my awesome new andy warhol (aka yoko ono) stitchy swap piece from shannon (aka giggly mama). i know it is andy, but in my rorschach brain it is brilliantly also yoko. i love it!! thanks so much shan!

booties

home again

someone's past is my present

thrifty kitties

someone must have donated all their kitty cross-stitches to the local (to mum) thrift. of course i had to rescue them. not sure yet what i'm keeping, selling and gifting, but i'm loving them all in the meantime.

Show Update!

If you haven't already, send in your submission info for the Gay for Eagles fiber art show! The deadline for getting me your info is coming up quickly - it's this Friday, Feb. 18th, so send it! All details are here. The show is shaping up to be incredibly cool, but there is still room for more!

*(and btw, if you're on the fence about submitting because you're not sure your work fits the theme, send me an email so we can confer. the show will be more interesting with wide-ranging interpretations of our theme.)*

happy valentines!

Aglaé et Sidonie

I finally listed some handspun yarns in my new shoppe... some of them inspired by (or at least named after) these adorable characters, Aglaé et Sidonie, from a French tv series that ran from 1968-1975. If anything can excite me, it would be this combo of vintage cute + Frenchy (thank you dear M!) I have a feeling this is just the beginning of my yarnie love affair with this series..

my heart, and some quilt loves too

zero-draft proposal

i want to share with you all the very, very beginnings of my new dissertation project. here's the short description that i had to send to the graduate committee of my department for approval. the 3rd paragraph is basically there to argue that my previous work is applicable so that they wouldn't make me re-take my comprehensive exams. i know it's a little academ-icky in how it's written, which i'm hoping to avoid in the future, and i'm not 100% sure of any of this - especially whether the farming connection works or doesn't. but one has to start somewhere, right? and right now, that means reading everything i can get my hands on that seems related.

and soo... i cannot begin taking oral histories from real people yet because that requires the approval of our institutional review board, which i'll be working on soon. but i hope anyone who is interested will save up their stories to share with me. even if you aren't in the u.s. south, but you have a family history here (i can think of a few of you!), your stories would be relevant. and if in the meantime, anyone has any thoughts, resources, citations, i'd be grateful. this is going to be a collaborative project in that it will depend on the people and their histories and the fabrics that are shared with me.

I have just returned from a leave of absence and am beginning my 7th year in advanced standing. I have decided to write my dissertation on memory and mourning in contemporary textile work in the US South. The notion of craft as a form of therapy is a common refrain among textile artists, and in recent years there has been a marked trend toward making and embellishing of "memory quilts," shrouds, and wrapping-cloths, often by hand. The working-through of memory in and through needlecraft has a long history, but has also taken a collective turn among textile artists who are using their using craft in activist contexts. [actually that's not new at all, not sure what i was thinking.]

Part of the memorial nature of this textile work seems to be the use of materials which have specific histories and meanings, and thus I will focus not only on the artist's experience of making, but also on the materials themselves, including the means of production. New generations of crafters and fiber farmers are in transition, and in many cases are seeking to use humane and sustainable methods and materials. I am interested in how methods of fiber production (and animal fibers in particular) intersect with a textile mourning practice. Gender, race and generation are likely to figure into my analysis as well.

Although the subject matter of this project is new, the theoretical and methodological bases remain the same. I will still be doing visual anthropology (or, "anthropology of the senses") within a skill and memory-based culture. Although I will not undertake an entire ethnography, I will observe and collect oral histories from research participants. Moreover, the historical and cultural context is similar in that I will remain in the US South, and my research participants may be primarily located in rural areas. This project will also deal with animals and animal products, although not as its central concern.

I plan to proceed with obtaining IRB approval right away. I will complete a more detailed proposal for my committee by the end of February, and a new review of relevant literature by the end of March. I will then begin to take oral histories throughout Spring semester and during the summer. I will prepare a detailed outline by September 2011, and produce chapter drafts during the 2011-2012 academic year. I will work steadily toward completion by no later than the end of my 8th year in advanced standing (Spring 2013). [actually it would be Fall 2014, whew!]

so that's it. i think i need to begin with the history of mourning embroidery and memory quilts...

two-tone bunny paws and new shoppe

i was so happy with how this pair turned out, with a special sequined vintage trim i've been saving for the perfect thing. they are off to ellen, fancy mitts for a fancy girl! btw, i finally opened a new etsy shop, to separate out my handmade and vintage. so much fun!

golden hours

the gorgeousness of the weather permeated my studio today... cosy with a kerosene heater, the balcony door wide open, a cool breeze and karen elson.

there's an interview with me over at folk reveries! i'm not sure how it happened, but i'm the new team captain, and so far it's been really fun. i had to get (another) new email for twitter, and i got folkreveries@gmail.com! so it was meant to be.

lots of good news.. my new proposal for school was approved, and i'll have a new co-advisor now who will help a lot. now on-to some less fun paperwork.. but i also got some new local quilting connections, so i'll be joining a bee or two. i made my very first three quilt blocks today, ever.

dye-ary

i am no-good at keeping paper notebooks, never have been. so i'm going to record the results of my dye experiments here - all of em! i've always been both fascinated and intimidated by natural dyeing, but i've been newly inspired to try with the inspiration of india flint and friends working with solar dye processes and gentler ways of dyeing.

all i did was bundle up some plants and rusty bits of metal in old handkerchiefs and toss them in a pot on my woodstove. the pot is a rusty enamel that i imagine is made of steel and so i don't think that acts as a mordant, although the rust probably did something. i didn't even do a separate extraction process, although i plan to next time.

the first bundle of dill did a whole lotta nothin'..


the bundles of rusty bits (found in the yard) are pretty spectacular:




this was a bundle of rosemary leaves and stems, and even though it looks kind of like a bunch of grass stains, i will thrilled to actually see little leaf prints! my first eco-print!!




this last one i didn't do on the stove. i just bundled up orange peels in this old monogrammed hankie and put it in a canning jar with wood ash, and stuck it outside in the cold. the yellows are quite pretty!




i'm especially excited to dye some linen with these methods and use it as a background for some embroidery. i think it would add a lot of dimension to plain old stitching.

oh, and like i've been moaning about on facebook, our porch collapsed under a big load of firewood. it's been threatening to go for about a year. it'll be a huge pain to fix, but for now, more firewood!