm sure MINE only works one way,' Alice remarked. 'I can't remember things before they happen.'It's a poor sort of memory that only works backwards,' the Queen remarked.Lewis Carol  illustration Jessica Wilcox 1923
The Small format tapestry I finished yesterday is  called “There has got to be a morning after?”, size- 4 inches by 6 inches. I have one more left in this series of 2. I assume a series can be only two much like one can’t become a serial killer until they have killed 3 times.I suppose there does need to be rules about such things.   I began working on it today for a few hours. It is a sunrise of a mountain, clouds and the end of a burn. Also, 4 by 6 inches. These 2 pieces are all about something that happened when I was in high school camping with my family and a wildfire that crowned close by. We were trapped for a while and later evacuated. The second is of  the breaking daylight over a mountain and it’s uncanny stillness the morning after.
I am staring at the keys of my computer keyboard trying to figure out where the start of this blog should be. Not exactly overwhelmed but not underwhelmed either with the time between this and my last blog. I have been rather ill for the last month. One random event lead to another to create a series of events. To quote one source “Concurrent events that first appear to be coincidental but later turn out to be causally related are termed in coincident.” But according to Jung life is not a series of random events but rather an expression of a deeper order, which he  referred to as Unus mundus. On the other hand there is a psychiatric condition called Apophenia which probably really applies to this last 6 months.
 One of the things that happens when I am spending to much time being sick is I have a tendency to read things that may or may not be nonsensical or very random.
still not finished, but further along then last time
Reading always makes me feel better.
So I have had an orgy of reading for the last month. So some of the books I found to read  in the last month are: 4-5 cheap-in the Victorian sense- novels that I refuse/embarrassed to name,  Jungs: Man and His Symbols, and Memories,  Dreams and Reflections(couldn’t find a copy of The Red book) I am never quite sure if I really understand Jung or if I just enjoy feeling confused like  some do feeling scared. Interesting thought comparing Jung to Stephen King.   The Black Count(the real count of Monte Cristo) by-Reiss,(I think I have read every book by his Grandson-Alexander) The Burges Tapestry by Staies, Annotated Grimm's Fairy Tale, Persian Carpets by Volmar Gantzhorn(which turned out to be the most interesting of everything I read. It is a comprehensive history of rugs and how the designs influenced other crafts from a slightly Armenian bent.
I received a gift of a beautiful book A Passion for roses; The note books of Henri Delbard with Watercolours by Fabrice Moireau(It’s so beautiful
I can’t stop looking at it. Thanks Diane K.) AND a copy from Don Norris of his new book on beginning Silversmithing. (Great job!!!! Don. I am fascinated by it. Don is my favourite silversmithing teacher)
Tuesday I find out if I am well enough/healed enough to go back to exercising and other things that have been held on hold for a month. One of the biggest is finishing up the house re-do and my spring gardening/clean-up.

So Why have I had so much time to read?
It all started with my getting my teeth cleaned. Something I do 3 times a year and ends I hope with my being able to get rid of an infection left over from the oral surgery to repair a rather large hole that was punched into my sinus by something that was supposed to be “no big deal”. All because my original Dentist failed to see a rather large cavity on a back molar that she should have been able to see for about 4 years in the 12 times that she supposedly cleaned my teeth at a cost of 268.00 each time. This year has been on surprise after another beginning with my Dad’s death In December. Actually it may have started earlier then that like in September-a long dry hot spell the necessitated a new roof in the middle of terrible down pours-finally settled on just doing the half that was leaking torrents of water into a newly remodeled laundry room from there it’s been one in coincident .
Found another soumack and tapestry rug. Some of it’s in rough shape, but for the most part good enuff to study. Perhaps, I’ll make it into a smaller rug, but for now I sit on the floor and study it. 
There is one part that is totally shredded, but the shredding allows me to see how the technique may have been done. The actual colour of the weft was most likely the colour of the reverse side below, Beautiful colours.What it shows me when I look at the shredding is that these particular squares were actually a form of double weave-two warps used as one warp-in a 1-2-3-2-1 diamond shape. The vertical  and diagonal lines lines are soumack.  The red sample is done in the same way with the exception of the two red and white borders being soumack.

Teaching in California at Inland Empire Hand Weavers guild was so much fun.
It was so odd to see spring in the flats or almost spring and then look up and  see snow on the hills behind us . It was interesting. Meant some very interesting people that I would love to run into again. It was a large group 13-14 participants.  The highlight of the trip-one of them-was the partial destruction of my computer by the airlines.  Good news is I am replacing it. The dent knocked something loose and it was like it  had developed dementia or Alzheimer's. It would loose itself in time and totally mess up whatever program it was working in, I ended up retrieving portions 3 PowerPoint presentations to combine into two lectures. So,   much for the airlines being gentle with the carry on they confiscated. Janet Castro had made sure that all of the looms were warped in advance so we were able to cover a lot of ground in the class. It was a mixed level class. The colour blending's were incredibly beautiful that the participants wove especially the mélange and and chene’ samples.
Finally, last put not least-Two of my students work I have pictures of some of !First--Cathie Beckman's work that she did while in the studio(Jacob's Rose-one of the most difficult coloured roses to weave) and two of her calendar flowers. The Jacob’s rose was taken while still on the loom and the other are finished work.



The second student is one of my blog students Patti Kirsch. These are samples that she did illustrating one of the exercises we are doing in on colour theory. I am doing the exercises with her that will be included in the new Colour Theory book that Pat Spark and I are working on.
Time to end! Before I am really late and Chene” becomes to bored


Cheers and all,
kathe