Minding my maps

Merriam-Webster defines  map :

1 a:  a representation usually on a flat surface of the whole or a part of an area

b:  a representation of the celestial sphere or a part of it

2 :  something that represents with a clarity suggestive of a map

~ the Freudian 'map' of the mind -- Harold Bloom

so I got to thinking ....

could photographs act just as easily as maps of a  life?

If I mapped myself, what might that look like?

And if I focused on, say, my creative life, would it be telling?

Could I show the route from back there 

to here?

So I gave it a try & here's where it led me ...

To the convergence of paper and books

to beads on cloth with an uncertain latitude

towards an elusive north star

with an ever present guiding light

and a dear navigator who teaches all the compass points.

Just a small smattering of map pages - old directions & new ...

so yes,  I can see how I got here

but perhaps the more important question is

just where am I going?

[ this is where a hushed voice offers, "Only the cartographer knows for sure..." ]

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Life is not lived in a straight line

"There isn't one right path for you or anyone else.

And there isn't a set of timelines of milestones ...

You're allowed to backtrack.

You're allowed to figure out what inspires you

at different stages of your life.

You're allowed extra time when you need it.

Life is meant to be a series of zigs and zags.

It should look like a mess, but a beautiful mess.

It shows that you have changed and grown.

You've had your ups and downs.

You went down one path, but decided to change course ...

perhaps on many occasions.

That's how life should be."

~ Angel Chernoff ~

First, I'd like to start by saying  Thanks  to each of the kind folks who've written

wondering where I'd wandered off to and why.

A disappearance wasn't planned, but it began and then it felt totally natural

and right to follow and to somehow trust that'd I'd know where I was meant to go

once I got there,

which wasn't to be here it seemed, blogging.

Except now it  is.

Have I confused you completely already?

To backtrack: I resorted to a few fairly strict measures to bring my body back to

some semblance of rightness, and again, I felt inclined to keep my concentration there

and not out here telling everyone about it.

Which is not my way anyway.

So while that was on the slow road to sorting itself out

I unexpectedly found myself on a new threshold

- literally -

when a space I'd put my name on a waiting list for suddenly became available.

This was a dream come true.

A small space for a textile / beading / photography studio ... at last.

Room to stretch my wings, dive into multiple projects at a time, close the door

on big beautiful messes  without having to clean up first  and then 

return the next day to pick right up where I'd left off.

And one of the best bits is that I can bring my dear doggy.

That's her new sleeping spot over there on the left wall

although I think she prefers the little rug by the door actually.

That quote up top from Angel popped into my email this morning and

as I read it, I knew today was the day to say a little something here.

I'll keep it short for the moment

[in truth, I am feeling somewhat rusty at this]

but I have quite a few tales to catch up on,

many pictures to share,

and I'm greatly looking forward to being out here with you all again.

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bead sketches : month two

And now there are 8 ...

February's collection - month two of my '52 weeks : bead sketches' project - is finished.

More playing relentlessly,

more diving deep,

more showing up faithfully.

I also did a lot of wondering about why I haven't imposed 

a project like this on myself before.  In truth I suppose because the time is NOW

and I wasn't where I needed to be to take this on before now.

Just showing up to do the work has great benefits.

I'll write more on that subject later as thoughts solidify, but for now

I've an amazing sense of freedom with this work / play

that I've never, 

ever

had before.

There's surely a lesson in this approach for me

although I can't put it all into words yet.

For this month I thought it might be of interest if I noted where

my inspiration, or word prompts, or weekly idea came from.

They are written below each photograph with links.

~ bugle bead inspiration arose from HERE ~

~ exploring some thoughts about THIS ~

~ describing in materials the meaning of THIS PHRASE ~

~ experimenting with the pattern of THESE ~

Feels  so good  to be back with my beads.

: : :

Postscript:  A few hours after I published this post I came across some

excellent words that seem to fit right in so I've come back to note them.

You don’t need more motivation or inspiration to create the life you want. You need less shame around the idea that you’re not doing your best. You need to stop listening to people who are in vastly different life circumstances and life stages than you tell you that you’re just not doing or being enough. You need to let timing do what it needs to do. You need to see lessons where you see barriers. You need to understand that what’s

right now  becomes inspiration later.

by Jamie Varon, from 'To Anyone Who Thinks They're Falling Behind'

: : :

To view all of the  52 weeks : bead sketches  posts, starting with the most recent,

CLICK HERE

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bead sketches : month one

When I wrote the following on Dear Flora last month,

"Something new for what is feeling like a glorious new year on the horizon.

Thought it might be time to embark on a yearlong adventure ... 52 weeks

of 3-inch squares and the discovery of all the tiny worlds I can create

within them. I have no idea where this is going,

but go I must ... "

what I didn't mention was that I was going on this journey mainly to

play with beads again.  We'd taken a break, my bead family and I.  You know how it is

when you have to step away for a while in order to come back with fresh eyes,

a renewed heart?

I'd been away for so long that many new bead varieties had hit the markets without me

and I'd been growing steadily more curious about how to integrate them

into bead embroidery work.  Compound this with all the hand dyed

cloth I'd been amassing, explorations with paper, metals and all sorts

of sundry textiles and what was building felt nothing short of a crisis of making ...

I needed to dive.

I needed to stop dreaming and start doing.

For the last year or so I've noticed myself being attracted to the projects

of others who'd committed themselves to creating something/anything on a steady schedule.

Committed.  Key word.

Schedule.  Key word.

Be they daily poems or sketches, weekly paintings or mixed media collages, 

even a gorgeous pair of knitted socks per month, folks were dedicating themselves to

show up ... do the work.  Best of it was, they were gaining much from 

this kind of discipline.  They talked about it - they were having breakthroughs.

Their new creative "habit" was renewing confidence &

providing fertile ground for inspiration.

This, to my mind, was a healthy choice of how to invest ones time.

So I had a good long think about what I could stomach doing for the long haul.

Having really blown it in the past was actually helpful for not setting goals

to outrageously out there ... 20/20 hindsight & all that.

Size was going to be critical.  Beads are [mostly] tiny little pretties

and the last thing I wanted was a demanding blank space shouting, "Fill me up!"

So learning from a previous 6-inch disaster I first cut the size in half.

Another extremely important aspect of setting parameters was allowing

for the element of  play  ... I did not want to produce a *finished* square each week.

Instead, how freeing to simply play with ideas & materials

and just see where that took me.

Hence the name, bead sketches - not particularly clever, but to the point.

Without the pressure of having to finish something each week I found

month one an extremely enjoyable enterprise.  As each new week rolled around I

picked up whatever caught my fancy in the moment & started from there.

I wondered what would happen if I paired this with that,

then tried it.  I experimented with edge treatments & extending beyond

the exact space while allowing the materials to dictate the direction.

There were mess-ups - like joining methods, thread issues, fabric limitations -

which sent the beads all wonky-doodle ...

but I sure know a lot more now then if I'd never started.

Little templates to explore some ideas every week.

Slow and steady ... just show up.

Play relentlessly.

I'm really liking how this feels.

:::

It would be immensely enjoyable to hear about your experiences.

If you are someone who's ever [or currently] embarked on a daily, weekly,

even monthly practice, your comments about the process are most welcome here.

If you'd like to share a link where we can come and see what you made during the process,

please do.  I think the sharing could be very advantageous indeed.

Thank you for stopping by.

"I have no idea where this is going, but go I must ..."

: : :

To view all of the  52 Weeks : Bead Sketches  posts, starting with the most recent,

CLICK HERE

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Closure :: metaphors in cloth

~ details on silk lace blouse, made by Vernon, 1915-1917 courtesy of Digitalt Museum ~

~ dress by Mariano Fortuny, ca. 1939 via The Costume Institute of the

Metropolitan Museum of Art ~

~ silk stomacher ca. 1720, The Metropolitan Museum of Art ~

~ boro & mending, from the book 'Boro - Rags and Tatters From the Far North of Japan' ~

~ garment design by Isabel Toledo, from the exhibit/book

 'Fashion From the Inside Out' ~

~ Paul, 1999, by Jackie Nickerson from the 'Farm' series ~

~ Peony Dress, Hand, San Francisco, 1997 by Linda Elvira Piedra

from 'The Story of My Love' ~

~ 'Savage Beauty' ensemble by Alexander McQueen, spring/summer collection 2001 ~

~ pattern on dress form, photographer unknown, France ~

~ photo by Lin & Jirsa ~

~ interior seam of boro jacket, sashiko stitched, from Sri Threads ~

~ pieced dress by Gibbous Fashions ~

~ detail from silk evening coat by Paul Poiret, ca 1912, The Metropolitan Museum of Art ~

~ photo by Emmanuelle Brisson, from the series 'L'air frissonne des choses qui

s'enfuient' (The Air Shivers of Things Fleeing) ~

Closure

clo・sure

noun

1.  the act or process of closing, or the state of being closed.

2.  an end or conclusion

2.  a sense of resolution or finality at the end of an artistic work.

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Natural progression ... of sorts

We've had a long stretch of uninterrupted bone-chilling cold.

The second heat lamp in the pump house has been kept on

[ not good to risk frozen pipes with our primary water source ]

but nothing stops the back pond from freezing over;

much to the chagrin, I imagine, of the small band of buffleheads

that paddled around in sweet abandon for a week prior.

Wonder where they've gone off to now?

The ice crystals criss-cross in a beautifully random manner.

Knitting seems to be primarily a winter habit for me ... dunno why.  

It's a soothing activity in the long hours of darkness.  I'm not much good at it

[ close inspection would reveal many wabi-sabi mistakes ] but I enjoy my time with it nonetheless.

The season has arrived, for this bit of lacy indigo recently came off the needles

and this green scarf-lette jumped on next.

Fell in love with this nubby yarn ... a blend of 70% silk 30% cotton

called  summer tweed in the colorway  Hedgerow

Very light ... shall come in handy on my summer travels when an 

evening breeze next to some bonny shore

has me reaching for an extra pinch of warmth.

Had to order an especially long pair of circular needles for this one

as my longest edge will be 52 inches.

Whoever invented the circulars should be awarded a Nobel prize,

don't you think?

So, late yesterday a pleasant walk with the dogs took us round the far back side

of the pond where we hadn't ventured in quite some time.  There are two

"wrapped trees" back there and it's been my practice to check up on them occasionally,

see how the cloth is faring ....

oh my

what a surprise

to discover the downed willow was missing its wrap!

And not only was the the cloth gone, but

the tree had been severely gouged by wandering deer

who'd used it for a scratching post

If you've been visiting here for awhile you may remember its earlier days ...

Here's the photo I posted four years ago showing the fresh wrap

[ notice the willow hadn't grown any lateral shoots yet ]

~ newly wrapped, September, 2010 ~

This piece of old cutwork cotton was from a tablecloth

I found at the thrift store.  So pristine, so   WHITE    back then ...

Then, just two years ago this is how it looked, greening up nicely from the lichen

and lord knows what else.

~ January, 2012 ~

~ May, 2013 ~

By spring of last year, the top portion had slipped some although the binding cloths

were still holding fast.  I contemplated removing it at this point but my curiosity 

won out and I decided to wait some more.

At that time, I was the last holdout amongst the members who'd

joined 'wrapt, tied and marked by nature' 

[ the blog has since been removed by its owner so I'm unable to provide the link to all the stories ]

... an interesting group project which involved about 8 of us from 

different areas of the world who wrapped cloth around parts of trees, 

leaving them for a period of  six months or more

in order to see what marks Mother Nature might provide.

We then recorded our results on the group blog, exchanged ideas, encouragement, etc.,

great fun overall.

Other climates produced very different results and

since I saw zero change after six months,

I decided to just keep going.

I wish I'd copied my original posts from the group blog

where I described in great detail the varieties of trees and the types of 

cloth I used for each.  Alas, all is not lost for I still have all the photographs spanning

the years, if not my written words.

But back to the fallen willow ....

After rooting around in the leafy detritus piled underneath,

lo and behold I found a scrap - ONE scrap of the original tablecloth !

I had visions of local deer galavanting about the woods with cutwork

dangling from their antlers -- what a sight that would be --

for what other conclusion was there than they'd scratched all

the rest away?

It's barely holding together.  Quite a fragile delicate thing now.

Once it's dried I'll carefully lay it out flat, assess what's really become of it

and make a decision about what's to follow.

First it was found,

then it was dyed ...

I may already know what comes next.

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Hanging out with squares

You could say I've been making the [re]acquaintance of squares ...

as silly as it sounds, Instagram might be to blame.  Which won't make much sense to

non-users so to clarify:  Instagram, the online mobile photo-sharing & networking service,

has the distinctive feature of confining photos to a square format.

If you want to post there your image must fit into a square

so if you didn't shoot it that way to begin with, it's resized to fit.

Remember the Polaroids of old?

Framing within the rectangular 4:3 aspect ratio almost exclusively for most of my life

left me, at first, fighting for elbow room within this equal-sided confined space.

But before too long, I wondered what was so bad about a little size challenge anyway? 

Surely this leap wasn't going to be as great as dumping my film cameras

in trade for digital?

That was enormously difficult.

Fast forward a year or so ...

Forward through a whole lot of practice/editing time

while commuting on the ferries,

forward through lots of "window seat" opportunities to try this, try that, ask what if ...

Alternative worlds were tried on - my app-aholic time, I called it.

It took a while to sort of tweak my viewpoint

but making the subject matter fit into a

perfectly

symmetrical

BOX

finally became not such a conscious struggle.

So what's come from all this?

A hefty file of ferry photos for one ...

During all weathers, ranges of light, in transit & not;

daytime, mid-darkness to ethereal at midnight; 

looking up, behind, out, across the rails or beyond -

laden with tourists in the high season,  deliciously empty & silent in the off ...

and at times, strangely decorated ...

My island wandercloth became a textile installation afloat

near Waldron Island

[yup, there's an app for that].

Somewhere along this mobile photography journey I began to follow an info-packed blog

called, "Art of Mob" compiled by Geri Centonze.  Wowza.  App reviews, tutorials,

fab interviews ... chock full.  I noticed Geri ran the occasional *challenge* on Instagram.

Planes, Trains and Automobiles  [any mode of rapid transit] was the chosen subject recently

so I thought, what the heck, I've got ferries ...

Twas the rope composition which floated me onto the  showcase

but I want to mention that I couldn't have done it without 

Distressed FX texture app ...

*  thank you  *

Now it seems the whole square option is sneaking its way into other aspects

of my once rectangular life.

'splash' went decidedly that direction without hesitation ...

and today's gathering of leaves got into the act ...

during the lineup for the seasonal portrait

they arranged themselves

just so.

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