Getting Ready

I haven't accomplished a lot of stitching or felting recently but I have done a load of desktop publishing to get ready for my exhibit at the Downtown Kingsport Association's gallery.

I'm really looking forward to interacting with visitors as well as with my inspiration and materials. So please spread the word and I hope to see you there!

Speaking of Trees . . .

Yesterday we went to the Eastman Recreation Area at the bottom of Bays Mountain in Kingsport, TN (where we live). There's a great little stream there--lots of rocks to walk across--as well as scads of gorgeous trees. There are so many varieties.

My youngest whittled herself a wand, my oldest played frisbee with her dad and grandad, the grands took a short walk, the kids and I popped balloons with the sun and a magnifying glass, I whooped them at tether ball.

Every once in a while we'd hear an enormous CRACK and realized eventually that it was walnut fruits hitting the metal roofs of picnic shelters. Grandpa also found a beautiful hulled chestnut. Life was quiet (except for the ocassional CRACK or POP) and wonderful.

And on our way to the car I saw these leaves. Aren't they cool?

I love the symetry and the asymetry of them. I am intrigued by the almost-but-not-quite right angles, and by how the veins are prominent on the outside edges of the bottom two points and almost nonexistent on the side near the center vein. And I think it's pretty cool how they fit into the rectangular field of my camera so tidily.

I see a work in here. Hmmmmm.

Duh! Can't see the forest for the trees!

I've been working on a second wool painting. Because I'm a glutton for punishment, I decided that since the first hard and shiny subject worked so well, I should do another hard and shiny subject. And I chose hard and shiny . . . and iridescent . . . and transparent carnival glass. What was I thinking?

The hard and shiny and iridescent and transparent parts are not the biggest problems, though. Carnival glass is also cut glass with lots of facets. And wool roving doesn't really want to do fine detail. But that still isn't the biggest problem. That took someone else to pinpoint, someone who was not invested in the piece. An objective observer. Tony Henson

After I explained my process and griped and winged a little, he said, "So it's sort of like me trying to make a realistic drawing of you on a regular sheet of paper with an inch-wide hunk of charcoal."

Well, yes, it is very much like that. The problem is not any of the difficult things I am tackling, but rather the scale at which I'm tackling them.

Thank you, Tony!

So yesterday I pulled the carnival glass off my foam and set up a still life to work on at a large scale.

I'll be doing this on a lovely dark green and blue wool backing I dyed. And once I've been successful in this medium again perhaps I'll retackle the carnival glass. On a much larger scale. Duh!