Diversity is Our Strength

I’m so  happy to announce that the fibre art installation Diversity is our Strength is now on show at the fabulous new Knit Nottingham at 9, Trinity Walk, Nottingham, until 12th August! Eleanor asked if she could have it for the month of Pride, which in Nottingham falls on the 30th, which made me sooo excited, as it feels like I haven’t shown any art since Peace Week 2014. The Trans-ally quilt flag has been strutting its stuff at some protests, and sadly at the vigil for those killed and wounded at the Latinx night at Pulse, Orlando. I’ve added some delicate ‘spinner’/ twizzels in red,orange, pink and purple with sequins to DIOS to commemorate those whose lives changed forever that night. I have PTSD and fibromyalgia brought on by PTSD, so my thoughts are very much with the survivors who will be needing support in a country that charges enormous amounts for therapy as well as physical medical aid.

Tonight, I’ve been reading about the third death in 48 hours of a black man, killed in front of his partner and children, by US police officers acting without cause. Tomorrow is 3 weeks since the British referendum result was announced, where a crucial 3% more voted to leave the European Community [and thereby capsize the British Economy, unsettle thousands of longterm/permanent EU residents, lose Britain thousands of necessary workers, and bring armed borders back to Northern Ireland] than to remain… because many of them believed this would stop immigration by asylum seekers from wartorn Syria !!!

 

The level of racism, anti European xenophobia and financial lying that the Leave campaigners used has become the backbone of a campaign by lawyers, scientists, economists and generally people of wider understanding to make sure the exit isn’t carried through. As a disabled person, exit would be a disaster, as a person who considers herself European and a global citizen, I am so ashamed of the level of belief in flawed media and election lies, and now, the wave of racism, xenophobia and just plain nastiness of so many. Leave has promoted racism as ok, and now every day, ‘minor’ incidents of verbal abuse through to smashed windows and most worrying, arson, have been happening.

Diversity was made thinking about the different strands in our DNA, the many fine threads it takes to make a thick rope, the 108 ethnic minorities within the community of Nottingham, the need for unity within the LGBTIQA communities… I’m bi, and I remember being asked to leave a lesbian night in Newcastle because of that, even though I was there with my girlfriend; I never assume gay men will understand underclass politics because so many of the ones I have met have pink pound privilege and old boy network contacts that mean they feel insulated from prejudice; I was spat at by a lesbian for defending transwomens’ right to access Nottingham Women’s Centre. However, I try very hard not to hold grudges, and I will always work towards unity where I can, and it baffles me when people don’t see through the mischief-mongers, trying to divide us while they literally Queen it at the top [her Maj earns as much from her properties as the UK Parliament awards her, and more from so many other sources, why ARE we funding her?] or coast along in their £2million cruisers bought from BHS pension fund plundering… etc etc. The Murdoch Media Empire is very much to blame, the weak opposition allowing so much bad policy to slide through unchallenged, but even so… why are people so willing to believe anyone other than the top elite are to blame?

I make beautiful pieces in a freeform process because I MISS beauty and integrity in everyday life dealings, I grieve that we are served so poorly by the MPs who mostly forget their constituents [honorable exceptions being the shining lights Jeremy Corbyn, Carolyn Lucas and Mhairi Black] and I work slowly because of my disabling conditions. I spend a lot of spoons on making art, quite a lot of money, [all those bargain queen tiara buys add up!] and call in favours when I am installing – thanks Sam!- and all because I want the results of that process to remind people better things are possible. Inequality is not inevitable, it is the result of choices all of us make, informed by our skills in deciphering what is around us. Some things are just plain wrong [racism, any xenophobia, any bigotry, any abuse of others] but what tools do we have to pit against them?

I feel arguing shuts others down, I would rather catch their mind, as I catch their eyes in a riot of colour that turns out to have an internal order that accepts and honours DIFFERENCE. There are quotes on posters around the work, part of its site specific installation this time round [it’s been at Nottingham Pride in the Arboretum and in London for Loudest Whispers 14] and they make concrete that message of DIVERSITY IS OUR STRENGTH. We’ve never needed to hear that more, to take heart that we are not alone knowing that it is a truth we must live by, and that it carries great beauty with it, great comfort and harmony and a place to heal, a home truth that places us at the edge and the centre, all at the same time.

 

turning corners

Sophrosyne (n) a healthy state of mind, characterized by self control, moderation, and a deep awareness of one’s true self, and resulting in true happiness

I read this on facebook, such a lovely thing to come across…

Centering down to do more of what I want/ what is mine to contribute right now means giving up some of the many other exciting and sparkling possibilities available…there is a happy balance between total simplicity and sufficient resources to sustain an artist in many media. Finding a new main medium/ expression for my art has lead to acquiring a lot of materials that all appeal, but are not necessarily viable [certainly not in my bijou flat!]

Like most artists, I have a tendency to stockpile materials, and as an upcycling artist, the number of POSSIBLE uses I can think of for an individual bit of…tat… are distressingly many. At the height of an argument with an ex he told me I was like a disco mirror ball, to which I replied, ‘Yes, how wonderful, all those facets!’  He  shouted: IT WAS AN INSULT!

Nerts to that!

By nature I have been much more of a juggler and a marathon tasker/ up with the rocket, down with the stick/ all or nothing person and it is a revelation to become seasonal and patient, an ‘enough is as good as a feast’ person. It has grown on me gradually, first of all through agoraphobia, then Daoism, gardening, living with someone with bi-polar, but now mainly having to make a balance that will keep me able to make art at least sometimes in a day/week. Pacing is so central to my management of the pain and fatigue and  weakness of fibromyalgia, and it involves moderation, never one of my strong points till now.

Lately I have had help tackling the studio, and great progress has been made, yay!

I give to a lot of projects, so friends give to me, knowing I can channel things, but it can be very tempting, all that eyecandy! Sorting through boxes always brings a feast of ideas to mind: the trick is enjoying the ideas and letting them go, materials and all!

I am becoming increasingly comfortable with knowing a number of projects ahead and rotating between them – after a lot of work on Wasting Waste, I’ve had a spell of gardening and pink Wool against Weapons knitting, and now I want to work on something else, still for Peace Week, but a different installation, probably the ivy rootballs. I’m going on holiday on Monday [the sea, the sea!] and when I come back it would be great to have WW sorted and stored, easily accessible but not on every surface!

So I’m very pleased some more sorting happened today:

 

Zero-waste projects are 1) making strong fabric carriers for the Foodbanks to give food away in, I had a few left over from the ones I made for the Fixers stall and clearing out my work-in-progress/UFO crate has added more.

2) putting all my threads and snippets into the same place so I can make embellishers for the guerilla gardening pouches. I have some see through plastic storage jars that seem just the thing.

I bought some more see through plastic (shoe) boxes and David, who was helping, gave me some ziplock freezer bags he was clearing out, so I am sifting and sorting, and I suspect there will be a lot of boxes of those, but then, they are very handy, so this shouldn’t be a problem, hmm?

Having sorted out the pieces of the duvet cover I am almost ready to finish quilting, I was able to put unwanted cloth into the smaller shoe boxes and colour code it. This liberated a 20litre crate for Wasting Waste yarn stash, which liberated an 80litre crate  for Diversity is our Strength, which liberated the travelling bag so I can pack to go on holiday on Monday! Oh my!

I hardly ever buy fabric anymore, maybe a particular keynote colour, as I am working through the stash acquired by a few years of visiting remainder sales and friends’ clearouts…it does take having access to a large collection of fabric to acquire the huge variety of snippets I love to work with though. This is where SOPHROSYNE comes back in…I seem to have hit the point where I can balance letting go of some plans [making embellished/complex cloth floor cushions, making clothes, printing cloth] and taking on others [guerilla articulture.]

Knowing and accepting what I can do within the limits of fibromyalgia is not a straightforward thing: but then, life is never straightforward, right? Some things suit my face though – the audacity of street art, the gifting and salvage side of what I make and how I choose to share it, these are much more mainstream than they were, more impactful as I can now share them through Facebook groups. I like to be playful in my making, but I am very serious about how stepping out of expectations of what contribution (among others) people with disabling conditions can make to the idea of worth in the community. People living outside the ratrace are necessary to the w/holistics of communities, we model being and doing, not having and buying. Artists/creatives of all kinds can encourage others to think out of the box and work with what we have to make what is needed:

 

Finally though, it comes back to living with what works for me, knowing what works for me and enjoying that. Definitely a corner turned.

 

fibre tagging

So these are the bedizeners I have been making over the last week, about 3 dozen, which makes a feast of colour and tiny details that get quite overpowering when they’re all laid out on my photography ‘tray’ (an A2 corkboard with black handmade paper laid on top.)

By the way, laying them out is a good idea if you want to keep an eye on colour balance – it doesn’t really matter, as I will be tying these to railings and trees individually, but if they were all being hung from one tree, just like decorating a Christmas tree, total randomness can look less than pleasing!

I discovered I had made nearly everything in shades of blue (leftovers from all the watery blocks on the chiropractor’s quilt) or purple and oranges (C& G Machine Embroidery colour palette) so I stretched myself and deliberately made some pink and green ones, and some black and greys.

I’ve also made hearts, some from complex cloth, which is where you lay out scraps of cloth and stitch them to a backing cloth, (like quilting without the wadding we assume for modern quilting.) I use ribbons, lace, leftover fabric, sweet wrappers, anything that will hold up to the task I intend the cloth to manage.

The slitheriest and most swearingest part was stitching silk taffeta ribbon to satin blanket ribbon…I set myself a target of 100 metres of thread in an ornamental stitch and by the end I was getting the hang of not twisting the ribbon as it unrolled…  😉

I then arm-knitted massive chain from this (like fingerknitting, but huuuge!) and as everything is so slippery, the next stage is stitching hearts to the links to keep them in position…

Of course, the ‘more is more’ school of embellishment means that some at least of these complex cloth hearts are being edged with beads and sequins, photos of that stage to follow 😉

Another set of hearts are knitted and some have a crochet edging. As my hands hurt horribly if I knit more than 2 a day of these small hearts, my lovely Mahjongettes have stepped into the breach. Gold star goes to Elizabeth, who has taken yarn home with her to do more (I so owe her cake!) and the moss stitch hearts are hers, with edging by PoetrySue. Eleanor stuck to garter stitch and had fun mixing ribbons in and making faces over my texture yarns. The results are very pleasing!

And of course, all those ribbons and threads and glittery bits and rustly wrappers are very attractive to Nonie…

richer by giving

I have been managing a little making again, and started with an engagement present. It is for the sister-in-law whose husband died the year before mine (yes, that is a little complicated!) meaning, our husbands were brothers. I am really pleased she has found someone new to be happy with and wanted to make her something, as although we are very different people with different tastes (she is much more elegant, and has a degree in the philosophy of science) we both enjoyed being able to have intellectual conversations at family gatherings and discuss books when the mainstream of the conversation was what third cousins were doing 150 miles away 😉

When making a gift, I always have a think about whether I am giving a reflection of myself, something purely for the recipient’s taste or some combination. This time I leaned more towards what I wanted to give, a piece that rejoices in her happiness with a touch of sympathetic magic (wellwishing) in the making.

Then I said in the card I hoped it wasn’t too eccentric for her 😉

As it is only 7cm square it won’t be too dominating… but it has some of my current concerns in, mandalas and fibre bundles.

I started with a collage background, and two possibilities, one plainer, so I could go with ideas as they came up, and by decision time, they were very different.

Comparing the two side-by-side helped me realise the first was too clumsy, and I cut the beads and button off, and put it all to one side (yes, you will be seeing it later 😉 ) I still liked the second, so on I went, choosing tinier and tinier elements, oh my…

Final touch was a machine cord loop for easy hanging, and that was secured by stitching the bead loop on the front at the same time.

Why? It is a little more fiddly, but it means the weight of the elements are braced against each other, with less drag on the twinchie canvas, which as you will see from the shot of the back is… more of a bargain than a quality product 😉

The Japanese, the Hindu, the Tibetans all have  ritual mindful sewing, and many contemporary slow stitch groups are connected to the prayer and good hope Christian church sewing circles, where women met and stitched quilts and baby clothes for the needy…the idea is that by consciously investing the process with good wishes, the recipient will feel loved and energised in themself as well as receiving the physical aid of the item.  Of course it also bonds the community and makes the group focus on positive action for the good of everyone, so it really is a shame the groups fell out of favour, with fundraising for bought goods taking over in some places.

I use this mindful technique a lot, as among other things, it helps overcome self consciousness about making, the worthiness of what you are offering as a gift etc – all good to pass on to anyone you know with social anxiety or low self esteem!

Making for others, even from patches and leftovers, often makes people feel very aware of how rich they are, and this ties in nicely with linking to zero waste week, which runs from 2 – 9th September http://www.zerowasteweek.co.uk/

for which I will be trying to post everyday with zero waste ideas – as the focus this year is food, and I have already posted about sprouting seeds, there will be at least one upcycled post – but how appropriate is that?!!

things that like to be together

So I have cleared every last cone of skipped and gifted yarn in my studio – I have NO, repeat NO, cones of yarn…I’m reeling! (sorry, bad pun!)

I have a small collection of metallics and serging silks/nylons on cones, mmm, kingfisher blue, silver, copper, mmm…. for embellishment, but all my yarn now fits in the small plastic 4 drawer unit that sits on top of some project crates.

Wow! Where did it go, you ask? The largest/fullest cones and some fluffy acrylic that will go well with the fake mohair on some of the cones is going to the refugee forum, a bag so big I can barely lift it 😉 Luckily my home help volunteers at the forum, so she will happily drop it off with some baby toys my child visitors no longer use.

For the story on where I get this skipped yarn and tips on winding yarn to maintain good tension:

skip for joy: a yarn winding tutorial

The 47 cones I cleared (in slow stages! it was a lovely anti-anxiety aid when I was fretting about the missing benefits – now sorted, only the appeal to not worry about now 😉 ) are now divided into yarn for ‘whispering wall’ and balls to use for fundraising for the exhibition next year. What you see below is for the netting and bedizeners and is now stored in a newly cleared 80litre crate of materials and components for whispering wall and cradle for stones – they only both fit in because about 80 cones and cardboard inners that I will use for scrolls are now stored in a big cardboard box, waiting for winter when I can dry the brusho painting by the fire.

I want to make the most enormous braid/dreadlock so will bundle several of these together for one huge freeform crochet chain…I wonder what the record is for the most strands/ply in a crochet/finger knitting chain?

Some of these were so pleasing to mix – they may look a little brash in the picture but once mixed will hopefully be rich and sumptuous 😉

My principle for choosing what yarns to mix is based on paying attention whenever I am in nature – there are colours and textures that like to be together. Too harmonious can become bland, so a little contrariness often pays off, too 😉

The smaller balls are to be corded with a zigzag on the sewing machine, I have some dark golds, metallic brown and gold mixes and a dull orange that shows up as sandy gold against blues, oh yum!

The blood orange mixes will be corded with a metallic plum and black mix…oh yessy 😉 colours are so pleasing to work with!

The other mixes are a fluffy fake mohair based set, and a wide range of landscape inspired mixes…my favourites are the ones with flashes of turquoise and the strawberry sherbet mix 🙂 I might knit some up as scarves, they would look lovely with machine cord tassels …

It looks as though I used picasa neonize for the bottom images, but I think my camera did some funny flash/solarise effect..no, I don’t understand the settings on it, it came free from a charity shop because it didn’t work properly and had no manual!! I will take better photos when I set up my fundraising site, promise 😉

taking a yarn trip

So, I was supposed to take a trip into my overdraft at a fancy yarn supplier, but life had other plans…instead I have been upcycling more factory yarn into hand work friendly balls… some yummy landscape mixes are coming through, very Cornish heath and autumn woodland, the holiday I want to have is happening in the winding 😉 Nonie gets mesmerised by not just watching me wind, but the long dreadlocks of freeform crochet as they accumulate on the floor. The next mix is sand, blues and browns, driftwood on the beach and white horses on the North Sea colours…mmmm….

But first a trip down memory of yarn used  lane 😉

diversity is our strength

So, this is a detail of the Diversity is our Strength installation I am hanging near the Community Stage at Nottingham LGBT Pride. It’s not finished yet, but while Cherise and I set the world to rights this afternoon, she wound some more pompoms and I sewed more feathers and opalescent pink buttons and generally wrangled until two dozen components have become a piece. It is very long as it will be hanging from a tree branch about 8 – 10’/2.6m – 3.3 metres high, so these are detail shots and I’m hoping Keith may take some in situ shots with his good camera, depending on heat and health of course 😉

It’s freeform crochet, with lots of organza, some batik print which is really like the Black Pride image background, a ton of eyelash yarn and lots of other rainbow-y elements. I used the knitting mill to make some long i-tubes, twice my height 😉 and then chained them, ooh very satisfying!

A couple of people helped with cutting fabric as my elbow is not happy using scissors, the lime, orange and black is an industrial remnant I bought at the place near Fixers, the nylon velvet ribbon was upcycled from a friend’s skip find, the 60s neon rainbow/lace fabric (Cherise called it “the most of more”) has been waiting patiently for the right project as has a lot of the yarn! Some of the long chains have been made with skip yarn and some are nets and nylons that have been given to me by stashbombers (they call themselves friends…!!) So I have cleared a lot of stuff from yarn drawers and fabric stash (hurrah!) and hired Cherise to help me consolidate my stash when I’ve gathered spoons after Pride. I’m guessing at least 3 x 20litre storage boxes will be freed up!! I’m also going to put my millinery supplies on E-bay as with this new complication with my arm, my 3D work is going to be yet  more limited, so time to downsize some less possible materials and tools (let me know via comments if you’re interested) and gather more space 😉

progress on bundles

Thanks to Wain for asking why I wrap bundles, it gave me the spark to write a post. I have been working slowly as I am very tired after the physical effort of going to see the graduate shows and then answering comments on the last post. People felt I’d been disrespectful, so it felt important to answer mindfully…though as it cut into making time/energy today I need to draw a line now. But Wain’s question was a good reminder to consider why and how I am working on cradle for stones.

This was my answer:
“I gather leftover making waste from my mixed media studio and wrap it in more waste/remnants until it acquires interest. The interaction of the visual elements begin a dance of their own which means the next element suggests itself from the tray of leftovers in front of me. That probably sounds like a how, but there is a ‘why’ in there, I am seeking to make even the waste have meaning or bring beauty to the world…as a metaphor for the solution to the problem of first world waste: we buy things, when we are seeking experiences.
After my husband died (dropped dead of a heart attack) I found I bought many materials for the machine embroidery course I started a year later, as a solution to the problem of not being able to paint now, as my damaged collar bone comes loose too often.
I feel I acquired a huge stash, very fast as: on the one hand, choosing between things was too hard, on the other, there was such joy in feeling the potential in materials, to feel absorbed and safe from the pain of bereavement, cocooned in making. Now I am working through the remnants and trimmings from many projects (large room installations, huge quilts etc, eco garments) as I also had a problem releasing leftovers…so the bundles are cocoons of acceptance and healing, and the wrapping is the healing skin/ the oak burr/ the pearl in the shell…”

It is an absorbing process, as my hands do a lot of the thinking, reaching for the next fragment of colour or texture, whether it be a bead, a snip of fabric, a tangle of thread, an end of machine cord; but then the eye has to accept and approve…and something else too, the brain function in charge of resolution has to feel satisfied. I have removed a couple of embellishers because they felt slightly “off”. Given that these are components of a very large piece, and so far, all balance in the palm of my hand, that is very meticulous! And slightly cracked 😉 But the devil is in the detail…

I love making machine cords and creating complex cloth with a  twisted version of crazy quilting ( as in the crazed surface of porcelain) using automatic machine stitch patterns, I enjoy mingling automatic/ machine and hand held techniques, so would be thrown out of  the slow cloth movement groups with a thud, but I feel at home in the mindful process approach.

I want to feel at ease when the piece is being assembled/installed, that different elements can be juggled to suit a specific site, and for me that means working each component to resolution… I made more cords and some shifu cloth with fibre additions today, very pleasing, blackcurrant, orange and black, mmm…and did some boring underpainting on the papier mache shells. Well, boring till I added glitter paint 😉  So more photos soon…though I have the chiropractor tomorrow, who is not going to be happy, as making my rollator ‘bump’ up and down buses and entries has been very hard on my neck…it will be a case of yelp, she yelps…

bundles

I have been tidying up in the studio, putting away sea change and then picking through boxes of randomness that were sent through from the living room in order to make space. A couple of cat-astrophes 😉 made them even more random, boxes of yarn balls don’t improve from somersaults and cat cuddles… It turned into a very enjoyable process as I had my eyes open for snippets to use in the next set of components for cradle…and treasure was there for the taking, a big bag of ‘rags’, quilt trimmings, the seams and other small waste from reducing a garment to fabric again, threads and yarn snippets from making machine cords…

So this is what I have made today, a dozen bundle bases which will be embellished in what, to me, is a mixture of kintsugi (making broken ceramics whole again by using a gold powder in resin glue) and boro (randomly pieced repairs), so expect some fiddley-diddley work! I’m thinking beads, buttons, wisps of thread, lovely frayed edges of taffeta, tiny inflections of colour from machine cord remnants, things it will be a pleasure to hold in your hand…there may be feathers and twigs, I’d like to use dried leaves too, but then I’d like to keep the option open that I could show this outside, it was so satisfying seeing the freeform crochet in the tree at the Meadows.

It was gorgeously sunny and hot over the Bank Holiday weekend, but two days of cold rain and my hands and knees aaaaache…even with the anti-inflammatories and painkillers, I need a distraction! And playing with buttons and bits of ‘tickytacky’ is very good for that 😉

see more slideshow

Boom! I finished the handmade book SEE MORE and I even knocked up a couple of flyers for the SEE MORE @ Nottingham Contemporary Space, while doing necessaries for SEA CHANGE…might need to lie in a darkened room all weekend 😉

so, you can see it is much shorter than the books I have made before, and is very focused to the theme of seeing with the new eyes art can give us, by simply teaching us to pay attention…the Thich Nhat Than quote is spiritual rather than creative, intended to teach the interconnectedness of all things, but is in the same vein:

PoetrySue says she likes it more for having such a strong centeredness, so that is food for thought…my favourites are the little reward bundles, the paying attention to small scraps, the discarded, that can become beauty:

– even the cufflink style button is upcycled, and the centre of the bundle is the chopped off ends of the peacock feathers from another page…but they make a delightfulness! I am so looking forward to getting to work on ‘cradle for stones’ where there will be lots of this 😉

Having been released from the tasklet of making a flyer for SEE MORE, I just thought I’d have a play with Stephen’s idea and when I’d sorted out my master copies of SEA CHANGE, I set the printer to making a gift for the class, invite cards they can give to friends for next week 😉

and in black on white card, coloured card too, but the white looked very chic and like the concrete walls of Contemporary!

Hope they like them 😉