another week gone

Learned a new lesson this week. When I take snaps I should make sure the camera is square to the piece I am photographing. Each of these pieces is 2 inches by 6 inches. The dice our pretty much self explanatory.

The second piece of the two is within a gold and silver crenellated border. The red woven beads refer to Mother, Crone and Virgin. The spider is related to the spider tat on my wrist and all it implies. These pieces reference the hand surgery I had a year ago and the hand surgery I'll have in the next couple of months to release frozen finger joints. The two tapestries will be mounted in a silver fretted bejeweled box with dice as the feet and handle.

Last week was busy, but not so much about tapestry for the most part. I spent several days learning new silversmithing skills. I am finally ready to start the fret work, bezels, etc. for the box that these two small pieces are going to be contained within. Historically, it seems a good time to explore the locks and boxes I have used in the past to house my tapestries. I am making the switch to silver because it seems cheesy to use aluminum and copper to but around my tapestry pieces. Silver is so much richer and loaded with tradition. It's a little more difficult and time consuming for embossing and embellishing, but feels richer, most substantive and more precious.
I made two rather ornate neck pieces and a ring with bezels, jade and flourishes in four 15 hour days. I have 3 small pieces of malachite that I have started to do the bezels and mounting for another small box that will hold one of the small tapestries I am designing. I think the piece that was the most fun to do was the silver pendant piece with a pottery shard as the stone. I finally did something with the dish I broke from my good china set. I can tell my husband I am going along with his rabid recycling.

BUT, still this all leads back to tapestry. This week I am going to be working on finishing these two small tapestries called miracles and a third purple sky colour study as of yet unnamed. It is 3.75 inches by 5.75 inches. The image is from a pencil drawing I did of a windy autumn night several years ago. I am also working on designing another piece that I have waited several years to attempt. It is called So Many Chances". My designs seem to becoming ever more complex.



We made a new edition to the studio tools-a time clock. A simple effective tool for discovering how many hours are in a given piece. Should help with the paperwork. Should be interesting to see where I will be in a week time wise. I am almost scared to find out how little time I actually get to weave in a week and how much goes into the paper work that surrounds FFP.

Our-FFP- studio assistant-Jen- will be working on sample exercises that I will be using when I teach shaped tapestry in Riverside in March. I am doing the seem samples, but am trying to decide how much information and how much actual weaving can be covered in a 2.5 day workshop by someone who is a little more then a beginner.

Cheers until next week.