It is what it is!

Kona Sunset-Orange is finished except for the twining and braiding. It’s done before the deadline for the Enchanted Pathway exhibit. YEAH!! All I can say is it is about time!!!! I was beginning to worry with all that’s been going on and not going on with FFP and the studio. It has a very boring name. ..Perhaps that will change after I look at it for awhile. Maybe it should just be Kona Orange. It has some interesting colour blends in the sky -oranges and purples mixed together on the bobbin and all through the hatches and hachures. I am not sure orange really describes this piece. I am very happy with the silhouettes’ of the trees against the blazing orange sunset. It’s a technique I will probably use again. The orange pushes the dark navy black to an intensity I wouldn’t have believed possible in a small format piece. The orange is warm enough and the blue black cool enough that it has substances with then appearing like a hole that black elements in tapestries sometimes create visually. Photographing my small format/small sale work can be difficult. There is a shine that happens that makes it look like the warps aren’t covered, when really they are. The rib structure in the photos has a tendency to moiré. The subtle blends are almost too subtle for the photos of the pieces. It’s a real frustration. They almost need to be viewed in real time rather than frozen in a photo. Time to stop moaning and move on! It is what it is!

And, now for the second Kona piece. By the way the
kona pieces are 5 by 7 inches at 20 epi. They are made of dual duty craft thread for the warp and the weft is composed of cotton and or polyesters sewing thread, embroidery floss and rayon embroidery floss. Thank you Jan for the incrediable oranges and the deep turquoise you gave me from your mothers stash. The all cotton oranges and yellows have a beautiful lustre. This is a picture a of the next kona sunset. Taken the next day on the same balcony 1500 feet above the ocean looking out across downtown kona. It is so opposite of Kona Orange in colour. I think the difference was caused by the vog and the erupting valcano.

Good news the So Warped book will be very closed to being finished this week with the exception of the endless proofing and the vast seemingly endless - minutiae that goes along with that such as Indexes, proofing and more proofing that can only be done once the layout is finished. It’s a little longer and stuffed with a lot more information than we thought it would be. So much for the small handbook on warping tapestry looms that we set out to write. We-Pat and I-built a copy of the old pipe loom that I used in graduate school-a pipe loom that was used pre-copper pipe looms. It brings back a lot of memories of sitting by the patio door and weaving obliviously for hours while a plethora of every kid for miles around screamed and created mayhem in the back yard almost silenced by the Debussy’s afternoon of the faun and a healthy dose of Rimsky-Korsokoff and Borodin. Now I have something much more effective my IPOD, but no kids. If you like pulled heddles it works really well for the Gobelin type of heddles. They are so adjustable in height.

Today I tackle the Mirrix. I am really excited about the treadles. I have never personally liked shifting the heddles with my hands, but... It eventfully makes the scar tissue in my palm sore. For most people this isn’t a problem. I also prefer the advantage of being able to use both hands when weaving with my slicker threads at 20-22 epi. But, I do love the Mirrix treadles and the fact i can fit it into a suitcase when I travel. I also like the heddle system itself. It is really fast. I noticed on Lynn Hart’s blog she’s using the heddle bar system on her Shannock, which is a very interesting adaptation. But, you know i don’t mind the tyed heddle system. What i do dislike is the hot glued heddles. Something eventually always comes loose and hangs one long and shortens another. Then when one has worn out the heddle the glue often pulls away part of the wood. Unless, it is really cheap glue and then one ends up at square one with a long and short heddles when the glue doesn’t hold over time.

The weather is odd. It is either beautiful, sunny, and freezing cold or warm, dreary and way too wet. The daffodils and Jonquils are out. My crocuses aren’t, but everyone else’s seems to be. The Camellias’ are blooming just in time to be browned by the rain. I wonder why we even try to grow them in Oregon. The downstairs part of the studio is/ was absolutely frozen and the the upstairs where I spend most of my time will be too warm. I want to lay out in the sun and read, but my fingers are too frozen to turn the pages. When the sun does shine and heat up the Daphne Odorata the smell is incredible as it gently wafts into the studio. Made a nasty discovery yesterday. The fasteners on the windows in the stairwell are in the middle and I am too short to reach them. Should be an interesting summer!

I am starting to think about my piece for the ATA small format show. I am beginning to collect the images. I want it to be about paradoxes. Perhaps, the paradox of the Alpha and the Omega a feeble attempt to weave what has been going on in my life lately and the thought processes that they engender. There is always the paradox of aging and youth as the body changes, fascinating to watch and examine, but difficult at times to live with. I am not sure whether it’s a paradox or an oxymoron-good and evil, old and young, fire and ice. The paradoxes involved in food and diabetes, Insulin and glucose

I keep going back to fragmented puzzles and puzzle pieces that aren’t really there. They remind me of quilting stitches-there, but not there. A combination of Coleridge’s Xandu and Stephen Cranes black rider.

Life is full of little discoveries such as coming home and finding out my neighbour can really play the delta blues on his guitar sitting in his front yard. Evoking memories of Asa sitting on the patio playing the guitar when he was a kid, or that the neighbour doesn’t mind Chene chasing his cats that are twice Chene’s size, or someone else also enjoys the opera. Another discovery I counted 7 different colours of violets on my 8 block walk to my better bones and balance class.

Discovered that Wry/Rya has taken to sleeping under pillows on the couch to hide from Chene. Can’t say that I blame him. I am about ready to lose Chene’s orange bone, especially if I have to throw it one more time, but first it needs a trip through the dishwasher. Discovered this morning while trying to sleep that he is still chasing flying geese and airplanes.
Cheers for now!

 
 

bit by bit, inch by inch

Today is a beautiful day. The sun is shining. There is a promise and perhaps a hint of spring-pregnant with waiting. The camellia buds are swelling. I saw the first of my Grandmothers violets of the season. The moss in the side yard is beautifully green. The last week or two has been busy, dreary, tax season and solitary in the evenings. I am definitely ready for a trip to the coast, seeing a movie or going to the opera-Anything!! that doesn't take place in my home, yard or studio. Spencer is working 50-60 hours a week doing taxes-probably a good thing. He seems to enjoy the people he does taxes with. Even closing in on 45 years I enjoy his company and friendship and miss im when we don't get a chance to talk and do things together.

The ducks are starting to migrate over the house. Chene' is chasing them as they pass over the yard. He's got this thing about geese and airplanes. He has great hearing. Spencer thinks I should be grateful that he only chases flying geese and airplanes. He starts barking and running towards them before we can even hear them. Wry/Rya is back from becoming an "it" and hernia surgery. The results of the hernia surgery have turned him into a leaping ballet dancer with incredible karate chops and jumps. Usually done and around the dog for maximum exsposure and impressive value. Chene' is learning not to try and follow him, anymore over the furniture. Chene' drops like a rock trying to follow Wry/Rya graceful jumps and ascents. Chine’s ungraceful splats can be heard all over the house.  Can't seem to get it across that belly flops should be done in water and not hardwood floors.

     

I am proofing the galley for the So Warped book.

 Pat's illustrations are incredible. I wish I had been lucky enough to have a book like this when I started tapestry weaving. Especially since I didn't come at tapestry as a weaver, but as a surface embellisher (old term for surface design). Everyone just assumed I knew how to warp a loom. I can't tell how many times I reinvented the proverbial wheel.  At this point it is around 90 pages and still growing, BUT, Pat and I can see the end of the process. In some ways this has been the hardest of the books because it isn't actually about technique and a new program had to be learned-In Design by Pat. I like the fact that it's has no frills, but is loaded with information and packed with pictures and illustrations.

The last month has been difficult. Pat has been recuperating from 2 surgeries and I have had some type of atypical something that has still left everyone wondering.  I feel fine now and am back to exercising and my better Bones and Balance class. Everything always seems to be behind or running toward major deadlines.

Yesterday I realized that I don't have a piece for the next ATA small format show that fits within the 100 square inch perimeters. I still have a year, but with small format the year slips away really fast. My Orange Kona piece is only half done, but at least it's the hard half. It will be going to ATA unjuried small format show-Enchanted.

I am building a galvanized pipe loom to photograph for the book and to illustrate the Gobelin heddles I used to use all of the time.finall figured out that a entretoise just means arched template.  Of course back then I loved sitting on the floor and weaving. Now I want a chair and cushions for my hip. I started weaving on a galvinized pipe loom in 1978-79. I wove on clear up[ into the 90's.  It was before I could afford my Shannock. It's so easy to put together and adapt and inexpensive. I spent several hours picking up pieces for the loom yesterday. I think the Home Depot people were glad to get rid of me by the time I found all of my bits and pieces for the loom. Things have changed since I built my last galvanized pipe loom. They barely carry galvanized pipe anymore. Everything has moved to copper or plastic pipe.

I think of all the looms I have been trying and researching I am beginning to really like my new Mirrix-best. I loved my hagen, but it's to difficult to get anymore. The heddle system and treadles on the mirrix is quite unique and portable. I am not so fond of reaching up and shifting by hand each shed, but the treadles do away with that problem. I find it to slow and it irritates the scar tissue from my hand surgeries to do for very long at a time.  With the treadles I don't need to worry about my shoulders or my hand pulling treadles or shifting the heddle bar. Also a definite plus when I am demonstrating to students both hands are free to point and weave. I am starting the thinking process for weaving a tapestry on it. Maybe I will weave two tapestries side by side so that I can practice taking one off and continuing weaving on its companion.

Both the Kona piece and “He who Tells...”have some interesting colour phenomena’s that I photographed and am trying to weave in the two pieces. In “He who tells...”I was photographing on Mary’s Peak at sunset what I am now using as the background for the piece and an interesting flash effect occurred. The green grass and trees suddenly flashed red. I was actually able to photograph the happening. I am trying to weave the effect in the background. By rights if you mix red and green you come up with grey or a muddy brown at a distance. I am using chine’s to try and get the effect of the red and green as they mixed in the photo. Logically your mind tells you can't do that because grass and trees are green or red. It almost shimmers. But it's amazing how the two colours when mixed on a bobbin and then woven become one colour and blend together. The Kona orange piece is a mixture of blue and orange to get a slightly foggy appearance as the colours blend together in the hatches and the Chinés. There is black foliage in front of the sunset that makes the orange appear particular bright. The thing that really interested me was the orange didn't seem to affect the bushes and the houses in the fore front. The colour splashes and houses all stayed magenta and turquoise-rather cool contrast to the intense oranges and blues.

The real problem with these colour mixes is they never photograph well or simply disappear in the photo of the work. One ends up trying to explain how the effect is really there, but you can't see it in the photo or slide. They need to be seen in person to get the correct effect. The blending is so subtle especially with the small needle thread tapestries. In some ways the colour relationships defines how you wish to use technique. Is the technique more important than replicating the picture or the design the design? Is there a difference or a new paradigm being created between architectonic, graphic, colour usage and blending almost photo realistic work? Is this starting to take the place in the tapestries some of us create? Well, at least mine. It's definitely a move away from the bold simplified designs that were woven in the past and ruled by Lurçat's dictates about what good tapestry should be. Based on the premise that all colours fade thier for the technique will become the design rather then the colour elements. To me it's more of a revisit to tapestries of the late 1700's a way from the tapestry designs of the apocalypse and earlier. For me and my tapestries not a bad idea!

I wish I could figure out this new blogger problem. It  seems to have a bunch of new features and no spell check.   What is it about us that always wants to change things whether they need it or not.  

Tell next time cheers and all

    
    

Stuff and the not so exciting stuff

Not as far as I would like to be, but with the studio cleaning and all of the other things i have had to do i at least have the hachures set up and the lace begun. if one looks really closely in some of the squares you can see the long jump diagonal soumack i am using to create the x's in the lace. i am still deciding if i like it. Many of the diagonal crossbars are a little over .5 inches. the float of the soumack rides on the surface of the tapestry and adds a raised effect. it looks very much like embroidered cross stitch, but isn't.

The Kona orange tapestry is a little further. i think it is the tapestry that i am going to send into the ATA unjuried show. Good thing i only have to send in the entry form and not the piece.

It's that time of the year when I do resolutions, goal/ guilt setting stuff, and scrunge out the studio. It's been a little harder this last week or so because I seem to have an inflamed nerve in a new place-my ear and scalp. O, well-could be worse-maybe. At least I am not dead and still have the energy to complain work and shake my fist at fate...Talk about trite sounding. I really don't like woe is me, but it seems to be my mood.
For the year I am doing a photo journal-one picture a day and a couple of comments about design. I really wanted to do a daily weaving journal, but realized how impossible that might be when I take off and travel days to weeks at a time several times a year. I really didn't want to set myself up for failure. I do enough of that accidentally with out planning it into a project. AND, doing a weaving journal entry ever day that I weave. I hate loosing the ideas that come unbidden and leave when not honoured. The photo journal is something i have wanted to do for a long time. I like the discipline of deadlines. Since it seems I have discipline only if i set a deadline to finish something. I think I have the personality of a grasshopper rather then the ant in the fable. Which would I rather be-ant grasshopper or butterfly? It is an endless debate as I get older. I know there is no butterfly in the fable, but I think there should be-look at the Monarch butterfly they get vacation in the mountains of Mexico-let alone flit around from flower to flower or idea to idea with no real responsibility. I wonder how long it would take before I was to bored to function?


Please note the reaction i sometimes get from the guys in the peanut gallery before i get my shots in for the day. Fortunately, they are usually in the mood to humour me as i try for one last perfect shot. Love you guys for your patience.

The good news is that the tapestry studio is just about scrunged out and reorganized. I look at some of the things that we have liberated from the corners. The ubiquitous plastic boxes I put everything into in hopes that by hiding it in a plastic box I can deal with it later-an unidentified later, of course. Seems i might be a closet hoarder, but in denial. My logic seems to be that if I put it into something I am really not hoarding. There once was a TV show called Weird, Indiana that had the lady next door storing everything including her children in "foreverware" with whom I tend to identify with. The same town that had a secret department for lost things--in "the loser" episode that all sock pairs missing one sock go to. You know the one sock that is always missing from a pair. The same department that hangers go to breed and take over or disappear into to every time you need one in a hurry. Another stash I wonder about is the cord saving place that we save all cords in because we might need the cord someday, but really have no clue to its relationship to any piece of equipment that is now in the studio or may be in the studio in the future. The cords last longer then the equipment it was meant to be used on. Or the stacks of magazines and papers I might need someday that just gets taller and forgotten because that time hasn't been yet, but when you do need it you have either forgotten you have it or has mysteriously hidden between something. Something and cannot be found for love or money. Added a resolution that I will date all strange pieces of paper and put names by all phone numbers that I write on slips of paper for future reference. ( (ASIDE) Sorry I decided I wanted to look it up and it is Eerie, Indiana not Weird Indiana even though there is one.) Also, Chene' seems to have found a new dessert wrapped electrical cords, but the cord has to be wrapped in a neat coil. He doesn't touch attached cords. He chews through the coils so it ends up in thousands of little pieces waiting to disintegrate when least expected or wanted.

I am slowly weaving on my two pieces. The large format piece isn't difficult. It just seems so large in scale. I keep wondering if I am really comfortable weaving this size-10 epi. I look at the maquette which is exactly half the size of the large format piece and wonder if it would really have been too much to weave a 2 foot tall needle thread tapestry at 20 epi. Then I think what and where would I use it? It wouldn't fit the criteria of any show or exhibit that I enter. Probably not true, but it would be a hassle to find where it belongs. Sometimes weaving the lace feels so coarse, but it is exactly twice the size in warp sett-10 epi. Everything is twice the size of a 20 epi piece. but it feels odd. i will be interesting to see if it still feels over sized in a square foot or two.

Guess there is till no place like home even if you have to scrunge it out and reorganize it very occasionally.

Cheers for now!

HOME! Small format tapestry-20 epi-sewing thread. This is actually my backyard from a hill not to far from here.

Winter Soltice and tax season

Yesterday was the winter solstice. Merry Christmas family and friends. It's 4:30 and the sun is almost down. Night for the most part equals day. The sky is all soft pinks, lavenders and grey blue clouds I love this time of year. Chene', Spencer and I walked down by the river today. It was a nice winter walk. Chene' kept getting lost in the grass that was taller then he is. At least it's better weather then Shane's and the grandkids 3 feet of snow in Maryland. Asa and Kathy get home to Maryland from their tour of the Mediterranean on Christmas eve. They have pictures of tapestries and weavers for me. I like the solitude of my studio this time of the year. Pat is in Washington visiting family for Christmas. I can work with my music full blast without disturbing anyone or I can have absolute quiet and peace for my thoughts and weaving. We did have a little snow up on Marys Peak a few weeks ago. I don't know who was more excited about the snow Spencer or Chene".

My cartoons are now sewn to the looms. Chene' kept inspecting the cartoon every time I laid it out flat so I could see it before I sewed it on-big help. My selvedges are finished. I redid the cartoon for the black leaves in the small Kona piece and I am ready to begin weaving the big piece. The selvedge is done. Colour is next. This is the biggest piece have woven in a while. It is 58 inches by 48 inches- 20 square feet. The big Shannock will be getting a work out. I'll see how long before I crave working smaller on a major piece. I am not so sure this piece might not have made me happier weaving it at 20 epi rather then 10 epi. It would have been almost 24 inches tall if I had and 15 inches wide-really big for a small format/small scale piece. Hopefully the wool piece will feel right and I won't end up reweaving it in sewing thread which has happened before. I started the Kona orange over because I lost the colour in my head and I wanted to start over with the colour in stead of trying to make the colour conform to an old palette that I created in my head to weave the piece. I am glad I did.
Pat will be out of the studio for about a month. She is having foot surgery and 2 weeks later wrist surgery. A big major event that will happen in this time period is a good house cleaning, organizing, clutter removing, and reorganizing the yarns and threads around my looms. I am so tired of the chaos in the studio. I will also be pulling ivy down because we are getting new windows in the up stairs studio in January. The new windows will be nice, energy efficient and will be heavily UV protected to spare the textiles. I have an east and west window that allow a tremendous amount of light into the studio. All while weaving as many hours a day as I can.

Pat and I spent several days photographing warping procedures-bouts, figure 8, circular warping. Warped a small Turkish Old Believers belt loom with a tapestry warp, which we also photographed for the book. I had almost forgotten how to do the heddles. I had forgotten picking the cross of all things. The So Warped book is moving right along. I think the layout and photo stuff is 33% finished. While Pat is laid up she will be working on another major junk of the photo's and layout. We are going to have a working copy of the book by the time i go to Las Vegas to teach. They Will be the first people to read it. Hopefully by CNCH it will to the printers. Pat is convinced it takes 9 months to do a book once you start it. Much like having a baby-Sometimes almost as painful.

Chene' is being a quiet comfortable presence as he sleeps behind me on my chair waiting for me to move to the loom so he can sleep and gnaw on his black pillow to the side of the treadles. There is no peace in the house Rya has seen to that this year. I have chosen not to put ornaments on the tree, but have a tree for the smell. Rya is too untamed and Chene' feels the need to steal everything before Rya can tear it up. The training squirt bottle is working overtime on both of them. Rya has a kitten's energy and we are all his toy from dawn tell the middle of the night. So we hide in the studio silently doing our thing.

Then their is Christmas vacation race to see and do everything before tax season starts and Spencer has to work 12-13 hour days doing taxes. Of course, this all so produces good things in a great hurry. We went to opera on Saturday to see Tales of Hoffman. Loved it. I really liked the muse and the thoughts about doing art-the rebirth of art. etc. Today we saw Avatar. It was incredible. The Naby were so Lakota like and in a way reminiscent of half a dozen movies about plains Indians and a healthy dose of Joesph Campbell mono myth. Wes Studi played the father. AND then you see the credits and realized the movie was made in New Zealand. Talk about universals-or not. -I sometimes wonder what would have happened if I had taken my other path as a cartoonist and animator when I was 20.

Christmas we will see Sherlock Holmes and then spend a couple of days at the coast. Then with the new year I will work long days because Spencer will be working long days and often 6-7 days a week. I do have a couple of students coming to the studio for instruction to break up the long days of waiting for the tax season to end.

I have been spending my spare time trying to get a handle on my soumack and brocade stuff-handouts. I have decided I am going to put them into the form of a monograph that I can sale. I have so many people asking for more information on the lines and soumack that I do. I am including some pictures of what I have been studying lately. I want to do diagrams and pictures. It just seems like at times so much information to get ready for the handouts. Way too much for people to take notes on in a workshop, but not so much to take home and look at another day once having been introduced to the techniques . All this should be ready by the time i teach at at the Northern California weavers conference. Turkish brocade

Brocade Afghani bag and more patterned soumack

Line Soumack-vertical

Brocade or inlay

Guess that's all for now. The last sunset was taken about 10 minutes after the first sunset picture at Yaquina Bay on a perfect Winter day.

Celebrate the solstice!

Between and Betwixt

Between, in the middle of, at intervals, in the midst of, among, betwixt, interjascence, etc, etc, etc. Things barely started and nothing near finishing or even begun enough to have a definitive personality. ..which always seems to morph into waiting, biding time, attend,anticipating, mark time, delay, tarry, lurking, hovering, dangling, wait in suspense,be left hanging...boredom and depression. Well, guess that pretty much covers my feelings for the last week or so. Think I better leave the thesaurus alone for a while. Just another way of killing time is to play the curious game with a book, but so much fun.

Now that I have written the words it feels almost humorous or possibly ironic. They sounds so static and lacking in energy-lackadaisical-almost. I still put in 8 hour + days. I have just added things like holidays, company, shipping times, cooking, Doctor appointments, research and writing.

I decided to start over on one of the Kona Balcony sunsets. I love the photos and the colours I took while setting on the veranda/balcony. Last Friday the electricity went out for about 5 hours. Fortunately, i had finished cooking our Friday Thanksgiving dinner eating in the dark was interesting. I was able to get out my collection of kerosene lamps to helpwith the darkness. My Father-Grampa- couldn't come on Thanksgiving because of a very long standing commitment to deliver Thanksgiving diners to the Elderly and infirm. He's 84. I am not quite sure when he things elderly starts. So, we changed diner to Friday. So when it got to cold we went to see the movie 2012. I kept laughing about valcanos and sky. They really needed a better colourist.
I had been away so long finishing so many chances I had lost the colours in my head. So I am resetting up the warp to start over. I'll need to finish it in the next week or two, because we will be photographing warping the Shannock loom for the So warped book Pat and I are writing.
Part of my research for this week has been the warp weighted loom. When i was requesting photo's of various tapestry looms Fireside Looms offered me a photo of the Sami warp weighted loom. The photo on the left is actually from wikipedia and is a Icelandic loom. I have had a sort of background low key fascination with warp weighted looms since I was at OKAC formerly known as OSAC doing undergraduate work. Marlene Kerrigan who taught Craft history showed slides of Greek pottery with warp weighted looms incised and or painted on the vases. Of course their is also the story of Penelope and Ulysses and of archaeological finds of viking loom weights and weaving. Pat who has a a really good background in Scandinavian weaving informed me that the warping begins with a rep weave that stabilizes and creates the top selvedge. The wefts of the rep become the warps for the tapestry or other weaving that can then be rolled around the top beam with the weighted warps hanging down the front of the loom. I am going to set up a small warp weighted loom. The process is totally fascinating to me. Beating is done with a two handed batten, so, any tapestry would need to be woven straight across the fell line and not up or down in this case.
Adventures of a Beginning Silversmith

Well this is as far as I have gotten. It's starting to come together. The top is laid out. One side is finished and the two sides are ready to sew together. My way of getting around pieces that are two large for me to handle. The pieces will be stitched together with gold thread/wire.







You can sort of make out the letters of the word miracles on the right side of the black paper. The green looking stones are Peruvian Opal and the other stones are died agate. These are the two tapestries that will be inside the box when I finish. Today almost became a little two exciting. I learned several valuable lessons. One, always work with shoes on. Two, always check the torch fittings and make sure they are tight. Three, Remember where the shut off valve is and reach for it first. Four, move fast, panic later. Five, Remembering, it's a good thing to keep Chene' in the house and not the studio when working with silver. No matter how much he wants to be in the studio.

Other then a melted floor, a few flames and scaring myself half to death nothing bad happened. A fitting on my torch head came loose and exploded/popped off the supply line in my hands and I dropped the flaming torch and pieces of the torch on the floor. Andy is going to check my torch for me to make sure I didn't damage anything and I am good to go. Probably not necessary for any reason other then my sanity. Valuable lessons learned without a lot of damage. Andy checked it a few minutes ago and taught me a little more. Helped me mark directions on the tank for turning off the valves. Gave everything a clean bill of and health and I am good to go again.

I am making great strides on a new monograph on Soumack and tapestry. I decided that my handouts for my class at ASCH 2010 were getting to be so many that perhaps they would make a good monogragh. I think I may also be teaching a variation of the class at the Eugene Textile Center. I have had several students come to the studio wanting to learn how I do my lines which are soumack and lacing. This week I also finished writing the chapter on the Old Believer tapestry loom. We just need to photograph the process for So Warped. Pat completed several major sections and layout on warping.

I had two small mentions in national Magazines- Fiberarts for an ATA award and An article about Small Expressions. There is a photo of one of the 3 pieces I had in Small Expressions.
Guess that's all for now.

Bye for now!

"If I could save time in a bottle..."

The beginning of my new tapestry. It's based on a quote from a folk song that Peter, Paul, and Mary made famous. The line is-"And, he who tells a bigger tale will have to tell a lie. That and the Jim Croce song.Time in a bottle. The two songs have been torturing me for the last 2-3 months. they are like a cycling rhyme that is always in the back of my mind. So i decided to design a wool tapestry that is going to be at this point 59 inches by 30 inches and be woven at 10 epi. The cartoon seems to be a little elusive to put on paper. It's been a sound in my head rather then an image. I had fun drawing and cutting up the images of one of my Grandmother's doilies for the corner and surrounding one of the peonies. The falling corked bottle with numbers or times is an old magnesium bottle I have in in my studio for years. The bottle glass starts out clear and when left in the sun they turn purple. There are more puzzle images and a banner that i adapted from a 17th Spanish tapestry. The clock face is the back of a raptor in flight. The peonies 3 of them are adapted from my drawings and photographs that I have taken over the years. The sunset pictured here is the probable backgound for my new piece. I took this photo at Mary's Peak just outside of Philomoth Oregon on a very cold evening.

I should be further, but I have been working on my book So Warped. Pat Spark and I are writing it together. Pat is one of the few people I would trust to write this book with me. She is incredibly knowledgeable about anything that has to do with a loom. Before she was a felter she was a tapestry weaver. I am working on a very special section about the loom that the Turkish Old Believers weave tapestry belts up on. It's been a few years since I have used the loom. Let alone tried to remember all of the steps to warping and weaving on the loom.The belt to the right is a Turkish Old Believer belt that is woven in tapestry. The loom is a type of backstrap loom and has interesting heddles. The belts are woven 3 at a time and are highly symbolic and are identifiers of the church members. The belt designs no longer designate a place or a village-only what the weaver thought was a beautiful design.They are given as gifts, requests for prayer, on all special occasions including birth, weddings and death. They symbolize the wearer as being wrapped in the arms of the church and of Christ. The more common type of belt to be woven on this loom is a warp faced warp replacement pickup. On the left are is the more common style of belt woven on the loom. In the center is the loom without the weaver in the center. The loom is made to hook into or onto the belt that is always worn by the Old Believer.

I am still studying soumack. i have been reading everything I can find on it by Marla Mallert. She has an incredible web site that is just stuffed with information. I also have used her book on woven structures as a resource. The other book that is very helpful in my studies of soumack is a book written by David Fraser-A Guide to Weft Twining... Soumack can be broken into two categories one is a construct that creates a ground fabric and the other floats over the ground fabric, but is always controlled directionally by the placement of the warps. On the tapestry list some one called it a surface design as opposed to a ground fabric. So my question is --can a tapestry that has soumack lines be entered into surface design competitions?

Chene's new kitten Rya/Wry and her facial markings and for the knot because he has tufts of very long white fur mixed with shorter black soft Persian hair. He is half Persian. Ryaa was raised with a doberman pincher. At this point he weighs close to 4 lbs and Chene' has topped out at a slight bit over 5 lbs. Pyewacket ways 13 lbs. Rya has huge feet and we expect him to be 2-3 times bigger then Chine' . Chene's still in shock that Rya doesn't behave like a cat should and run from his kingly majestic self.
I am not sure that Rya doesn't think that that Chene" is an over grown rat that's the way he treats him. They wrestle and chase each other all around and up down our two story house. Chene' is totally bent because already Rya can get up on things such as the bed with out being lifted up like he has to be lifted. It's pretty hilarious.

Yes we did see Turandot Saturday. It was live feed. We loved it. Still have never figured out why Calipha didn't find away to dump Turandot for her evil nasty ways and keep the Liu the slave. Put Liu was at least compensated by having the best lyrics and best arias. So maybe there is a little justice. The costuming and sets were wonderful and designed by the same designer and producer as the movie Romeo and Juliet in the very early 70's.

Okay, This seems to be enough for now!
kathe