I’ve been contemplating space in relationship to the artist. Is that what really what I’ve been doing all this time? Yes. Well. Yes. I suppose it has a something to do with not having a designated space to work for the past two years. I tend to float when this happens. This is a choice that I made. It isn’t that I feel deprived of a proper studio. ‘ve been sort of willingly and pleasantly adrift in a sea of ideas and inspiration with no particular place to manifest. I realized just recently that I had not deconstructed and vacated The Crow’s Nest as well as I could have and that I have unfinished business there. I’m not sure where to begin connecting the dots so I’ll go back to one relevant point in time, eleven years ago.

The photographs in this article are from an installation by artist Fumio Tachibana. The photographer is Yasuhide Kuge. This exhibition was the first time I had consciously experienced the artist, his inspiration, materials, work, and working space as inseparable. Tachibana is someone who has mastered the art of evocation. The re-purposing and re-imagining of “fragments” woven or arranged into a new whole is a important concept in my own work.

His subject is Clara, a fashion institute for western style dressmaking in Japan, founded and run by Motoko and Shiro Koike in 1923. They also published a fashion magazine called Yosai Shunju. The building was demolished and the magazine banned during World War 2 in 1944. I’ll take a wild guess that anything to do with western culture was not at all popular in Japan during that time. Motoko revived the institute as a classroom studio in the 1950s. When the studio was dismantled, Fumio Tachibana collected and reorganized the fragments of Motoko’s work and materials (drawings, sketches, dressmaking patterns, postwar Japanese handbills, wrapping paper, silk thread, and printing equipment) into a large scale installation of new artworks and arrangements in their own space so that the classroom itself was part of the work. There is something powerful going on here in that Motoko’s presence is strongly felt in the photographs.

Source: Communion W, 2001 Curator: Can Wong

While sorting through the old books at the Horticultural Center, I picked up a musty old tome which I thought was a history of gardening. It turned out to be a book about alchemy and the construction of various types of stills. Most chapters focus on use of plants by the Puritans of New England for herbal medicines and tonics. However, it does occasionally veer off into herbal lore and “the chemical art” of the early alchemists. The book was in rough shape, water damaged and falling apart so the scans are not so nice. Of course, I had to offer up a few bits of it, since this blog threads together the subjects of my fascination – art, old books, gardening, and alchemy. Included among these tattered pages, is a hand drawn map from the 1600s of the area where I now live and work. Sadly, it was too faded and ink smeared to scan well.

“The fifth chapter deals with the sum total of background knowledge applied by the settlers to their task of growing, distilling, and preserving all they would need for both meate and medicine. The sixth deals with ‘the meate’ and the seventh with ‘the medicine’ for which they felt sure so many plants were intended”. – Anne Leighton

“A satirical portrait of the vain Englishman of the time, Henry VIII, so keen on being in the latest style that he strides along with a length of woolen cloth over his arm, unable to decide what rayment to wear”.

In William Lawson’s ‘New Orchard and Garden’ the "falling gardens" are shown below 2 large squares devoted to fruit trees, one for an elaborate design of garden knots, and two for the kitchen gardens.

“In order to succeed, your desire for success should be greater than your fear of failure.”

This quote scrolled past me today, somewhere in my travels. I liked it and snagged it. Now I forget who said it. Bill Cosby?

C.P. McDill and I have been talking about fear and anxiety in this context. I always pay attention to synchronicity. Sometimes inspirational quotes are thought of as hokey. I think they are helpful. Besides, it’s okay to be hokey. Why not? Fear literally is the mind killer. It can also be a mind virus that is spread around to others. What I observe is that the media and various authorities in our lives attempt to keep us in a constant state of anxiety and fear. Why? Sometimes it is a bad habit and not deliberate. There is quite a lot of subtle peer approval awarded for negativity and cynicism. We become trained to police each other in this manner.

Sometimes though, it is part of a design to keep us in a state of mind that is dis-empowered, more easily controlled, and perhaps more accepting of injustices and absurdities. One certainly can not be audacious if the mind is kept focused on fear and failure. As always, I am speaking to myself as much as to anyone else when I write up this kind of thing. Expel the “bad fairies” from your mind.

“Do one thing every day that scares you.” – Eleanor Roosevelt

Various experiments and works in progress. Larger images are available on Flickr. Just click on the pictures.

These are the art books that were left out of my art books are love post on Valentine’s Day. They were spread all about the studio and when collected made quite a pile. I thought I should include them, seeing as these are the books most currently referenced, they are probably the most important. The difficult to read titles are Ray Johnson’s “Correspondence” and Shirin Neshat’s catalog from one of the most amazing art exhibitions I have ever experienced. It was in Edinburgh’s fabulous Fruitmarket Gallery and it literally choked me up. That doesn’t happen often, especially at modern art shows. The rest of the studio book collection is in this previously mentioned post

Here are two of my favorite things combined, art and the beach. Discovered the work of Jim Deneven and thought I’d share. He does this freehand with a stick. There is something so beautiful about ephemeral art. It emphasizes the experience of the art process without concern for object. It is being in and of the moment, something important about art and self that is so easy for us to be distracted from or to simply just forget. In a way, the ephemeral speaks to us of the the importance of memory and mindfulness.

There are more images on the artist’s website.

This is another experiment with working dry. I “painted” the surface with composted endpapers by ripping it strategically and hand-stitching it to linen. Then I drew on the paper (ink, pastel, crayon, pencil) and embellished it with embroidery.

Denny Crane claims that the secret to life and success is to pull a rabbit out of your hat. I’ve decided that since everything around me seems to be reversed (as in upside down and backwards) that the secret to health and happiness is to follow the rabbit down the hole and through the looking glass. You don’t necessarily have to take the rabbit out of the hat first. I usually forget that part and it always works out just fine.

C.P. McDill and I just finished completely gutting my workspace and the creative process along with it. The “crow’s nest” that we use for a studio is the attic of our tiny cottage. It has a low ceiling of only 6′ at the highest point. The previous owner had installed a drop ceiling and glued down wall to wall carpet which made it seem even more cramped and office like. We ripped out the drop ceiling, liberated the wooden rafters, exposed and sanded down the lovely hidden wood floorboards. C.P. installed full spectrum lighting and painted the walls and ceiling a warm brilliant white. The difference is amazing. It’s so bright and warm as well as feeling much larger than it actually is. Then we created a more open floor plan with two work tables, one for wet media and the other for textiles and paper.

“We can no longer physically read the book, so in that way it is made redundant; and yet on another level it has taken on a new life and is telling a different story.”

This is from the artist statement for Su Blackwell. These are called book cut sculptures. I found the link through Blue Tea and I’ve never seen anything like them. It was fascinating to read Su Blackwell’s description of her process and how it relates to my own work with books and manuscripts, even though our results are so different. It’s nice to find another book pirate who loves the alchemical transformation of pages into artifacts as much as I do. She also uses mythic and storybook themes in her work.

“The wear on my books, as physical objects, holds their history and makes my relationship with their contents immediate and visceral. The books I carry when I travel get stained and frayed, and the damage tells a story. I love second-hand books that have been marked up with pencil because I can see what was important to the person who read it before me.”

The installations of Jennifer Angus gives new meaning to the expression “fly on the wall”. I find this work aesthetically pleasing but I really don’t know how I feel about it, which is part of the reason it fascinates me. I think there are several elements combined here that are interesting; perception shifts using displaced natural elements and the ability to rearrange space in an evocative manner. Insects are simultaneously beautiful and terrible, alien and familiar. These exhibits also shift me a little sideways and that is always a welcome if disconcerting experience.

“Western culture in particular has a certain hysteria when it comes to insects. They are symbols of dirtiness, disease and decay. In other cultures, insects hold religious significance or at least a measure of respect, be they food, medicine, embellishment or pets. ” – Jennifer Angus, Artist’s Statement

“I am an ant wrangler. And ants are, as we all know, tireless workers. So if you get a project that they can do, they’ll do it. And there’s no questions asked. No unions. I had ants in my kitchen, and they are little, small what they call I think sugar ants, but they are coming in I think for water. I made a small head of cheese and turkey. I put a ball of cheese and turkey together and then cased it with clay, and mounted it on a small coathanger. I made an opening in the mouth, I exposed some turkey in the eye and in the ears. Now the ants found the coathanger, began climbing in for four days and nights non-stop and emptied the entire head of turkey and cheese.” – David Lynch

The heat wave has broken so I will post an article and then work in the studio for awhile. It has been too hot to be in the crow’s nest where my work space and office are located. I’ve been sitting in the first floor kitchen which is more or less below ground, in front of a fan ripping stitches and sorting embroidery threads and materials for work on another tapestry. I keep my mind and hands busy when it is difficult to concentrate. The situation in Lebanon doesn’t do much for inspiration so I have to work though on pure coffee and spice.

I distract myself with pretty books, ideas for art making. I tracked down used copies of Shining Cloth which is sort of a textiles version of the Amulets book and also Relicarios, a book of devotional miniatures from the Americas. Why do I allow myself to be seduced by books when I am always trying to get rid of my possessions? I think I make exceptions for anything related to my work. Ideas for current projects are considered exempt from the “no collecting” rule but this can be dangerous.

Otherwise, I am in recycle and reuse mode and refuse to buy materials until I find a clever use or a new home for every single fragment and scrap within these walls. I have piles and piles of fabric and mirrors and metals and threads and ribbons so I work with C.P. McDill on torans and tapestries and a large quilt for our bed. This is something that we can do on the porch or in the garden or anywhere else when we do not want to be in the crow’s nest. He taught himself embroidered mirror work yesterday. I did not help him at all. I’m impressed.

From “Shining Cloth”

The Obi is a Japanese wearable art form from the Nishijin region.

This man is a king of the Kuba people. His cowrie shell regalia is a sign of wealth and prestige and a tribute to the Kuba ancestor god Woot! Isn’t he glorious. You will think of him the next time you say “Woot!”

From “Relicarios”

I tend to favor Mexican style of relicarios.

The Mexican tin and mica relicarios resemble some of the northern Indian tin work and I think this kind of frame would also go well with my painting style.

I just rediscovered the work of Father Paul Plante on a website for a New York City gallery called Mixed Greens. I am excited to see his new work and that he is doing well. I love his philosophy as well as his art. I think I once read that he makes one of these small works every evening as a kind of meditiation. His is the first art that I ever collected and could afford. I have his Weedy Seadragon and one other pastel of a bird’s eye which I purchased at the Nielsen Gallery in Boston. These two little pastels are still my favorites. They are both hanging in the main room of our seaside cottage.