Rebecca's Nest

Tawney and Martin

2013-04-08T08:55:00.001-05:00

Two artists whose artwork and art practice I admire are Lenore Tawney and Agnes Martin. Tawney and Martin were friends while both lived in New York and I definitely see parallels in their art and statements.

Lenore Tawney from an article in ‘American Craft’

Tawney writes of that art is just beyond language. She states that the magic found in the artist’s creation always retains the memory of its origins and is destined to return. She also notes that these origins are closer to the silence of the universe than to the noises and verbalizations.

Lenore Tawney, Even Thread

Lenore Tawney, Seed Puzzle

Lenore Tawney, Discourse

Lenore Tawney, Untitled

Of course, Tawney is most known for her spectacular weavings and I acknowledge those but wanted to focus on her drawings, collage and assemblage for this post.

Agnes Martin writes about her artwork:

I would like my work to be recognized as being in the classical tradition (Coptic, Egyptian, Greek, Chinese), as representing the Ideal in the mind. Classical art cannot possibly be eclectic. One must see the ideal in one's own mind. It is like a memory-an awareness-of perfection.
from Dia Art Foundation.

Agnes Martin “With My Back to the World”

You may be very familiar with Martin’s art as she was quite prolific and her work is displayed in many museums. I’d like to show some pieces that are not seen as often and those to me that most closely align her with Tawney. All artwork below by Agnes Martin:

Untitled, 1960

Falling Blue

Untitled, 1960

Tremolo

Friendship

The Sea

New Artwork

2013-03-09T09:37:00.001-06:00

I’ve been experimenting with some new artwork that focuses on color, color relationships and form. I’m still in the designing stage working on sketches and doing samples. Here’s one of my earliest sample pieces. It isn’t quite there yet as I’m still working out materials and relationships between the forms and the question of “do I want to stay formal and use pure forms”? I’m purposely trying not to over think at this stage and just play.

Also, a couple of sketches that play with pure forms but give them a more interactive background:

Jiro Yoshihara

2013-03-01T06:00:00.000-06:00

Artwork from Jiro Yoshihara, 1970, 17.91" x 20.87".

Circle, acrylic on canvas, 1971, 45.5 x 53 cm.

Untitled, 1962

White Line on Black, 1968.

Circle, 1971. Exhibited in “Gutai’s Splendid Playground” currently at the Guggenheim through May 8, 2013.

Red Circle on Black, 1965

Untitled.

Untitled, silkscreen, 1969. I love the rawness and energy in Yoshihara’s artwork and, yes, the scale:

White Circle, 1965.

Japanese Postwar Art – Gutai

2013-02-24T11:30:00.001-06:00

After the end of World War II, Japan saw a rise in young artists who called themselves the Gutai Art Association. In the fall of 2012, Hauser & Wirth mounted an exhibit of work called “A Visual Essay on Gutai at 32 East 69th Street” featuring artworks by twelve members of the Gutai. From the web exhibition at Hauser & Wirth, the exhibit “traces efforts by these artists to resolve the inherent contradictions between traditions of painting – the making of images on a flat, framed plane – and the core tenets of a movement that called for experimentation, individuality, unexpected materials, and, perhaps above all, physical action and psychological freedom.”

Although the members of Gutai attempted to distance their work from the past and from reminders of the war, death and destruction, I found several artworks that don’t escape the reminder of the horror of the atom bomb. Others allude to the mushroom cloud yet also hint at renewal and rebirth. Saburo Murakami’s Work, 1963, Paint, polyvinyl acetate adhesive, plaster on board, 182.5 x 107 x 10 cm / 71 7/8 x 42 1/8 x 3 7/8 in.

Work — Jiro Yoshihara, 1967, Oil on canvas
90.9 x 115.5 cm / 35 3/4 x 45 1/2 in.

Work — Jiro Yoshihara, 1965, Oil on canvas, 182 x 227 cm / 71 5/8 x 89 3/8 in.

White Ceremony - E — Norio Imai, 1966—2012, Acrylic, cloth, plastic mold, 63 3/4 x 51 1/4 x 7 1/8 in

Work65-Daiwa — Takesada Matsutani, 1965
Polyvinyl acetate adhesive, paint on canvas
183.4 x 183.5 cm / 72 1/4 x 72 1/4 in

Some of these artists were also featured in an exhibit called, “Destroy the Picture: Painting the Void, 1949-1962” at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles in 2012. I’ve been working on a new series that focuses on form and color. The artwork of the artists of the Gutai is something I want to explore more fully, especially the artwork of Jiro Yoshihara.

All images courtesy of Hauser & Wirth. A book on Gutai, titled “Gutai: Decentering Modernism” is available, as is a catalog from the exhibit at Hauser & Wirth.

Warming Huts in Winnipeg

2013-02-10T09:51:00.001-06:00

In August I was contacted by an architecture firm in Cambridge, MA. about collaborating with them on a warming hut for a contest in Winnipeg, Manitoba. A warming hut is used along a winter trail as a place to “warm up” as you ski or skate. The contest is for international firms and artists and ask that the designs “push the envelope in terms of design, craft and art.” Out of over 100 entries, our design was chosen as one of the three from the open submission process. See the entries here.

The architecture firm had seen my work on Pinterest and was very interested in using industrial felt to line the inside of the warming hut. The city of Winnipeg has two rivers that intersect within the city and this is where this competition is centered. The frozen rivers have been turned into trails and there are a lot of activities during the winter months. See more about The Forks here.

I was unable to go due to work commitments, but have received some images and some wonderful feedback about my work. I was also able to participate in the 10x20x20 presentation from the warming hut participants via Skype. A blog post about the presentation is here: http://10x20x20.blogspot.com/. I must say that it was very challenging to talk to an empty room, I was unable to see or hear anything as it was happening but I am so, so grateful to the organizers for allowing me to participate. In fact, everyone associated with this event has been amazing. I’m particularly grateful to Mette Aamodt and her partner Andrew Plumb of Aamodt / Plumb architects for choosing me as their artist collaborator. They are an exciting firm in Cambridge and have had a lot of success with their designs. See the original proposal under Warming Hut here.

Following are some images from the finished hut and a few that I took before shipping the felt panels. Unfortunately, my camera quit working before I could get good images – I have been told that the organizer of this event has hired a professional photographer so I’m hoping for better images in the future. The images I chose to stitch centered around the rivers and their intersection. I also used images from pictographs in the area and the animals that have roamed the area for hundreds of years. I wanted to use imagery that 1) was an homage to the area, and 2) stayed true to Mette’s initial inspiration of huts she remembered that were lined with animal pelts. It was a challenging project but I’m so happy to have had the opportunity to participate and was very happy with the outcome.

Recommendations

2013-01-26T10:44:00.001-06:00

I received several books for Christmas via a nice cash gift that enabled me to pick and choose some favorites. One of the books I chose was Inside the Studio, two decades of talks with artists in New York. From Strand Books, a synopsis:

In1981, Independent Curators International, a New York organization with a record of innovative art programming, began “New York Studio Events,” an annual series of visits to the studios of prominent artists. Inside The Studio presents excerpts from the talks delivered by nearly seventy-three artists to their guests over the last two decades. Transcribed, excerpted, and shared here for the first time, ICI’s tapes of these talks constitute a remarkable record of the thinking and conversation of key artists of the 1980, 1990, and today. The artist variously provide personal insights, philosophical reflections, stories, and discussions of the origins of their practice, the evolution of their ideas, and the intellectual, psychological, spiritual, and even physical bases of their work. Includes color reproductions of artists’ works. Index of Artists, Photograph Credits. 296p.

I’ve really enjoyed the fact that I can pick up this book and choose an artist, see his or her photograph and an image or two of their work, and read the 3 page compilation of the studio visit. Many of the visits are from the 90s but I think are still so relevant. Most are well known artists, but some were new to me. Here’s a paragraph from the visit with artist Jane Hammond:

“When I start the painting, I don’t ever know what the meaning is, I don’t know why it’s important, I just come to trust that the things that occur to me at night while I’m lying in bed are real. I say to myself, “This is a painting idea,” and I find my glasses and kind of drag myself up and make some notes about it. In a fascinating and ever deepening process, what happens to me is, as I make the painting, or after I finish the painting, or sometimes a month after I finish the painting, I realize why the idea came and what the painting is about. I wouldn’t get that insight if I didn’t make the painting, so the painting, for me, is a process in which I get to access something that I couldn’t access but for painting it. Painting is like a tool for self-knowledge. Maybe it sounds kind of corny to say that today, but that’s how I see painting.”

Wow. I know that I find insight into my artwork when I review it years after first completing it, and I’m able to articulate more clearly what I was trying to say. I even find links between small series to the larger whole that confounded me initially.

One more recommendation is the film Gerhard Richter Painting. Highly recommended. If you have a Netflix streaming account, it is available to view. I’ve heard that people consider him a bit crotchety but I found him very insightful and at times somewhat embarrassed when the camera records him starting a painting. Can you imagine? It’s such a painful process for me to sew that first stitch. See the trailer here.

The Art of Charline von Heyl

2012-06-26T06:21:00.000-05:00

Nothing makes me happier than to see a talented and contemporary female artist be recognized with museum retrospectives at a relatively young age. Von Heyl is a painter and printmaker with a style that is difficult to pin down. I find her work utterly compelling.

In her interview with Tyler Green of Modern Art Notes, von Heyl talks about her three martini theory that there are three types of artists: those that rely on input, input, input (such as herself), those that are like a dog to the bone, and those that are bright-eyed and bushy tailed and who are conscious always of where their art fits into the art scene of that moment. She says she constantly reads books and looks at printed images and trolls the internet and blogs absorbing information. Von Heyl says it is a completely cannibalistic “search and seizure” (my words in quotes) and then she goes into the studio and paints. She says that when asked about her reference in paintings, she often can’t recall.

In It’s Vot’s Behind Me that I Am, 2010, acrylic, oil on linen and canvas, 82 x 72” (courtesy Freidrich Petzel Gallery), she used canvas and layered a bed sheet on top exploring the way the sheet absorbed the paint vs. the canvas. There is strong geometry, pattern and a graffiti type of abstraction. The white and black rectangle is meant to be a brick according to von Heyl. (an example in this case of a recalled reference, she cites the influence of Krazy Kat comics.)
The next image also has pattern and also shows hints of humanistic or animal form yet distorted to the point of being unrecognizable. You can also see instances of where she laid down tape as a technique. Below image from the Institute of Contemporary Art PA and is not identified.

Below Untitled, 2007, woodcut on digital image, 30 x 22 1/2”

Below, Woman, 2005, charcoal, acrylic and oil on canvas, 82 x 78”

Von Heyl, who was born in Germany in 1960, says her works have a “cringe factor.” She says she forces things together that could not possibly work. She says it is akin to bending bones.

In Lying Eyes, 2005, acrylic and oil on canvas, 82” x 85” below, also from Friedrich Petzel Gallery, there is pattern and architecture, animal heads and other body parts, and fractured imagery that dispenses your tenuous grasp on any realistic hold. I love the shadow effect in the background. You often see artists using the exploded hard edge imagery but the combination with soft sections of more restful suggestive shapes are very compelling. It’s as though von Heyl goes to that next step, as though she looks at the image and wants to thwart any reference you might be grabbing. I could look at her work for hours.

Below is Lazybone Shuffle (2010), a newer work. Hear curator Jenelle Porter talk (gush!) about it here. Extraordinary.

Von Heyl recently had a museum retrospective in the U.S. (at Institute of Contemporary Art in Philadelphia and ICA Boston) and just wrapped up the same exhibit in the U.K. at the Tate Liverpool. There are articles about her in Art in America and an excellent one in BOMB magazine. Also, there is a time lapse slide show of von Heyl painting a mural at the Worcester Art Museum. Tyler Green of Modern Art Notes (referenced above) interviews her here. I’d like to thank her gallery, Friedrich Petzel Gallery, for most of the images. They do a beautiful job representing their artists online for those of us not able to see them in person. I’ve just scratched the surface in featuring these artworks – check her out. You won’t be disappointed.

The practice of seeing (Part 2)

2011-11-06T09:22:00.001-06:00

Last week, I wrote about an interview conducted by Alessia Masi in ARTnews, November 2011. She interviewed Wayne Thiebaud in an article titled “Object Lessons: Wayne Thiebaud on Morandi, light, color, shadows and more.” After Thiebaud discusses Morandi so expressively, Ms. Masi inquires about his own art practice, how he works in general, from reference, memory or imagination.

Thiebaud notes that he cannot work from photography, that he has a “kind of quarrel with them.” He notes that he does a lot of drawing, a lot of painting. He also talks about looking at other artists for his reference. He says that with a lot of practice, you can see a dime size piece of a painting and know whether or not it is a Vermeer, a Degas, a Seurat. He says you have to look a lot, see a lot, spend more time and look more carefully to learn.

One story that he related I found fascinating. He says that the painter Jean Ingres challenged his students to create a 100 step achromatic value study. The students rebelled saying it was impossible. Then Ingres brought out his own student work featuring a 1000 step value study!

Ingres, Jean-Auguste-Dominique (1780-1867)

Half-figure of a Bather

1807; oil on canvas

Can you imagine a 1000 step value study? Amazing. Thiebaud says that by looking at the back of one of Ingres’ Turkish Bathers, you can see those beautiful subtle values.

In terms of practicing drawing, Thiebaud notes that Mondrian made thousands of little thumbnails. These drawings would be studies for placement and intersection of his lines and to determine “how much space in one area as opposed to another”. (pg 80) Thiebaud notes that one has to test out different set ups, re-draw, adjust, move things slightly and pay attention to composition if you are serious about your work. He acknowledges that it can be neurotic but, how much you learn! Don’t, as Thiebaud notes, cast too early in concrete. Practice seeing, drawing, painting.

I’ve read many books about practice but I always get more inspired when I read interviews or articles or books that give you specifics. I feel like the artist is in the room with me, sitting next to me, encouraging me by example.

In the upcoming weeks, I will be visiting the Dallas Museum of Art to see the work of Mark Bradford and going to the Modern Art Museum of Ft Worth to see the Richard Diebenkorn exhibit. I’ve read a book on Diebenkorn, and have seen the ART21 video on Bradford. I look forward to checking out other books on both and reporting on my visits.

The practice of seeing (Part 1)

2011-10-30T14:42:00.001-05:00

I read a very interesting article the other day in ARTNews, November 2011. The title of the article is “Not-So-Still Lifes: Thiebaud on Morandi.” In the article Wayne Thiebaud talks about the good lessons that can be learned from looking at Giorgio Morandi’s work such as the “wonder of intimacy and the love of long looking.” Spatially, there is something not quite right in Morandi’s still lifes and, also, dare I say it, in some of Thiebaud’s. This is what makes them more interesting than a traditional still life.

Thiebaud goes on to describe more of “long looking,” “of staring but at the same time moving the eye, finding out what’s really there, and there are so many things that are subtle and may look like something at one moment but not the next.”

Wayne Thiebaud, Two Cheese Cubes, 2011

Thiebaud also says that Morandi’s work was hard to appreciate initially, “These didn’t come to you, you had to go to them.”

Giorgio Morandi; Natura morta (still life), 1956, oil on canvas, 30.6 x 40.8 cm

Thiebaud goes on to talk about the formal qualities of light such as highlights, core and cast shadows and how to replicate or use these strategically as a way of determining volume. With Morandi’s work, and also I believe with Thiebaud’s paintings, he says, “the light is created through creating energy, by the juxtaposition of colors and the interaction of those colors to create light quite different from the modulation of volumetric rendering.” Other artists who use light by “way of color” are Bonnard, Matisse or Vuillard. The light can be discussed as “eternal or symbolic or a light that is sustained by energy.”

Giorgio Morandi; Natura Morta (above), Wayne Thiebaud, Condiment Bowls, 2008 (below)

We are currently working with color to express the illusion of space two dimensionally in my classes. This article could not have come at a better time.

Hunting for Treasure

2011-07-30T18:39:00.001-05:00

Above: sneak peek at a commission not yet delivered…

Every year Seth Apter organizes a "Treasure Hunt" for favorite blog posts from the past. You can find links to other bloggers taking part in the treasure hunt, here. This post about Eva Hesse still gets lots of hits, so I know I’m not alone in my admiration.

In my opinion, no female artist has had the impact on art that Eva Hesse had in her short life. (1936-1970). I am particularly enamored of her drawings and her sculpture. Her drawings have a child-like feel to them and she was a master at using color. From the Estate of Eva Hesse site:

Untitled; 1963-64; Collage with ink, gouache and watercolor on paper; 22 x 30"

Untitled; 1963; gouache, watercolor, pencil on paper; 22 x 30"

Untitled, 1963; oilstick, ink and pencil on paper; 8.5 x 11"

Untitled; 1963; collage with gouache, ink and watercolor on paper; 36 1/4 x 27 3/4"

This book on her drawings is worth checking out if available in your area.

Show Opening

2011-04-18T08:16:00.001-05:00

My show opening was a great success – a huge thank you to everyone who came out and supported me and my work. I’m updating my website with all of the new artwork over the next week, so be sure and visit there to see all the work in the show as well as my older pieces.
In the meantime, here is a shot of the east wall:

And the series “Fragments”:

Each is 6” x 6” and are honoring my grandmother with the fragments of leather gloves, along with industrial and unprocessed wool felt; machine embroidery.

New York Park Armory Red & White Quilt Show

2011-04-05T08:50:00.001-05:00

You may have seen the overall image of the amazing four day show at the Park Armory in NYC. It was put on by the Folk Art Museum and consisted of over 650 quilts owned by collector Joanna Rose. She’s been collecting red and white quilts since 1956. Here is a slide show so you can see some of the quilts in detail. You can read interviews with one of the co-curators and the head of the exhibition design company here and here.

Exhibit opening

2011-03-29T09:58:00.001-05:00

I’ve been given the wonderful opportunity to show my artwork at a small arts center in Irving, Texas (near Dallas). I am having an opening Sunday, April 3 from 2-4pm and would love to see you there! Here’s the information and a few photos of the new work in the show. I’ll be posting all the artwork on my blog once the show is over.
New Work by Rebecca Howdeshell
Exhibit dates: March 27 - April 28, 2011
Opening: Sunday, April 3rd, 2-4PM
Contact Information:
howdeshell@gmail.com
http://rebeccahowdeshell.blogspot.com
Jaycee Park Center for the Arts Directions
2000 W. Airport Freeway
P.O. Box 153581
Irving, Texas 75015-3581
(Note: the entrance off the service road is still open – just stay on the service road and turn in through the construction barrels)
Gallery 972-721-2488
Hours:12:30 p.m. - 4:30 p.m. Monday thru Thursday, and 1:00 p.m. - 4:00 p.m. on Sundays. Closed holidays.
Email info@irvingart.org

Sectional Dance II; 2011; industrial felt, thread; 6” x 6”

Modern Geometry I; 2011; industrial felt, thread; 12” x 12”

South and east walls of gallery with artwork installed

Two recommendations

2011-03-05T13:03:00.001-06:00

Recently, I had the opportunity to see a clip of the Oscar winning animated short “The Lost Thing.” I was intrigued enough to purchase it on iTunes for $1.99. Wow. This short, about 16 minutes long, is so visually arresting with a compelling story line to boot. Highly, highly recommended.

I challenge you not to watch the part that begins about 12 minutes in, over and over.

Second is a film that I’ve had in my Netflix queue forever due to another artist recommending it. The documentary is now available for free on demand. “Between the Folds” is billed as the science of art and the art of science. I find it hard to describe, it is so much more than the art of origami. The documentary starts small and builds into possibilities that you can’t even imagine. Watch this!

Rachel Whiteread (cont.)

2011-02-06T08:09:00.000-06:00

Courtesy of Jo Horswill at Mystory, a short video of Rachel Whiteread talking about her Drawing show, which I wrote about here.

Rachel Whiteread: Drawings from Field Studies on Vimeo.

Class results

2010-10-31T13:05:00.002-05:00

We had a great time during my October Blast class. It is fun and educational to be able to really study a concept or principle in detail and delve into all the ways you can use motion, rhythm and repetition to your advantage when creating composition.
I asked the participants to share an image exhibiting motion in her work and was very pleased with the images chosen:

Above (left) is Rosemary Claus-Gray’s Indigo Sketches.
Above (right) is Jeanne Raffer Beck's Letter Rhythms.

Above (left) is Marcia DeCamp’s Earthquake Faults.
Above (right) is Jeanne Simpson’s Green Heatwave.

Samples

2010-09-06T22:15:00.001-05:00

Making samples is a great way to work through design and construction issues. I spent a nice part of this long holiday weekend relaxing and visiting with family. Most important was the time I got to spend in the studio stitching on new large work.

I’ve also been working through some ideas for a new series on paper. These two collages (and one that didn’t work at all) are the results of my musings. Each are about 4” x 6”.

Art filled weekend

2010-08-15T09:27:00.001-05:00

I was so excited to be able to spend part of my birthday weekend visiting some exhibits in Dallas. If you are in the area, I recommend all of these, particularly the Luc Tuymans exhibit at the Dallas Museum of Art. It is on exhibit until September 5. The Rachel Whiteread exhibit ended Saturday, unfortunately, but the Il Lee exhibit continues into September.

Rachel Whiteread is known for her installation work and large scale sculptures that reference space. At her exhibit, there were many drawings of some of her monumental projects, such as the Holocaust Memorial in Vienna and the Water Tower on the roof of the Museum of Modern Art. In studying negative space and memory, she creates large molds and casts them often using resin. For example, the Holocaust Memorial is a cast of an interior of a library including imprints of the books on the shelves.

Although Whiteread says that these drawings aren’t preparatory work for her installations but rather art unto themselves, when viewing them and reading about the resultant sculptures, it is hard to not see them as such. The Water Tower drawings were printed photographs where she had inserted the outline of her proposed sculpture into the environment. She often draws on graph paper and uses correction fluid to fill in the outline. She also did one of the Water Tower at night that I found absolutely stunning. I can’t find an image online but below are two of the Water Tower drawings:

On the lower floor of the Nasher Sculpture Center, I found some of my favorite of the drawings and collections in the exhibit. Below is a drawing of Stairs:

My very favorite were the collections of images where she took vintage postcards and altered them with paint, or in the case below, by using a hole punch:

There were many, many of these propped on rows of display boards. The book that accompanies the exhibit only has images of 2-3 and that was a disappointment but you can see more images of the exhibit here. In addition, Whiteread sent collections of objects she has picked up on the street and in thrift stores. She likens these collections to “like doodling in a sketchbook.” Below are shoe molds and two of her casts:

The Il Lee exhibit was in a fairly small space at the Crow Museum but the high ceilings made up for it and showed the artwork beautifully. Lee’s drawings convey a huge amount of energy and he says his new drawings are more angular, interrupted with a more rigorous approach. Some are huge, 4’ x 6’ and you know that Lee is putting his whole body into creating these drawings. There is intent in the drawings, you can definitely follow the pattern as they are constructed. Below is one example and an image of Lee in action:

There was also a wall of drawing studies, about 50 of them hung salon-style. I found them fascinating as they were put on scrap paper, newspaper and other material. Highly recommended.

A celebration

2010-08-06T08:10:00.001-05:00

Today is my birthday and those of you who are artists can guess how I’ll be celebrating. I purposely planned a long weekend to take advantage of TIME -- that all elusive thing that seems to disappear when you work outside the home for long hours. I’m also spending part of tomorrow visiting some exhibits in Dallas, including Il Lee at the Crow Collection of Asian Art, the drawings of Rachel Whiteread at the Nasher Sculpture Center and the paintings of Luc Tuymans at the Dallas Museum of Art. Whew.

There will also be various dinners and lunches which I plan to take full advantage of including a free brunch offered all of their subscribers at the Blue Mesa Grill.

Jeanne Simpson has been one of the students in my pilot offering of classes, and I wanted to feature two of her homework assignments. The first one was in response to an exercise that asked my students to create an example of proximity using actual line:

The second image was in response to an assignment to explore the illusion of space:

I think she did a wonderful job!

Happy Fourth!

2010-07-04T09:12:00.002-05:00

For those of us in the US today is the Fourth of July, Independence Day. This day has a lot of meaning for me beyond the celebration of the US declaring independence from Great Britain. My maternal grandmother was born on this day in 1902. She passed away in 1999 just short of her 97th birthday.

She inspired me every day through her work ethic, independence and character. She was an accomplished cook, gardener, seamstress, as well as doing china painting later in her life. It seemed to me as a child, that everything she touched turned to gold, or on Christmas, pink, as growing up she would decorate her pink tree with pink lights and bulbs. It was so magical to walk into that room on Christmas Eve.

I found out later in life that her "talent" came from sheer hard work and perseverance. As an artist, I strive to do the very best I can and sweat through numerous samples to accomplish just that. Some days, I'm very hard on myself for the time it takes to get from idea to product. In reality, if I slow down and enjoy the process, the outcome is so much more enjoyable. It isn't perfection we are after but rather artwork that comes near the imagined final product and most important, evokes the emotion and soul of our ideas. Today, I remember my grandmother and salute her memory by reminding myself of just why I love being an artist.

Art Heroines

2010-03-31T08:11:00.001-05:00

Terry Jarrard-Dimond posted some photos of her studio on Facebook and included a sampling of images of her art heroines. One of her heroines is also one of mine, Eva Hesse. While sitting outside recently enjoying the spring sun, I was reading Catherine de Zegher's book Eva Hesse Drawing.

Highly recommended. One of the most interesting parts of the book is Hesse's "relationship" with Anni Albers. You can certainly see a connection between the work Hesse was doing and fiber art. More discussion to follow.

Collage exchange

2009-11-14T21:27:00.006-06:00

I recently participated in a private collage exchange and here is one of the collages I submitted. It is 9" x 7" and mounted to an 10" x 8" piece of watercolor paper. Part of the image was a collage that was scanned and printed on W/C paper, then additional imagery was added.

New felt artwork

2009-08-29T10:19:00.003-05:00

A few weeks ago, I posted a blog with new spinal drawings here. Although I don't work directly from my drawings, I do use them to map out where the major elements fall on the page as I want to get proportion right. I saw a post about Rapid Resizer, a software program that allows you to enlarge your drawings that I had heard about some time ago but had never tried. I downloaded a trial of the product and found it very easy to use. Here is an enlargement of one of my drawings:

As you can see, it turns your drawings/sketches into line drawings that can be used for patterns or for placement. Below is my latest felt artwork derived from the line drawing.

Density; 24" x 24"; industrial felt, paper, thread; 2009

Density (detail)

Artist Recommendation – Marilyn Pappas

2009-08-22T13:59:00.003-05:00

Marilyn Pappas has been included in exhibits at the Snyderman-Works Galleries in Philadelphia and had a solo exhibit at the Nancy Margolis Gallery in NYC. She taught for many years at the Maryland College of Art and Design. Marilyn will be exhibiting her work and speaking at SOFA Chicago in November.

I'm particularly drawn to her new work titled "The Life of Beauty." Marilyn says about this work that they are "meditations on Western concepts of beauty throughout time." She also states that she is interested in the "imperfection of beauty and the beauty of imperfection." She also talks about the comfort of hand work, the meditative quality and the slow development of her work. You can read more of Marilyn's statements here.

Here are some examples from The Life of Beauty series:

Nike and the Life of Beauty (left and detail, right); 2006; 102" x 59"; cotton, linen, gold

Left: Nike with Broken Wings (detail); 2002-2008; 68" x 33"; cotton, linen, gold. Right: Venus, Marilyn and the Life of Beauty (detail); 2009; 70" x 52"; cotton, linen

And from the Fragments Series: left: Fragment of a Wounded Amazon; 2000; 32" x 23"; cotton, linen. Right: Fragment of Killimachos Aphrodite; 1995; 36" x 15" x 2"; cotton, linen

Conversations

2009-08-17T08:00:00.004-05:00

I am participating in a project called Compositional Conversations. This was conceived by Terry Jarrad-Dimond. There are 14 artists in the group and my contribution will be featured today. Terry will be posting updates once a week, so check in on Mondays to see the progress and please join in on the conversation. All input is welcome!

As part of the process, I made full size patterns to test how they worked before making any fabric choices. Below is the composition with the paper pattern after I had made my final shape choice. Read the full story here.