Final show - Topo Map: Ridges

Two days after the class final show I was off to Bryce and Zion National Park for get-away time. It was nice to finally have a break from deadlines of work and class and only have to accomplish what was in front of you, be it sitting and looking out the window at the passing scenery, hiking up a trail, or just sitting down for a nice dinner.

Now it's time to catch up with what we all produced for the final fiber art show. I may not post all of the projects, but will put up the ones I feel will show well on the blog. Almost of these look better "in person" my cheap camera can't capture the detail many of these have.

I'll start with mine, it's called "Topo Map: Ridges" rather than go on with a long discussion, I let you read the artist statement and come to your own conclusions. The size is 48" x 30" and is made out of dyed burlap in several layers.

The detail photo shows a bit more of the 3-D aspect of the piece. The topo lines are perpendicular to the rest of the burlap. Sometimes I would cut and pull out fibers to let the layer below show and in some places I would add dyed burlap parts to the top layer to get the effect I wanted.



Artist Statement

I create maps to help people explore new places.

I grew up on a farm in the Midwest, and I feel a real kinship with the land. I like the way the machinery imposes its crop-growing grid upon the land, but I like even more the way natural features such as rivers, boulders and trees break up that grid. As a child, I’d curl up on the couch and pore over maps from around the country. What were those places like? How were they different from Minnesota? What would it be like to travel there?

When I moved to the Pacific Northwest, I saw my first topographical map and learned that all those squiggly lines show changes in elevation – what an interesting way to show information. When I flew, the view from airplane windows gave me three-dimensional information about the land. When I rode my bike cross-country and in other states, I learned first-hand about topography as I climbed mountains, battled headwinds, smelled the salt air and felt the changing weather.

Today, I make my own version of topographical maps. I see narrowly spaced multiple lines and I feel a sharply ascending mountain or a dizzying canyon; languidly spaced lines show me the open plains.

I invite the audience to explore the world as I see it. Walk over the earth’s crust, travel through canyons, peer over the edge of the crater, or feel the coolness of a forest.

My maps show more than roads.



Flying home yesterday from Phoenix we ended up going over what I think was Canyonlands National Park. I snapped a few photos from the plane (the only good reason to be on a airplane) thinking this will maybe help explain where I'm coming from.

I plan to produce more of these "maps" for awhile, exploring the idea and materials.

Group Project

For our second project spring quarter we were assigned a group project. I was not real thrilled about the idea of getting together with a group to get something done, not that I didn't want to work with a group, it was more the logistics of getting together. Plus I really wanted to save my weekends for working on my final project, gardening and bicycling. Sally and I were talking and thought maybe if we got people together that all worked downtown we could meet at lunch if we had to and leave the evenings and weekends free.



I thought of doing some kind of round-robin art where one person adds something and gives it to the next person and they work on it from there and pass it on until we run out of time or declare it finished. When we finally got a group together we brainstormed for awhile about my idea, then Sally's kite idea/skydiving and somehow ended up doing a parachute idea, maybe because Nancy said we could get little parachutes cheap at the army surplus store. I liked that idea; cheap, nothing to construct, we just needed to decorate the 'chute.



Sally volunteered to make baskets for all of us if I dyed her parachute. Hattie went shopping for the parachutes the next day and we were in business. We all had the task of finding a place to launch them from and finally ended up in the inside atrium at the Library.



We were all working on the concept of trusting in ourselves and what we had learned in class, moving on after class, growth, launching ourselves etc. Some decorated their parachutes with imagery of these items or wrote quotes or sayings on or in the basket.



Wednesday morning we gathered at the Library and let our parachutes float down from the 10th floor to the third floor. A few technical problems, but generally worked just fine. It was fun! We had a few people taking photos for us to document the event and then unfortunately we had to go to work. I think we all would have rather stayed and played with the parachutes a few more times and then gone out for coffee. Reality bites.



Project-wise I think it was good, documentation-wise trying to photograph a small moving object in questionable light in a large space made for a challenging task. Thanks for all who participated and Photoshop for its editing.

I'm in ANWG!!!

I know it's been forever since I posted... Spring is such a busy time even without school projects to work on. But...

I was notified today that I'm in the Juried Show at ANWG (Association of northwest guilds) in Spokane at the end of May. yea!!! I actually designed the piece last summer before taking the fiber arts class, so I think my stuff is more interesting now, but hey, who cares, it's a good thing.

Work on the final project is progressing, I'm pretty happy so far how it looks --- it's sort of a fantasy topographic map -- more later.

Our group project is due before that -- we're doing mini parachutes and launching them inside the Library in the atrium on Wednesday, May 20.

I feel like I'm being pulled many ways -- class projects, gardening, bike riding, getting stuff ready for the conference, plus work and day to day stuff -- somehow it will all get done... maybe.

Trail Torches - the show

Spring. It's such a great time, but even without a class to do projects for I would be busy -- more on gardening and cycling later...



My site installation went up fine, I think the neighbors and invitees like it -- or maybe it was the wine... anyway I had fun, I kind of like the idea of installation or outdoor projects.

Photos will show the work from a few different angles, enjoy.


The only annoying part was showing it to the class. I made my first ever powerpoint presentation. I thought it was beautiful, set almost perfectly to music, changing views as the music changed, had this cute little fade that introduced the project, I was really happy with it -- I stayed up till midnight just tweaking the timing and used my lunch the next day to tweak some more. Well, of course you know what happened. Technology failed me, even though I brought my own computer to plug into the AV equipment, the music didn't play until I pulled out the plug and just ran it off the laptop speakers, but by then the timing was all off. GRRRR, if I was only going to show photos I could have went to bed at a reasonable hour and not worried the whole thing. I just really got into the whole powerpoint thing and wanted to show my project off the best I could.



GRRRR, never trust technology, maybe that's why I weave and ride a bike.

Trail Torches

I did my art installation piece on Sunday, invites some friends and neighbors to view the work and basically have a party. Never underestimate the power of wine and food to get more favorable reviews from the masses. Generally people liked what they saw, one person said it looked like a sunset.



I'll show a few of the beginning photos and follow up soon with a few more. The first ones will be some arty shots of the pieces I was working with and then me beginning to install it on the lawn.

I'm backkkk

Back from a trip to Minnesota. What to say.... Had a nice time, but I guess now it's back to work. For school we're stilll looking for a place to have the end-of-quarter show after the place we were going to use is becoming a pizza resturant. I guess we'll all meet on Tuesday with what we know about the different spaces and make a decision of where it will be...

I finished my simple inkle weave while in Minnesota, don't know what I'm going to do with it, but it was an interesting project in a technique I had never touched. I feel it's kind of limited, but may be just the mindless thing to keep the hands busy at times.

My Mom is a quilter and while visiting her, we did some shopping for quilt materials. I kind of got caught up in what she was doing and announced that I would make a quilt --- what was I thinking? The quilt in my head would be fun to have and know one else will make it for me... It will probably be the only quilt I ever make, so I better do a good job. I have also told everyone it will take me 20 years, so that should take some of the presure off.

Gotta get going on the install details of my school project, I need to show it this weekends so I can present it next Tuesday -- where will the time come from?

Grrrr

I've basically have all the pieces for my installation project ready to go for when I get back from my trip. I wanted to put it along side the Sammamish Trail in one of the Redmond parks. Preferring to do this legally I contacted the Parks department, found out who to talk to and ended up sending the art person an e-mail with all the information I could (explanation of the project, the idea, and a little bit about myself; projected size; map of where I wanted it to be; and a photo of some of the pieces). As in true bureaucratic fashion she wanted to meet and discuss the whole thing. I'm not sure what more I could tell her, but I told her I was going to be gone for the next week, but was available any time the week after. The install was also going to be on Saturday instead of Tuesday as I mistakenly said in my first e-mail. Well, she fired back an e-mail and said there was not enough time to get together to plan and discuss this project, so the whole thing was off.

This was a temporary install, only for 6 hours, like somebody having a long picnic -- did she expect mobs of people to crowd the trail? It was a student project, I would have been lucky if someone stopped long enough to give me a polite comment of "interesting" (also known as the death comment.)

Since I don't have a lot of time to deal with this anymore, I will probably end up putting it up in the common space at the complex and invite the neighbors.