tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-81712905102836171312025-03-31T00:17:21.111-06:00Artist Books and Fibre Studio of Linda M. CunninghamLindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12788520568413440337noreply@blogger.comBlogger240125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-90398693441397350512018-01-01T14:21:00.000-07:002018-01-01T14:21:10.931-07:00

The time has flown by since my last blog post at the beginning of June! By the end of that month, I officially owned a vehicle again, and took three days to drive from Vancouver to Calgary, one of which was spent visiting wineries south of Okanagan Falls. I ended up with two full cases that have ranged from good to exquisite (the latter referring to the 2014 Blue Mountain sparkling wine I had

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-42671258013746423162017-06-06T09:27:00.000-06:002017-06-06T09:27:00.276-06:00

Part of my ongoing recovery has been walking: I’ve always been “a walker” having grown up in a house where taking a stroll after dinner was part of my family’s evening routine as a child. But it was prescribed after my surgery in November, and except in the depth of winter, not been much of a challenge. Unlike last year, when we really didn’t have much of a “winter” here in Calgary, it’s been

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-27840751476256994392017-04-21T11:33:00.000-06:002017-04-21T11:33:25.773-06:00

When most people hear the word “cancer,” they expect the worst possible consequences. And for many people, that’s what they get. For whatever reason, my experience has been quite the opposite. From finding the squishy benign cyst on June 24 last year, to the malignant lump underneath that was removed November 10 (and having full motion on that side within two days), and finally

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-66190572893623978772017-03-02T10:45:00.000-07:002017-03-05T15:32:22.570-07:00

While I had an initial reluctance to submit a piece for the inaugural Alt Alt DIY Performance Festival in Saskatoon the first weekend of January, I eventually decided I wanted to continue exploring some of the work I had done as part of One Yellow Rabbit’s Summer Lab Intensive last summer by actually performing craft. My initial submission was related to “spinning a story” and I thought long

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-6567601612608077062017-03-01T17:14:00.000-07:002017-03-01T17:14:03.433-07:00

Yes, there’s been a big lapse since the last entry in October, but not for a lack of things to write about! From the time I stepped off the plane, returning from Denver, much of the time has been a blur: straight into a long house-sit, facing a big grant deadline, and then the beginning of the resolution of medical problems initially discovered in June. Part of the process was made easier

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-13670082904413913442016-10-09T16:07:00.000-06:002016-10-09T16:14:24.981-06:00

Morning rush hour traffic jam The main purpose of my adventure to Colorado was a two-week artist residency in the city of Salida, a three-hour bus ride down US 285 that’s mostly south, a bit west, and 2,000 feet up from Denver. “City” is a bit of a misnomer though, because while it is the county seat it’s only 5,500 souls big. With a lovely historic downtown, a well-known and heavily used

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-35632215867229893462016-09-14T18:49:00.000-06:002016-09-14T18:49:14.215-06:00

Apart from the one stop in Stapleton airport and a ski trip (by bus) to Steamboat Springs, both many years ago, I had never spent time in Colorado until I arrived in Denver on Tuesday last week. It’s a stunning airport, and even though it’s large — I had to take a train from my terminal to pick up my baggage before picking up the rail line into the city — my baggage arrived. Quickly, even. I’m

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-78583555215606342662016-08-26T15:44:00.002-06:002016-08-26T15:46:00.134-06:00

Well, The 55 Days of Crazy turned into The 74 Days of Crazy before I quit counting: trying to sort out everything that happened, especially during One Yellow Rabbit’s Summer Lab Intensive, will be a process that I don’t see a definitive end for in the foreseeable future. In some ways, that’s not a bad thing: so many ideas spinning around within the room with my fellow students has spilled over

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-83382968335966986912016-07-18T11:11:00.000-06:002016-07-18T12:04:25.806-06:00

I always knew the last half would be hard: three solid weeks of One Yellow Rabbit’s Summer Lab Intensive, followed by a full week of volunteering at the Stampede. Heck, just the week at the Stampede is hard enough. Our days as Labbits (as participants in the Lab are known) quickly developed a pattern, with mornings were taken up with movement: anywhere from sixty to ninety minutes of yoga, a

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-10970544041512874162016-06-19T15:43:00.000-06:002016-06-19T15:43:28.247-06:00

One advantage of having family that possesses a crabbing licence is the likelihood of a fresh-trapped meal. Within 30 minutes of leaving the water, these big boys were in my cousin's sink, struggling in vain to get out. Yes, Weapons of Crab Destruction (i.e., a hammer and pliers) were used effectively to dispatch them humanely, although I was fascinated by how long the pincers kept trying

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-30685005491749343972016-06-19T15:05:00.000-06:002016-06-19T15:05:46.256-06:00

I've known for a few months that from mid-May to mid-July was going to be pretty busy, and as I now find myself halfway through, I've had a couple of days at home to reflect on the first stretch, which involved a lot of travelling, and plan for the next, which will be much more introspective, although equally exciting and exhausting. One of the best parts of travelling, for me, is being able

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-61452254404781567182016-05-14T13:43:00.001-06:002016-05-15T17:57:19.203-06:00

The last two weeks of house-sitting were crammed with too many things crowding my brain, and I'm still trying to resolve what remains: this is typical, but I was more keen than usual to find a way to avoid most of them. As is my usual modus operandi, I resorted to abandoning the city for the countryside. First up was actually going south and east to Ralph Klein Park when it was open: I had

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-54205241458443869062016-05-08T16:14:00.000-06:002016-05-08T16:14:44.517-06:00

If you own a pair of blue jeans, you're familiar with indigo, the dye used to colour them. Indigo, which is a legume like peanuts, has a long and fascinating history and while not the most straight-forward procedure to get the dye into the cloth, it's not that challenging if you have all the supplies and a proper studio in which to work. As I don't, I took advantage of a half-day class with

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-79114233218995924322016-04-16T16:30:00.000-06:002016-04-16T16:30:04.613-06:00

Although it's been painfully dry here in the city, and virtually all of the snow melted ages ago, the Bow River is still fast-flowing, especially downstream of where the Elbow meets it. The level's not that high -- yet -- but a recent wander along the southern shore in Inglewood surprised me with the speed of the water. There are also a growing number of summer residents arriving and setting

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-70637422090753636062016-03-18T12:15:00.000-06:002016-03-18T12:15:14.196-06:00

Despite a couple of brief snow showers in the last few days, spring is definitely early here in Calgary, and few people are happy about it. Farmers and ranchers are desperate for more moisture on the land, and many of the political jurisdictions surrounding the city have implemented restrictions on open burning. Last year, a careless smoker started a large grass fire south of the city that was

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-58579668934508123622016-03-02T12:06:00.000-07:002016-03-02T12:06:50.650-07:00

And so begins my tenth year with this blog. Even though the focus has transmuted from being "all about the work" to encompass how "my life has changed the work," I appreciate how it has helped me sharpen the language in and out of the studio of what, how, and why I've taken this road. It's also the start of my sixth year of being alone, and I am finally back to the point in my artist's life

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-13904253757722463662016-02-25T11:49:00.001-07:002016-02-25T15:26:23.327-07:00

My regular winter house-sit tends to be a very fruitful time artistically: even in the years when I haven't spent much time in the studio creating, the solitude and quiet have always fostered much thought that I've tried to build upon in the rest of the year. I've been building, sketching, and writing far more this stretch, however, which pleases me no end: I have projects in a number of

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-79934388870421492482016-02-02T13:06:00.000-07:002016-02-02T13:06:35.663-07:00

I've never been one to make New Year's resolutions, because, and there is science to prove this, they mostly don't work: they get made in the heat of the moment and the glow fades quickly. One wag on Facebook posted a status that read something to the effect that he was going to open a fitness centre on January 1 called "Resolutions" that would disappear on February 1 to become a bar instead,

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-46480615386286119202015-12-29T09:28:00.000-07:002015-12-29T09:30:01.980-07:00

There are four national parks on New Providence, the island where Nassau is located, although I'd stretch that to five, if you count Clifton, where I went snorkelling twice and saw the undersea sculptures. I set myself the goal of getting to all of them, aided by my sister-in-law, who not only had a car but is also an avid birder. When we were at The Retreat (as mentioned here, I asked the

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-70811449888765631602015-12-28T08:58:00.002-07:002015-12-28T08:58:34.413-07:00

One of the advantages in being somewhere for an extended chunk of time -- five weeks, in the case of this trip to The Bahamas -- means you can have a great number of different adventures without feeling rushed. My niece's husband now runs his own boat charter service, but for awhile, he worked for Powerboat Adventures, and arranged for me to join their day-long trip to Allen's Cay and Ship

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-53271117868997628092015-12-27T10:13:00.001-07:002015-12-27T10:13:46.708-07:00

One of the places I went to the last time I visited Nassau was The Retreat, a national park as well as being the headquarters of the Bahamas National Trust, which runs their national park system. The main attraction of The Retreat is the huge collection of palms from around the world, gathered by Arthur and Margaret Langlois, who owned the park when it was a private landholding. (And they

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-15571647254700730992015-12-26T11:42:00.000-07:002015-12-26T11:42:47.234-07:00

Ever since I was in Nassau four years ago, I had kept my sights on coming back to work with Sonia Farmer at Poinciana Paper Press: it took longer than I thought, but it finally happened. Sonia's studio is tucked away in downtown Nassau, and it's really lovely, with great access, lots of light, tons of type to look at, and a little sign press to do smaller runs (plus a lovely C&P that needs

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-8023132669101230292015-12-09T07:16:00.000-07:002015-12-09T07:16:01.858-07:00

Back when I was a teenager and had done all my lifesaving qualifications, I looked for something else to do in water, and signed up for snorkling lessons, as I was too young to be certified on SCUBA. I had the opportunity to go on a couple of free dives after that, but Calgary wasn't then, and isn't now, on anyone's list of great dives, and apart from a few vacation trips, I hadn't been in

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-87782316143193290152015-11-29T07:46:00.000-07:002015-11-29T09:51:06.418-07:00

One advantage of having been here before is that there are places I went to that I enjoyed and wanted to visit again: four years ago, we paid a brief visit to the Clifton Historical Authority, a national park that is on the far southwestern tip of New Providence. Didn't have much of an opportunity to explore, and, to be honest, there wasn't much there that talked about why it was a

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8171290510283617131.post-9548507482073407462015-11-27T18:47:00.000-07:002015-11-27T18:47:37.981-07:00

I've gotten more than a few of I kind of hate you for being somewhere warm notes from friends in frosty/snowy Calgary: I hope this post makes them feel better.... My first night in the Bahamas was eerily similar to my first night in Vancouver, with calamity stricking again. This time, it was in the form of some sort of insect which found my legs irretrievably attractive, and to which I had an

Lindahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10328269941718909713noreply@blogger.com0