First, here’s a link to a nice interview with me on the World of Threads Festival website. This International festival is a bi-yearly event that happens in Oakville, a town not far from where I live. I’ve been participating in it for years as an exhibitor, speaker, and juror. Each year it gets better. I am getting harder and harder to please with textiles, and yet last year’s showing just blew me away!!! So if you are a textile artist I strongly recommend that you visit the event if you can, enter your work in Common Thread exhibition or keep an eye on what’s happening there (even if you’re from VERY far away)…. I have a strong feeling that this year’s festival is going to be a knockout.
Also, I will be teaching a 3-day workshop in London, Ontario this coming May, as part of the Gathering Threads conference organized by the Canadian Embroiderers’ Guild. I suggest booking early for any of their events and workshops – they are filling up fast!
OK! Down to the day’s discussion.
The Gathering Thread interview stirred up some great topics and got them buzzing around in my head. This is why I rarely turn down interviews, especially those that go beneath surface. First of all, it’s flattering that someone, anyone, might be interested in what I’ve got to say. Heck, how often does THAT happen? And the other thing is, especially with the written ones, they cause me to really think about the reasons why I feel as I feel. Most of the time, space constraints don’t allow me to put it all in the interview, so I’m going to make a list and do it here in my blog.
Why I love my technique
The most important quest for any artist is to find a medium that resonates with her vision, her abilities and her personality. I love my technique. I do.
And after a lot of thought, I believe this is why: from start to finish, there is a lot that ‘just happens’. That is to say, chance plays an important role in the finished product. For example, although I have a huge, and I mean huge, collection of fabrics, I rarely have ‘exactly’ the right colour envisioned for the piece. Or it’s there and can’t be found, in spite of the relative order of my storage system.
So what’s a girl to do? Go out and buy new materials each time? Not an option… the nearest fabric shop is a good 20 minutes’ drive and in the heat of the creative moment I am not a good risk behind the wheel. SO – I make do. Yes, I make do with what I have. And this just happens to be the most important and salient and exciting part for me: the medium itself, the fabrics I have now, become part of a ‘conversation’. I am no longer the dictator.
This way, my process begins to record where and how I am at the moment, with the materials I have, with the machines, studio and life that I’ve got. Me, and my life, not ‘just me’. By pushing it just a bit further, by using scraps that are just lying around, cutting them in a random way, throwing them on instead of carefully placing them, sewing over them in unplanned patterns and lines, letting the raw edges fray, going for BOLD rather than FUSSY… I live in the moment, turn the ego off and experience a direct connection with the muse, no longer getting in my own way.
Letting go is exhilarating. It means accepting the risk of failure. It means overcoming obstacles in new ways. It means learning to live with and embracing imperfection. It’s the ONLY way to exceed my own entrenched ideas. Plus, no problem worrying about running out of this or that. I KNOW nothing is going to impede my creative energy.
I think all life should be like that … as in art, so in life. Or so I hope. As I explore this idea in my art practice, every day, I hope snippets of ‘letting go’ will drift into my daily life. In that way, art is definitely my teacher.
I know there are all kinds of great new products out there, glues and sprays and sparkly things, tools and machines and threads and storage options… There are all kinds of ways I might be able to ‘improve’ how I work, do it better, faster, quieter, bigger…. but I resist, for all the reasons above: those ‘things’ will find their way to me if they are meant to. Otherwise, I am fine, content and free of want.
That’s all for now… It’s winter, the most beautiful of seasons. Stay warm and we’ll talk again soon.
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