A huge forehead smack for me. If the transfer paints are process colors, then I can use all my old knowledge of color mixing for print to get colors I am aiming for instead of bumbling around in color space. And that means that I can use the Media of the Moment to explore the Take it Further Challenge (it is just TIF from here on out friends) and that makes integrating my life much, much easier.
Color swatches for that tomorrow, bed now.
week 1 leafrise
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.
In the middle of all the experiments, I got the leaves in orange into/onto a starry night sky, and they looked like a series of rising moons, only, you know, leaf shaped. LeafRise.
This is the first of the weekly objects. It is 5×7" (12.7×17.8 cm) transfer printed using leaves and star shaped sequins as resists, embroidered and foiled (hard to see but present).
It was substantially done yesterday but the day kind of escaped from me, so I finished it today.
Today I also extended the experimentations to sheer fabrics like this:
Jan 7
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.
but I can’t figure out what to do with them – it wants something that demonstrates the sheerness of them somehow.
STR first sock as far as I got
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.
The Other Kate told me to pack up these bad puppies and send them to
her. So I did. They are gone. I feel much lighter and happier, at
least in the knitting department, and I have been roaring along on these, which are making me happy. The yarn is a silk/merino single ply which is fabulously smooth but has no spring and is kind of splitty. The pattern is one I made up, and continue to make up as I go along. They are toe up even though I prefer top down because I have one more skein of yarn and I will need 1/2 for each sock, and I want to Use it All Up.
joyful socks
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.
Raising kids, you never know exactly what milestone is going to be big. Alice has been growing smarter and stronger pretty fast over the last couple months, and she has taken up knitting, teaching herself how to go back and forth, and learning how to use dpns to go around in circles, figuring out decreases… That was big, but she kind of snuck it past me.
The one that flattened me today was soldering lessons. She and Al, sharing the same great thought, each bought a robot kit for the other for Christmas, to share. So there are two different purple robot kits ready to go. They started one yesterday and realized there was a fair amount of soldering involved, and we decided to call in Dr Bill. Because Al is the ugliest solderer ever. Ever, and still have the object work, and sometimes it doesn’t, on account of bad soldering. So Bill came over this afternoon with family in tow, and he carefully showed Alice and Aerin how to do it properly, and they did nicely, and then floated off to play with their virtual cousin. Bill tried to help Al too, but it didn’t take.
So both girls can solder now, and put together robot kits. Alice still needs help and oversight, but Aerin can start working on the backlog we have lying around the house. After she finishes her T-Rex automaton.
We have good lives.
I started out to deliberately get transfer paint onto leaves with this one (I started it as a series of color mixing tests but it got out of hand):
Jan 5a
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.
Then I flipped the leaves color side down and used them as a resist for a dark blue plate:
Jan 5b
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.
and then I realized the leaves had blue on them and I should try this.
Jan 5c
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.
I am stunned. There is a very easy progression to making this stuff and using it, but the results are so fluid and unexpected. I will have yards of samples by the end of the transfer paints as the Media of the Moment.
Unexpected bummer: transfer paints work best on man made fibers – these gorgeous things are 100% polyester which makes the fiber snob in me quiver
Jan 3b
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.
Painted leaves with a painted piece of paper behind them – I am verry pleased with the detail from the leaves.
Jan 3c
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.
After the above experiment, the backs of the leaves had color on them, so I flipped them over and ironed again. They look very dreamy to me.
I experimented with other polyester fabrics, but the shiny stuff carries the most detail. I should go troll through Joann’s for other polyester fabrics that are smooth but less shiny.
Unexpected bonus: ironing oak leaves makes a nice smell.
Unexpected negative: it is the middle of freaking winter in New England – the only leaves I can find are dead oak leaves. I wonder if people would mail me leaves… you know, from warmer climes?
It helps me think about what I am doing if I can make it into a list. So I worked on formalizing yesterday’s nebulous concepts into a list, and it looks liket his:
Art commitments:
- daily thing – daily sample of the media of the moment
- weekly thing – using the samples or new knowledge of the media of the moment, make a 5×7” work
Personal stuff:
These are things I intend to do this year. In June I will revisit the media of the moment concept and see what I have left in my stash to explore. It could be a semester course, or it may go all year. I am not sure how many different kinds of stuff I have in there. The weekly thing will keep me making stuff with my experiments, and I will try to tie the monthly thing to the media of the moment experiments as well.
so Mom – you’ve moved up the list in importance, and you should hear from me soon.
At the end of every knitting pattern I have ignored to date, there is the instruction at the end. It says "Weave in loose ends." There is generally some nonsense about blocking as well, but for socks, well, I have block shaped feet so I figure that works fine for me. I wear all my handmade socks with the strings sticking out like this: 
It is a personal failing that I have acknowledged, and care about insufficiently to modify. But now the ends of my art are sticking out and it feels untidy and unfinished.
I am not sure how to describe what I want to do next.
It occurred to me in the middle of last year that I am creating for myself a giant, self directed art curriculum. I spent the first year making simple things over and over again, varying the constraints and trying to find a style and voice that is authentically mine.
I think this year I want to explore different media. My shelves and drawers are full of paints and inks and markers and more of all of these that I purchased thinking they would be good to use. Now is the time to use them. What I want to do is spend time every day noodling with a particular medium. The aim is to explore what I can do with it when I come at it again and again and again. How far can I push one particular idea? How flexible is it? How much control do I get, and how much serendipity do I have to accept? It should take at least a month of daily effort to begin to get a grip on these things, and I am actually thinking about six weeks each. Or until I run out of stuff. At the end of each media exploration, I need to be able to do a final project using that stuff. It may be some kind of piece using the samples I have made, or it may be a final report kind of thing. I will probably write a brief review of what I liked and hated, and what I might use it for in the future, if I ever want to touch it again….
I am starting with transfer paints, but also allowed to use the transfer crayons and transfer pencil that I have squirreled away.
This is going to be a more boring blog for a while. I will document the process as much as I can, but I am not sure how useful it will be once posted.
Happy Blogiversary – I started this project one whole year ago.
I offer here a self assessment of the last year.
Postcards:
straight up numbers: 330/365 = 90%
weakest month: October and July – October I couldn’t get a rhythm, and I wasn’t pushing the ideas hard enough. It wasn’t til I relaxed and let each one come that I calmed down, but the results still were not fabulous, with one or two exceptions. July I had two good ideas and then it was a looong time until the month ended. Two were beautiful, one heartfelt, the rest were filler. I expected to have more fun, and more ideas, for faces in September, but that felt like it dragged as well. I did well with the theme I finally settled on for August (sunflowers) but I could have chosen a better theme.
strongest months: November and December – I never expected to get so much out of chasing a color I wasn’t fond of, and I think the work in November is the strongest of the year. December has some strong stuff in it as well – I am doing well with abstracts, and with simple interpretations of real things. I had a lot of fun with the holes in June, but I don’t think the resulting work is strong, it mostly looks like I was having fun. Not there is anything wrong with that, sometimes. March was educational in part because I finally had to address myself to learning Photoshop and getting gmore from my camera. January was a fine start, but I definitely got better as the year wore on (which I was hoping for but didn’t really expect). April had a couple of inspired (if I do say so) money images, but overall was slow.
Overall: A- for fulfilling the letter of the law, a daily postcard. Selected postcards were completely awesome and deserve A+ for design and execution.
best part: having done it, I think. Going into my room on a daily basis and making something is very very good for me, mentally and creatively. I had more ideas than time, and I didn’t run out (which is reassuring, as those who make stuff up will tell you). I am going to do something every day again in 2008, but I think I need to make fewer, bigger things as well. Philip Pullman says that he doesn’t wait for his muse – he goes and sits down at his table and starts writing. Things show up. I certainly found that to be true. In fact, I had a harder time restarting the process after a vacation than I did maintaining momentum in the middle of the year.
Do it again? yup. Watch me go!
Journal Quilts:
straight-up numbers: so far 10 of 12, = 83%, if I finish December it’ll be 91%
overall grade: solid B – some extra credit for trying to cram so much into such small spaces, still a solid B. Hand in the last month and we can revist your grade.
worst parts: I am certainly my own worst critic: let the images breathe! how about some colors beyond blue? I think I stressed too much over these because they were bigger (yikes!) and less frequent, and seemed to require more meaning. Once I stopped trying to make them quite so meaningful, I had more fun making them and I think the results were easier to “read”.
best parts: It is fun working at small sizes. After the postcards at 4×6”, a full page seemed enormous, but still extremely manageable to accomplish in a month. When I didn’t freak out.
other thoughts: I spent a year thinking hard about some part of my life on a monthly basis, and then making a quilt about it. I prefer the pages that are more opaque to the viewer, and have less me all over them. I think it might also be easier to look at pages that don’t need to be explained quite so thoroughly. While I will be making things monthly next year (SharonB’s Take it Further Challenge), I think I’d prefer not to focus so much on what is internal, but turn my gaze outward more to see what I can show others.
Do it again? eh – not the journaling so much, but the monthly object? definitely.
For today, New Years Day, I took the day off. The whole house slept late, we got more snow, the girls and I shovelled while Al snored, I walked around the block and we finished by going out for Chinese food. It is funny – I think we were all thinking Chinese New Year, even though it isn’t for another couple weeks. Just the conflation of our New Year and Chinese Food. It felt like good luck though. But then, dumplings always feel like good luck.
New Projects starting tomorrow.
Lee Thomson 