Art of the Mind

I'm still dealing with our upcoming move (including keeping an overly clean house--unlike my usual standards) and other family stuff. So I don't have a lot of time for art.

But I continue to be startled and gladdened by the family of orioles that deigns to come to my feeder. After numerous unsuccessful tries, I finally managed to get this picture of two of them this afternoon.

In their honor, and as a way to at least think about art, I've been, in spare moments, trying to figure out how to make hand felted pieces inspired by oriole nests, using the hand dyed felt I got at IQF. After a couple of attempts, I think I've figured out how to get the shape.

But then I realized I had not envisioned them beyond that point--other than felt with thick and thin spots and color variations, what was I thinking? Apparently nothing...so I'm still working out that part. I could go over the top and encrust them with threads and beads and such, but that seems so antithetical to the 'less is more' esthetic I've been cultivating lately. So I'll dither on that for a while.

And ponder this really cool tree stump/burl I found in the Hamilton City Park today:



Is that nifty or what? That texture....how to capture it in fiber....

The Big Move

I haven't been making much art lately. I have a really good excuse--my husband is being transferred to the Geneva, Illinois area. So I'm currently swamped with decluttering and cleaning and painting the house we have now, getting it ready to sell.

And there's also the whole sucking out of any artistic feeling thing--the idea of moving after 30 years in this area, 19 years in this house, fills up my head. But once in a while I see a glimmer of the creative force. It'll come back, I'm sure. Maybe next week while I'm sitting around waiting for a buyer, trying to keep the house spotless...I'm thinking that needle felting doesn't make such a mess, maybe I could work on that.

For marketing purposes, I have to disassemble a large part of my studio--the downside of having put it in what should be the master bedroom of this house. Goodbye design wall, boxes of fabric, ironing board. But it's all in a good cause, and things will get back to a new normal soon enough.

One of the sparks of art is kind of strange. There's a city park in Keokuk on the Mississippi River where I like to eat lunch. They have been marking dead trees in preparation of cutting them down with blue paint--the contrast of the bright sky blue paint with the peeling bark is pretty cool.



I'm thinking of manipulating the pictures and printing them on organdy. One of these days, in my new studio, whereever it is.