Friday, May 18, 2012

enlarged to show details

i've been hermiting a lot lately. poking around in my brain. remembering. connecting. digging aimlessly through scraps and threads.  been feeling disconnected from the community around me. but not yet ready to venture forth into the thick of it. so content myself with fingering salvaged bits of cloth that once clothed neighbors. and strangers from town. scraps culled from known and unknown quilters' fabric dross. while feeling a sense of community amidst these salvaged fibers, a thought filled my mind about creating a human wrapping cloth. a product, i'm quite certain, of my journeys with jude... but also, perhaps, a gesture to pay homage to the longing to feel connected to those around me.


last night the dark skies became crowded with rolling spring storm clouds attempting to cool the day's heated edges while i sat in my tiny house filled with a giant dog and too many big dreams and stitched together remnants of cloth. of community. an attempt to slake this thirst. i'm not ready to spread the emerging cloth out for eyes to peck at like hungry birds, so you will have to be content with these folded excerpts.


this is just the first row of soon to be many. it will be flat. i think. but still a human wrapping cloth. not intended to lazily stretch itself out across the expanse of a bed, but to embrace and cuddle the human body. constructed primarily of 6" squares and 6" X 12" rectangles and soon to be joined by circles (moons?) and smaller squares, if only for good measure. being much larger in scale than i've been working in of late, i've pulled out the old treadle sewing machine again and done my piecing therewith. though i quickly found i missed the texture and interesting bits of color afforded by hand-stitching the seams open with variegated threads... to that end, i am now going back and needle chanting them in place while contemplating my community and how these scraps may have once fit into the lives that once held them.


this morning i planted another oak tree in the front yard. a 14 foot twig, really. some day i hope to bring my treadle out and sit beneath its spreading branches to sew in its cool shade. but for the moment, i am content in its infancy and am delighting in its twigginess.

i'd like to say that i will be getting back on track to posting every other day. spreading my own creative branches once more. offering cool shade to wanderers. my own ideas enlarged to show details. but for right now, i am sitting within my own twigginess...

namaste'

13 comments:

  1. Sometimes one needs to hermit... until the hermitage is done. There's really no way around it but through. Human wrapping cloth is a lovely thing.

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    1. sometimes i wonder if the hermitage will ever be "done"... and, yes, a human wraping cloth is a lovely thing. i so appreciate jude for the concept.

      i'm thinking this will become a human furoshiki. ha!

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  2. Those colours and patterns seem to sing to one another, perhaps they are practising to sing comfort songs to a wrapped person

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  3. Your wrapping cloth...bringer of peace and comfort.

    Enjoying the folds, they hold lots of interest and hidden treasures.

    Enjoy your quiet stitching "in your tiny house filled with a giant dog and too many big dreams..." (you have a lovely way with words Joe).

    Jacky xox

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    1. yes. sometimes hidden even from the needle chanter!

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  4. Wrapping cloths wrap many things, eh?
    I love to see your cloth selections because as I would not think of these pieces together...they so work. It's the Joe style. I like that :) Maybe an oak leaf with those moons on the wrapping cloth.

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    1. the joe style. ha! i suppose, if one could call the random cullings of a community of strangers one's style, then this is correct. ha! i shall have to ruminate on that one a while...

      oh..and yes! yes to the oak leaf idea! thank you!

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    2. Yes...the Joe style! They may have belonged to others as clothes, but as fabric they belong to you! As you said to Clare, you choose intuitively what speaks to you and therefore a style is developed. Maybe by accident, maybe unconsciously, but it does shine through :)

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  5. And what if, as you said before, you woke up and expected the best to happen? I sure wish you were in my community....I love what you do and I love your style of writing. Most of all I like your boldness with colour...I sometimes think I play safe with colour.

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    1. so true, clare. thanks for the reminder!

      as for color boldness...i think i just decided somewhere along the way to throw out all the *rules* i was taught about color and just choose them intuitively. i remember thinking once that every color looks beautiful in a rainbow...so why do we have so many rules about which ones look good together and which don't?

      i mostly just choose what speaks to me and quit worrying about what someone else might say about my choices. more often than not, people like them. but, if they don't, does it really matter? so long as the choices make me happy. after all, i am the one choosing them...

      that's a difficult leap, i think, for most artists. to let go of our need for approval and validation from others for our art. but not an impossible one to make.

      namaste'

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  6. Hello Joe
    just breathe.....

    sending a little of the kindness back to you...

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  7. I do love that phrase 'needle chanting'. As Clare said, I enjoy your style of writing. Thanks for sharing a bit of yourself.

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