Stripes

Kitchen Stripes

Bowl in Upper left and Platter in Lower Right by Susie Rubenstein

I will do anything to procrastinate workshop preparation--hence this new blog post. Actually, I have been very busy preparing. I have this wonderful lecture on stripes that I used to do with slides and a slide projector--but my projector is long gone to the dump and my slides are buried somewhere in a closet--so I decided to create a new lecture with digital images of stripes. The most fun was walking around my house taking images. With stripes in mind, I found all sorts of examples that I wouldn't normally associate with that word. I love the bowls and platters that I own that were made by Susie Rubenstein. She runs the ceramics program at Mt. San Antonio College in Walnut, California, and has some current work in an exhibition there that runs through April 14th.

Kilim Stripes

Obviously my lecture is full of images of stripes in traditional textiles. I had such an abundance to choose from in my collection that it became frustrating. Too much had to be left out. But then, I have to leave something for the participants to discover on their own. The image above came from the book Kilims: Masterpieces from Turkey by Yanni Petsopoulos with commentary by Belkis Balpinar (NY: Rizzoli, 1991).

Loom Parts Stripes

It was fun to go up to my studio and find stripes on my looms. They are an integral part of the process of weaving. Below you can see the most current work, in progress, on my TC-1 loom. Vibeke Vestby has started a blog about the ongoing development of the TC-2. It is interesting, technical, and exciting. As one would expect from Vibeke and Digital Weaving Norway, it is very innovative and will take the potential of jacquard weaving to another level.

On Loom Now Stripes

Work in progress by Bhakti Ziek

And of course I have to show you my latest baked goods--strawberry shortcake with bananas and apricot preserve filling. Photographed on stripes of course.

Stawberry Shortcake on Tablecloth Stripes

Who are the lucky people who are going to hear my talk? Members of the Potomac Fiber Arts Guild in Maryland. I am giving a talk on my work to the guild on Saturday, April 9th. It starts at 10am and I believe it is open to the public. Then that afternoon I give a min-workshop on Photoshop for Fibers and then will do a two day workshop on design and creativity, with a focus on fibers. That is where the stripe lecture comes in.

Draw Like a Weaver

5 Wefts Used to Create This Weaving

Do you want to know how to draw like a weaver? I'll use a recent weaving built with five wefts as an example. Take 6 crayons or pencils or inks and arrange them so you will use them in the same sequence, over and over and over. In this case, weft one (color 1) is salmon, weft/color 2 is black, weft/color 3 is dark green, weft/color 4 is white, and weft/color 5 is light green. The sixth color represents the warp--red in this case. It might help if you have a page with horizontal lines on it, or under it as a guide, or just go freehand--weavings tend to be wobbly even though they follow a grid.

How a Weaving Builds

Now make a series of horizontal dashes, on the same line, with the red color that represents where you want that color in your image. Follow this with some dashes on the same line with the black color where black should go. Put the black down and pick up the light green and draw your light green dashes on the same line. Then put that color down and pick up the white color--and draw your horizontal dashes on the same line, followed by some horizontal dashes of the dark green. Depending on your image, you might have filled in the complete horizontal row, if not, fill in the spaces with the red color, which represents the warp. Now move to the next line and continue building color by color, line by line. Some lines might not show any of one color. You get a break here drawing on paper, but as a weaver, that weft is still thrown, working at the back of the cloth rather than the front.

Most of my recent weavings are composed of series of four or five weft colors. I am averaging 140 picks per inch--sometimes more, sometimes less. If using four wefts, that means they pack down to look like 35 horizontal rows composed of four colors, plus warp color. To be fair, I don't actually draw my images line by line but use Photoshop to make compositions and insert weave structure. The book Alice Schlein and I wrote, The Woven Pixel: Designing for Jacquard and Dobby Looms Using Photoshop®, is a great resource if you want to learn how to do this. When I want to weave a design though, I do have to build it, pick by pick, and in this example that would mean five picks (wefts) create one horizontal row in the cloth. It is not unusual for my weavings to exceed 5000 picks. I am standing at the loom most of the time, though recently I obtained a stool that I can use too. 300-400 picks per hour adds up to alot of hours at the loom. What would be excruciating for some people turns out to be sanity for me.

Sea Glass formation on Bear Island

Sea Glass by Bhakti Ziek, handwoven jacquard 2010

Night Cap

Sometimes though I want things to move a bit faster. Sea Glass was woven in a new structure for me, a lampas that used a plain weave ground against a three shaft patterning twill. I dropped my wefts to three systems in the center, but created 15 structures with them. The sides of the weaving are a damask structure using just one weft. When I saw this bottle of wine at the store I had to buy it. I didn't know sea glass existed until the summer vacation in Maine, but the wine and wikipedia showed me it is a well-known phenomena.

Weaving Lesson: Threading a Loom

McMorran Balance, Weighing Yarn, Finding Sett

When I wrote on Facebook that winding warps was one of my favorite activities, my friend Ann said I was "wacky." But i do love the set up of a loom, winding the warp and dressing the loom, something I miss when I add a new warp to the TC-1 loom by tying knots that connect the old warp to the new one. For all those of you who think weaving and setting up a loom is a boring process, I say, it is fraught with tension--a mine field where every step has a possible mishap lurking. So I photographed my process the other day to share with those of you who have never woven, and might be interested in the process. Before you actually get to throw the shuttle and actively make cloth, there are dozens of steps that proceed, and lots of lovely tools to help in the process.

One warp I wanted to make was from a spool of linen thread, which had no data on it--so I took out my McMorran Balance to find out the approximate yards per pound of this yarn (1300). Then I weighed the spool (15 ounces); and then I did a warp wrapping to find out how many ends per inch would work for a balanced plain weave (10 epi) (the warp sett). Calculator, pen and paper (not photographed) got me the calculations that I could safely wind a 24 inch width at 10 epi of almost 3 yards and have enough yarn left for the weft. (We will see.)

Overall Picture of Threading Loom; Counting 40 Warp Ends

With the warp wound, I can go to the loom. The following pictures are of a different warp than discussed above--this one is 40 inches wide, Borgs Bomullin (50% flax and 50% cotton). I wound on an 11 yard warp (with the help of my husband), and the plan is to thread 20 ends per inch--800 threads. What isn't pictured is the hours spent counting the heddles on each shaft, moving them over so they are in the proper place on each shaft (these shafts are divided into three areas) and adding heddles on each of the eight shafts since none of them had enough heddles. There was math involved here too--800 divided by 8 = 100 heddles per shaft; then divided appropriately for the three sections which are not identical in width. Above you see the general set up--note the important coffee cup which seems to be making an appearance in every step of the process. On the right you see me counting off a group of 40 ends.

Counting and Moving Over Heddles; Threading Heddles

Then I count off a group of 40 heddles--5 on each shaft (40 divided by 8 = 5). I should note that I go for accuracy rather than speed and I have these processes which help show me as I am going whether I have made a mistake or not. I would much rather correct a mistake in 40 threads than find out at the end that there is a problem somewhere in the middle, or anywhere. I hold the 40 ends in my right hand, along with a threading hook, and use my left hand to move over the correct heddle and pull out the next thread from the group and hold it taunt so the hook can grab it and pull the thread through the eye of the heddle. If I have done everything right, there are now five threaded heddles per shaft and no extra threads in my hand, and no shaft with more or less than five threads.

Pulling Group of Warps in heddles and tying them in a knot

Then I pull the group tight and make an overhand knot in front of the heddles. Even though i don't go for speed (I always lost to my friend Marilyn when we worked together in her studio in Brooklyn in the mid-80s), I am always amazed how fast this process can go. It definitely takes me about a third of the time to thread a loom than to tie the knots on the TC-1.

Pulling two warp ends through dent of reed using a hook and tying groups in a knot

After all the warp ends are through heddles, I get to thread the reed. In this case I used a 10 dent reed, and put two ends per dent (bringing the sett up to 20 epi). Reeds come in different divisions, and over the years I have acquired a great variety. If I had decided on 30 epi, I could use this 10 dent reed (10 spaces per inch) and put three threads per dent, or I could use a 15 dent reed and put two threads per inch, or, if I had it, and the threads moved smoothly through the space, I could use a 30 dent reed and put one thread per dent. The cloth I am going to make is going to be a fairly open plain weave, but the cloth will shrink when washed and make the cloth firmer. It is going to be used by my husband, Mark Goodwin, for his work.

Mark and I have talked about collaboration before, or tried to talk about it--I guess I am not an easy collaborator. But he has been doing some experiments on cloth I have given him, and the results are starting to be really intriguing. You can see two of them below. So now I am going to make yardage for him so he can really explore. I don't know if the energy I am putting into the weaving is really making a difference, and I don't actually think this is a collaboration, since the creativity is all coming from his side once he has the cloth, but I do like the idea that the cloth is a catalyst for him, and I like that I have this weaving to do. It is different than the work on the TC-1, less demanding in terms of expectations on my part. Thinking about why I like dressing a loom so much, I realize it is an activity where I feel in control--I have mastery. It is one of those mind-body connections where I have done it so often that the smoothness of the process feels right--I feel right--in other words, I know what I am doing.

Drawing by Mark Goodwin on cloth woven by Bhakti Ziek

Another Mark Goodwin drawing on Bhakti Ziek cloth plus more work by Mark Goodwin

Will end with an image of the beautiful light pattern on Mark's studio wall yesterday. We both wish we could claim it as our art.

Light Pattern on Wall

Code Nightmare

Code One

I don't usually think I dream, but this morning I woke from a nightmare with all the physical sensations of panic and distress, along with relief, since I "found a solution" to the problem just before I woke. In my dream I was suppose to give a talk to students at a college in California (I know it was California but didn't know the school) and I was bringing sample fabric rather than images to the presentation. I know I went with a friend to the campus originally, where I met the people and set-up the appointment, and I remember being given a brochure with a map showing that I was at campus two, somewhere in the hills of a high desert region. Then I was in the car with Mark and another friend and we were looking for the school, for me to give the talk, and I realized that I hadn't brought any of the sample textiles with me. When our friend pulled up to the campus, I also realized he had brought us to the wrong campus. I went inside to try to call the department--I didn't have any contact names or information--and no one answered the phone. No one seemed to know where the second campus was either. We went down the road, which was sort of like the yellow brick road, and a hiking couple told us we were going in the wrong direction and sent us back to a highway. When we arrived at the school, I went in first, loosing Mark and our friend, which nagged at me for the rest of the dream, and someone tried to call the department, with no luck. But then a student from the area walked by, and took me upstairs. I was going to see if I had time to go home and get the samples, when we walked into a huge room full of students, sitting waiting for me. The instructor introduced himself and I told him I had nothing with me, no samples, no images, but I thought I could talk to them anyway and keep their attention. Maybe this doesn't sound like a nightmare to you, but I do alot of preparation before talks and workshops, and I was totally upset and sweating. Then suddenly I realized they had a digital projector and I remembered that my blog had a link to my slideshow, and I could show that--and that is when I woke up.

My first degree is in psychology, maybe I thought if I studied it I would find out why I never dreamed (yes, I know about waking yourself up in the middle of the night, with a little pad of paper next to you and immediately writing down the dreams, and then one starts to remember)--so when I have a dream that I remember it is an occassion, and I do dwell on it. I see there are overtones of the talk I did last Saturday at BigTown Gallery--where Holly Walker and I each spoke about our work practices and the work in the gallery to a wonderfully receptive audience. Instead of the usual dark room and slides, I had the wonderful light pouring in the windows and clear views of the people I was talking to, and they could see me! The talk went well, Holly was terrific, and though I was nervous to begin with, it was a wonderful experience. Much like my dream.

The other part, probably the cause of the nightmare, is that I have been trying to create a website for myself (and once I did that I was going to do one for Mark). I have been reading a book on Dreamweaver CS3, and watching tutorials on the computer, and reading code everytime I open a webpage. Did you know you can go to View>View Source and you will see the code for this page, or any page that you are on? It is a new language for me--and I guess I would say I have gone from intro level to basic level. In other words, I do understand some of what I am seeing, but not enough for a conversation--certainly not enough to make a webpage with lots of images that transition smoothly from one to another. In my head I understand, but in front of the blank computer page, I am stymied. Two nights ago I was up until 5:30am trying to understand this stuff. Yesterday I was a statue frozen in front of my screen until late afternoon, when Holly called with her own computer melt-down and I went out to act the hero. How wonderful to finally have a part of the day where I knew something, instead of being in this limbo place of understanding/not understanding.

I have decided that I am going to put the website on hold for now. In a few weeks I am going to a workshop where they will talk about web design, and hopefully they will be able to offer advice that will get me going. I know if I wanted to devote the next month or two to just learning this on my own, I could do it. I need more books, and I probably could use some other software, but then if I am doing that, what about my weaving? So the nightmare has helped me have a sense of priorities. I am going back to the loom, and begin this series of work that I have been planning. And if I need someone to see my work online, well, here it is, right in this blog--just go to the right hand column and click on the image in the slideshow and it brings you to the slideshow in a bigger format.

Thank goodness for nightmares. Oh, the code below is actual code from the last blog I posted. And now I am thinking that I am going to weave code. I especially like it when it has color, like the one above.

Code from my last Blog post

Some Finished Projects

Modelling both sides of Knit Hat

The days are still short, but I can feel them growing, which encourages me to get some work done. Making mental lists of what I need to do the next day is also helping. I finished my hat and have worn it with great satisfaction. It is comfortable, but when the wind blows it still penetrates all those layers over my ears. I saw a friend's knitted gloves, which had a soft flannel-like lining, which makes sense with the open stitch of knits, but it is too late to try and do something like that with this hat. I won't say next time because I doubt if there will be another one.

Roll of hand towels on front beam and finished on right

I also finished my hand towels--well, sort of. I was starting to worry that the roll was getting so big I would not be able to wind any more on the cloth beam, but it never got that big. This morning I stitched between the towels and cut them apart, then washed them in my washing machine and dried them in the dryer. I was worried about both processes but since these are intended to be functional, they have to function properly--which means getting thrown in the wash. They shrunk about three inches in the length and an inch in the width. Even before washing I realized I had made them smaller than I intended. I just measured a finished towel that I like and found it to be 30 inches by 18 inches, while my towels are ending up at about 22 inches by 13 inches. I am still in the process of sewing under the hems, but a few towels are finished and folded.

I want to be clear about this work that I am doing. One of the reasons I am still a weaver, after 41 years (how is that possible when I am only in my 30's?), is that there are so many ways of working as a weaver that it is impossible in one life time to cover them all. I think I told you this already, but maybe not. I began to weave with the intention of taking this skill to a commune--and in the commune I would weave whatever was needed. There was no intention of being an artist, nor, at that time, did I even realize that weaving could be an art form. Later, when I lived in Guatemala and studied brocading on backstrap weaving, I was entranced by the figurative motifs, sometimes abstracted, used by the Mayan weavers. And when I did my senior fiber studio for my BFA at the University of Kansas (which still has an excellent program), and began the body of work that started my reputation as a weaver, I used the brocading process to tell my own stories. Here and there, over the years, I have woven a scarf, or some dishtowels, but I have never seriously undertaken the work of a functional weaver. I have certainly admired other weavers who work this way, and right now I am testing the waters, seeing if I have the skills to make textiles that I would want to use in my own life.

Detail of a drawing by Bhakti Ziek

It is not an all or nothing proposition for me, more an addition to an already crowded room. I have an exhibition coming up in the Fall of 2010, and I want to do a new body of work specifically for the gallery space involved. At the same time, i want to keep going with my exploration of functional textiles, using several of my floor looms. I am not sure if I can actually balance several projects at once, but my idea is to devote one day a week, or perhaps part of each day, to weaving curtains for Mark's studio, scarfs for sale, and getting the hand towels right. The majority of my time will be focused on the work for the exhibition. I have an idea of a very long weaving, segmented, but linear, and have started some drawings, a detail of which is shown above. So it is good that some projects are done, clearing a space for new ones to start.

Invitation to an Exhibition

Sled Ride in Vermont, collage by Varujan Boghosian

Invitation to BigTown Gallery exhibition

Modern Treasures for the Holidays

Inside of the exhibition invitation

Big Town Gallery

99 North Main

Rochester, VT 05767

802-767-9670

The opening of Modern Treasures for the Holidays is opening this Saturday, November 28th at 4 p.m. at BigTown Gallery. If you click on the image above, the image should open in a large file, allowing you to read the names of the participants--but just in case it doesn't work, here are the featured artists: Varujan Boghasian, Lizi Boyd, Leslie Fry, Pat dipaula Klein, Abby Rieser, Charles Spurrier, Charles Shackleton, Miranda Thomas, Holly Walker, Bhakti Ziek.

Again, I am not sure if the writing on the left page of the invitation will show up in the larger image or not, but it describes the Wish Wall that is going to part of the Holiday Exhibition. Anyone can put as many wishes as they want into the wall. It is going to be a sea of color and I am sure it is going to emanate good energy. I like having more than one wish possible--then I can be selfish with some and generous with others. Of course, when one wishes something like "peace for all" or "health and prosperity for everyone" then I guess it covers oneself as well as others.

If you read this blog regularly, you know Holly Walker and I are friends. She just received great news--her work is on the cover of a new book, Masters: Earthenware by Ray Hemachandra, editor with Matthias Ostermann, curator. Pat dipaula Klein is also a friend of mine--we both were teachers at Philadelphia College of Textiles & Science (PCTS) at the same time--she in print design, me in weave. She has lovely embroideries in the exhibit.

I have a range of work in the show, some handpicked lampas weavings where I dyed the warp with natural dyes using ikat resist techniques. Also some handwoven jacquards as well as digitally woven jacquards. Birds 2, below, is one of the pieces that will be at the gallery. The background cloth, woven on a fully electronic jacquard loom at PCTS is based on a historical Italian damask from the 14th century (if my memory is right--not that I was alive then, remembering from history of textiles class). The top cloth, woven with fine, almost-invisible-as-a-single-strand silk, I handwove on a 19th century jacquard loom at Fondazione della Seta Lisio, in Florence, Italy.

I love that Birds 2 encompassed old and new modes of jacquard weaving in its making, and that the historical image is done on the new equipment, while the contemporary image (my drawing from birds in a plaza) was done with the historical equipment. The material is also flipped--silk in a form that is hardly used today for the top panel and polyester and cotton for the background. I am always talking about a continuum in weaving that goes from the first weaver to the present weaver (me, you, us), a continuum of ideas, of processes, of kinetic knowledge that helps shape an awareness of the world. Weaving is a process of unity--of bringing individual elements into a whole--chaos to order. I am sure there are weavers in this continuum who would fall in every one of the categories listed in my last blog, we are diverse as well as similar, but it wouldn't surprise me if themes like structure, systems, stories, and identity cropped up again and again.

Birds 2 by Bhakti Ziek

can be seen at BigTown Gallery holiday exhibition

By the way, I am starting to read a manual on Dreamweaver, in preparation of making my own website, one for my husband, and helping two friends create their own. Reading this (it definitely is not easy reading) reminds me how some readers must feel reading The Woven Pixel, by Alice Schlein and myself. Understanding technology is learning a foreign language. I just want to open the application and get on with it--as our readers probably want to do with jacquard or dobby design--but getting an overview is important and since I am basically ignorant about web design, I have decided to take the time to read through once, acknowledging that much of it is going over my head, not in my head. When I finish, I will start again with the book open and do their exercises, as well as start my web site. Again, impatient, I want this to happen tomorrow, but I already see that assembling the parts is going to take time and if I want to put a realistic goal on my page, I will aim for a spring debut. Just my long-winded way of saying to those of you who have The Woven Pixel, or those of you who are planning on getting it (a good holiday gift), it is an instructive book that will help you become proficient, but it still is a step by step process. Take the time to read it from the start, and to follow along with the instructions, and soon you will be master of the information.

Systems and Classification

The other night I got a phone call from a friend, and I was very rude, very distracted. I was busy trying to figure out the system behind the PBS Art 21 series—how was it organized? Did each season have the same thematic words as the principal of organization? I had just started writing down the words when the phone rang, and I just could not shake myself out of my pondering, so I hung up quickly. This ability, or obsession, with focusing, sorting, cataloging and making connections between things that are sometimes correct (and, as my husband likes to point out, often bizarre and very far off the mark), helps me to understand the world.

Finally I had an ah-ha moment and realized that each program had its own word (theme) and this was divided into four segments (artists). So far there have been five seasons, every other year since 2001. Four programs per year means five times four times four equals eighty artists categorized by twenty words.

The twenty themes have been:

Place

Identity

Spirituality

Consumption

Stories

Loss and Desire

Time

Humor

Power

Memory

Structures

Play

Romance

Protest

Ecology

Paradox

Compassion

Fantasy

Transformation

Systems

After I got that sorted out, I made a list of all the artists in each segment that we have seen so far. Eventually we will get to them all. Sometimes the categorization is self-evident, but more often it seems arbitrary, or at least just one part of the puzzle. I guess that is the more accurate description—since most artists or people in general are multi-faceted and could be placed in different categories. That is the fallacy of any system of division—whether it is horoscopes or numerology or whether you prefer vanilla, chocolate or strawberry ice cream—we all have shades of the variables within us. Nevertheless, I sent an email to several friends and asked them to place themselves, and the rest of us in one of the Art 21 categories. I think it was an interesting exercise. It certainly made me think about myself and my work, and five other artists and their work, in a concentrated manner. I found certain words were easily eliminated and some seemed to cluster. Some topics could have worked for any of us (is that why we are all friends?) but in the end I made individual decisions for each of these people, as they did for the rest of us. No one had just one attribute, though there was similar choices made—which must show that we each have some consistency or clarity that is being expressed.

Now I am thinking about visual ways to express categorization or systems of being.

Reading, Architecture and Holloween

Architecture 2051 at Vermont Technical College

(top left to right: Holly Walker at her house; Erin Fajins; James Vincent;

center left to right: Michael Wilson; Professor Paul Hartmann and Jamison Cook; Jamison Cook;

bottom left to right: Jess Mosman; Majken Thomas; Ashley Fernandes

I just finished reading The Women by T.C. Boyle, about the wives and mistresses of Frank Lloyd Wright, a novel that vividly brings all the contradictions of Wright's personality and creativity to life, and filled me with images of the horror of love and divorce one hundred years ago. One hundred years ago--that sounds like a long time, doesn't it? Yet Wright is still seen by most people as a contemporary architect and visionary. Just this summer my brother, a long time fan, went on about Wright's attempts to marry buildings with landscape. I remember reacting with a slightly bored, jaded attitude--but reading this book has rekindled my curiosity about him, getting me to take another look at images of his buildings.

Coincidentally to my reading, Holly Walker and Geof Finkels invited us to attend the presentations of the students in Professor Paul Hartmann's Architecture 2051 class at Vermont Technical College. The students had come to their house to see the site, and were making proposals for a pottery studio for Holly. When I was a teacher, I sometimes had projects where students made proposals for real sites, and I know how working this way makes a project really tangible for them. There were actually two classes, and two days of presentations. Almost all of the students took the project very seriously and made clear presentations of their ideas. It seems as if they fell into three categories: an addition to the west, connecting the garage and the house with a studio, or a separate building to the east. After the second critique, I walked around the property with Holly, offering my own suggestions, trying to consider her needs as well as the feasibility of construction by Geof. On Saturday Mark and I went back and all four of us walked around, standing in different spots so Holly could go inside and see if a building where we stood would affect their views.

I love architecture and building, probably inherited from my mother, though I never considered it for myself (though my sister became an architect). Of course the reading and discussions has made me think about buying land and starting over--really getting it right this time. I don't think we are going to move any time soon, but it has to be sooner than later if we are going to do it in our lifetimes. Going into a classroom full of young people coming into their own strengths and ideas was so invigorating. It did make me miss being a teacher and how vital it is for everyone involved (teacher and students) in a studio where questioning is encouraged, and all ideas are allowed expression.

Now I am reading Loving Frank by Nancy Horan. It focuses more on Mamah Borthwick than Frank Lloyd Wright, fleshes her out in a different way than in T.C. Boyle's book, makes her dilemma about leaving husband and children for a married man seem more complex than in his book. She was an early feminist, a creative force who couldn't quite find the right outlet for her own intelligence. I feel that Horan has captured many of my own frustrations through her character. Again, this is a novel based on historical figures. Many known facts are accurate, but it is Horan who supplies the angst and internal conversations. Mamah's frustration about how to use her intelligence is hitting me hard, as I see myself spinning my wheels instead of going to my studio. Good books do this, don't they--make you think about your own life and what you are doing with the gift of time.

Well, Holloween came and went in Randolph along with a fierce rain storm. We live in an area where children and parents from all the surrounding villages, as well as our own town, come to say "Trick or Treat!" I was prepared with too much candy, knowing I could bring back unopened packages to the supermarket. Last year we had between 300 and 400 visitors, this year I gave out about 250 pieces of candy. The rain became a deluge just when I was at the bottom of the bowl. I could open another package, knowing I would end up eating most of it since parents and children were running to their cars to get out of the rain, or blow out the pumpkin and turn off the lights. I choose the later (can you see my halo?). Many of the parents, as well as all the children, were in costume. I remember going out with siblings and friends on Holloween--we were allowed to expand our circle wider than just our known neighbors, so I didn't mind giving candy to all these strangers. Plus I got to take alot of nice pictures.

Trick or Treaters--top picks

More Trick or Treaters

Peak Leaves

We have passed peak leaves here in Vermont, though everywhere you look it is still pretty. I have been reading books on peak oil over the last few months, and it is much more fun to think and talk about peak leaves. About peak oil, I just want to hide my head in a pile of leaves and ignore it, but that would not be fair to the future generations (being optimistic here and assuming generations). I have no answers to the dilemma of what to do, but am sure that living in a town where I don't have to use my car every day is on the right track. If nothing else, walking my dog and taking pictures, and thinking about my weaving, about what I want to weave, brings me back from despair. In this moment ("be here now") everything is perfect. The daily changes of the red leaf pathway, turning dusty brown but still lots of color, brings my attention to the moment.

In preparation for one of the lectures I hope to do at Colloquy, I prepared this image of slices from this morning. If I weave it I will call it Leaf Walk. Just now, I worked through all the steps of going from image to weaving. Below the initial collage you see the same image reduced to 10 colors--which is what I will need to do if I am weaving a weft-backed cloth with four wefts (wefts 1-4 alone, 1&2, 1&3, 1&4, 2&3, 2&4, 3&4 add up to 10 color possibilities). I will do a live demo of my process for Colloquy, but wanted to run through it first so I don't forget steps. I don't know how many of the attendees own The Woven Pixel, but the process is well-documented there.

Potential weaving design

Yesterday Mark and I had studio visits by Anni MacKay, owner of BigTown Gallery in Rochester, VT. She is going to put my work into her Holiday Show that runs November 25-January 31. I am thrilled!! I think she has the best gallery in Vermont. Rochester is a small town--it is where I went to pick berries for my jam this summer--and it surprised us to discover her wonderful gallery when we were exploring the area in summer of 2007. We always stop and see the exhibits, and always are impressed with the quality of work she shows. It will be an honor to have my work shown there. She is also interested in figuring out something with Mark for a future show. Mark says I am his biggest fan--but that is just because I get to see all his work. If more people saw it, I know he would have a big following. After Anni's visit, I felt more hopeful about Mark and I as artists and our future in Vermont. I was wondering if I had already passed peak art--but now I can say, not yet.

Mark Goodwin in his studio with Anni MacKay of BigTown Gallery

Works on Paper by Mark Goodwin

Works on Paper by Mark Goodwin