Settling in

I'm enjoying being part of the Spanish Village community.  As I spend more time there, getting to know the place and my fellow artists, and talking with the many people who visit the studio, I feel more and more at home.

Friday has become my usual workday in Studio 40, and next month I'll also be working one Sunday a month.  If you want to be sure of seeing me when you stop in, e-mail me first to check my schedule.  We do occasionally swap dates.

As promised in my previous post, here are more photos of the studio.

Studio 40 at Spanish Village

Last week I moved some of my felt vessels into Studio 40, and on Saturday I made my first sale there.  I  share the space with a very nice group of artists:  Susan Salazar "paints" with colored pencil and specializes in drawing animals; Mindy Turk makes beautiful bead jewelry; Kathleen Romero weaves baskets according to her Native American traditions; and Pierre Bounaud (who's even newer there than I am) is a ceramicist.  It's exciting to be part of the village, and I hope all of you who are in San Diego can stop in and see what we offer.


Pierre snapped this photo of one corner of the gallery, showing some of my work, his, and Susan's. The gallery arrangement is a work in progress, as we get to know one another and we two newbies settle in. I will take a few more photos and post them soon.

If you are near Balboa Park this Saturday, stop in at Studio 40 and say hi -- I'll be working there from 11 to 4.  Also happening this weekend at Spanish Village is the San Diego Potters' Guild's annual sale, which starts at 10 on both Saturday and Sunday.

Still here, really!

Spring fever lasted most of the summer.  Turns out I had some undetected medical issues, not serious but energy-draining.  It took me four months to figure out that I needed a doctor, rather than yet another nap -- and about two weeks to get it all resolved.  I'm happy to say that I am back to my usual self at last, and back in the studio.  It's just that I spent most of the past few months in a frustratingly unproductive haze, so there hasn't been much to say or show here.

I'm still having fun, and challenges, with felting handwoven fabric onto my vessels, plus a side venture into cobweb felt scarves.  I'm excited about both avenues and will be showing both in galleries and sales events this fall.

Spring fever

We fiber artists are not immune from spring fever.  I wander into my studio, stare out the window, play around with colors for a while, wander out to the sofa, take a nap...

In my southern California garden, nature is putting on a show.  I draw a lot of inspiration from the local landscape, so it's an exciting time. 


 

When I do manage to buckle down to work, I've been felting handwoven fabric into the surface of my vessels.  As a long-time weaver and collector of other people's odds and ends along with my own, I have quite a stash to play with.  I like the results so far and will be doing more of this.


My most successful piece in this new genre is shown at the top of my new Gallery 3 page on this site. It's part of a series of natural-colored basket forms that are now for sale at Zazen in Coronado. Funny to be using browns and tans in the midst of spring's riot! Ah well -- all part of the adventure.

Crazy busy fun

I was in production mode through January and early February preparing work for Sophie's Gallery and the Talmadge Art Show.  Then I had to immediately switch gears and completely clean out and reorganize my studio in order to host a five-day intensive workshop there on sewing clothing from handwoven fabric with wonderful teacher and friend Daryl Lancaster.  A small group of us had a blast learning and making together.

Now that I've mostly recovered, and the studio is mostly back in working order, I am giving myself a holiday from shows and major deadlines for the next couple of months.  There's so much felting, weaving, and sewing that I'd like to do, and I need to let serendipity be my guide for a while.  I want to be a kid in my fiber "candy store".

At the Talmadge Art Show, I was privileged to sell one of my large vessels, Spice Market, to a gentleman who is a new client.  He was kind enough to send this lovely photo of the piece in its classy new home. (Photo used with his permission.)  I feel honored!

 In the garden my freesias have started to bloom, while the weather bounces from winter to spring to summer and back again.  It is full-on nesting season for the local hummingbirds.  My husband keeps their feeders filled, I keep the flowers coming, and in return we get endless hours of entertainment watching them.  The rate at which they're going through the "juice" makes it clear that there are a lot of babies being raised, though we have yet to see a nest.  Sadly, nobody built one in our wind chimes this year.  But all this activity, and some old yarn that caught my eye as I was felting, inspired this latest take on my miniature vessels.  And yes, there are tiny felt eggs inside.  Happy spring, a few weeks early!

Then practice some more

There's the desire to change, and there's the ability to change, and sometimes one has little to do with the other.  (Insert big sigh here.)  I do believe it is possible for people to change, to improve on our bad habits.  But if it were easy, we'd all be perfect already, wouldn't we?

The post-holiday crunch always takes me by surprise -- although no one other than me signed me up for mid-winter shows and exhibits --  and I never seem to make enough time to try out all my new ideas.  It's so much more expedient to make the same thing again.  But after a while that isn't art, it's manufacturing, which is not my goal.  Nevertheless, I've been having fun cranking out miniature vessels this week, shaped like hearts in honor of Valentine's Day coming up.  Maybe shamrocks come next?

My previously announced daily practice of reading "Art and Fear" was a bit ambitious as it turns out.  But I am managing at least weekly reading of it and still finding it thought-provoking.  Maybe some day I'll even reach the end of the book!

The other thing distracting me from felting is that I am suddenly feeling drawn back to weaving.  In December I dressed my floor loom for the first time in a year and a half and wove off a length of narrow yardage, which some day will become a vest for a dear friend.  At the moment cones and skeins and balls of yarn are scattered all over the studio, grouped in combinations that intrigue me.  I'm trying to decide which one to start with, but I'm such a color junkie that I flit from one to the next like a hummingbird drunk on nectar.  My felting table is a little island of order in the midst of all this happy chaos.  What fun!