Tuesday, August 10, 2010

Time flies, again...

It's been a rough few weeks over here. Trips to the animal emergency room (mysteriously all better now), trips to see family out of state, dealing with loss and grief-- and through it all, my first choice for processing everything, aside from talking things over with my dearest, is working with fabric.


I've been sketching a bit, though for me sketching to start work on new pieces can be tricky... so much of how I think and visualize is, well, less than concrete. The images are more like the blendy backgrounds and bases of scenic art than the defined lines of cut fabric, and it can be difficult to translate back and forth between them. I still wonder how different it would be to work on a backdrop now, with my glasses, able to see lines and shapes in much finer detail than I could a few years ago... someday I hope to find out. I really miss painting and the trance-like state my mind shifted to when I could sink into a project.
I guess learning to play with art-journaling ought to be a goal, teaching myself to use watercolors or at least colored pencils while I'm sketching, but that seems too... complex? If I'm going to haul out a bunch of supplies, I'd rather be doing something more than sketching. On the other hand, it might prompt me to do more work.

I've been leaning towards a one-to-one target for the studio anyway. One for me, one for X. For every shop sample or baby quilt or family gift, I can turn my attention back to artwork. For every finished art piece, I need to cross another "regular item" off the list. Considering the insane number of people I know having babies right now, this could be extremely productive.


The first quilt is off the frame and at it's new home-- forgot to get a picture once everything had been nicely clipped and tidied, but that can come later. And it's potentially a new record for me, getting the binding onto the quilt less than 24 hours after finishing the quilting. The next sample is on the frame and is currently a bit over half done, big meandered feathers this time. I'll get some photos posted once I remember where I put the camera.