New Studio Assistant?/End of an Era

Meet Wilma! She is a new one-year-old kitty we adopted from Ottawa Stray Cat Rescue last Sunday. She was originally a feral cat, but was brought in to be spayed with the intent of releasing her after. While in care it was discovered that she loves to be petted, so she was put up for adoption. It is true that she loves to be petted and have her cheeks and chin rubbed, but first you have to find her to do that. She is very shy and loves to hide!

She does appreciate a good bed of velvet in my fabric closet, where she is living since yesterday.

We had our first face to face meeting yesterday in my studio, and I was able to pet her for the first time.

She even "kneaded" my knees for me. But it is going to take a lot of time and patience to earn her trust.

This gives me increased motivation to get into my studio!

I did not mention this before because it happened only a couple of days before we left for Costa Rica. We lost our dearest companion, Kissabelle, at the age of 17.  She was the best cat ever! Lots of personality, many classic "Kissabelle moves", and an all around beautiful cat. These photos are in memory of our beautiful times together. She was the centre of our household. We miss her a great deal, but knew there was space in our lives for another kitty needing a warm and loving home.

RIP Kissabelle.

The Vidcast Made in Houston

Last November I had the opportunity to be filmed in one of Bonnie McCaffery's Vidcasts. You may recall me mentioning it in one of my blog posts about the International Quilt Festival in Houston. The video was just published today, and you can access it here.

I am finally back home for a few weeks after my class at the Haliburton School of the Arts last week, and stopping off in Southern Ontario to visit my father for his 89th birthday. It feels so good to be home with my family, including my girls, Ms. Peek-a-Boo ("Peekie"), at left, and Ms. Kissabelle ("Kissy") at right. We're going to do some serious bonding in the next couple of weeks :-)

Look Ma, I Can Draw!

My drawing classes have ended, and I have been working on my own. While they are not masterpieces, I am pretty thrilled that I am starting to achieve somewhat of a likeness to my subject. Our dear old cat, Kissabelle, is a perfect subject as she always appears in shades of grey and I have lots of great photos of her. This goal of improving my drawing skills is one that has been on my list for a long time, one that I procrastinated on for a long time, and one that I am absolutely thrilled to be making some headway on. It offers a wonderful new diversion from being a career quilter, as well as adding to my base of artistic skills.

In the first drawing, Kissabelle lies on a sheet of draped fabric (we drew lots of draped fabric in my class!). As I look at it now, I see a few things I want to tweak, but it is close to being finished. The original photo that was my model appears below the drawing.

I have also been working on a second drawing of Kissabelle, based on the photo below this sketch, which is really only half finished. I just wanted to share them today since I wont be able to work on them while I am away. My big obstacle is impatience. I want them to be done fast, and it just does not work that way. 

Still lots of work to do to get that arm and paw right. I think her nose is also a bit too long.

Kissabelle is facing some challenges right now ... suffering from pancreatitis. At 15, she is the last of our band of three geriatric cats, and very much loved, so I hope we can nurse her back to good health. It is going to require a diet change, which she is not very happy about. Peekaboo is stealing our hearts a little more each day too!

Just a Word Before I Go

Friday morning I am heading out of town for 10 days, teaching in Orangeville and the Greater Toronto Area. I'll manage a couple of days visiting with my sister and father in Waterloo between gigs. Tell me, how can I bear to leave this? The little blue-eyed girl, also known as "Peek-a-Boo" has stolen my heart.  Just look at those eyes!

This week I discovered a few U-Tube videos I want to share.  Remember that post I made about the show I saw at the Mississippi Valley Textile Museum by the group Soulplay? Well this week I discovered a video in which Liana Voia (the same person who interviewed me in January) does a gallery walk-about with the Museum's Curator, Michael Rickley-Lancaster.  You can walk around the show virtually here.

It also happens that yesterday Liana Voia interviewed artist, Mahshid Farhoudi, my wonderful drawing instructor at the Ottawa School of Art. Mahshid was born in Tehran, Iran, and came to Canada at the age of 16. She is mainly a figurative painter who deals with issues of identity, disaplacement and belonging. I think you will find her story to be an interesting one.  There are two videos: ONE and TWO.

Teaching and Travel, Back in Full Swing!

The last few days have been very busy with teaching and travel.  On Friday I taught Part 2 of my Uncommon and Unforgettable Threads class here in Ottawa at Dragonfly Fabrics.  We had lots of fun dyeing thread!

A couple of students brought their thread sketches from last class.  Ruth did a great job with the three chairs, although she found that because her stitching was fairly dense she could have used an extra layer of stabilizer on the back.

Not quite finished yet, but well on its way, is Sylvia's leaf.  You can see near the bottom left where she has started adding in the finer veins.  These are really more like thread paintings than thread sketches.

Ruth sent photos after washing out her threads.  Lovely colours!  

Friday night I drove to Kingston to teach at the Stitch by Stitch quilt shop for two days.  They have a wonderfully large classroom that is well-lit by natural light.  On Saturday I taught my Collage Tree class.  You can see the class busy cutting tree bark.

On Sunday I taught my Liberated Strip Piecing class.

Two students actually finished their quilt tops during the class.  This is Allison and her work; I love the movement and wonkiness in the central portion, and I really think this piece would work no matter which way it is turned.

Kiley put her piece, featuring the complementary colours of orange and purple, together quite quickly.  I love that the work is predominantly purple with only small bits of orange, and I like the small light strips she has inserted here and there.

My weekend included cats!  While staying with Betty, I got to schmooze with PITA (whose name stands for "pain in the ass" since he is always there wanting love).  When I came through the door at the end of Saturday, he threw himself at my feet.

He's a handsome young cat

who loves to snuggle, and snuggle we did!  Betty has a second cat, a beautiful white female who is a recent feral rescue, but she was too shy for me to get a good picture of.

Back home my kitties were waiting.  Here's my new Peekaboo.

After some play time she snuggled in the crook of my arm for a nap.

Kissabelle and Peekaboo are getting along fine now, for the most part.  There are occasional spats but most of the time they tolerate each other well.

Yesterday morning it was off to art class, and then during the afternoon I crashed in bed for a while.  This coming Friday I am off again for a teaching trip to Orangeville and the Greater Toronto Area.

What Are You Not Doing This Year?

I've been thinking about the year ahead.  What do I really want to do?  What do I need to NOT do so I have the time to do something else I really want to do? Well the big thing I am NOT planning to do this year is have a solo show, or even apply for a solo show for a future year. As you may know, planning a solo show in a gallery or museum often requires you to apply and plan at least a year, and often two or more years, in advance of the actual show. After quitting my day job in 2008 it became very important to me to branch out in all directions in order to set up the best scenario for making a living as a full-time artist and teacher. The result was that between 2009 and 2012 I had four solo shows and one joint show. Showing in the City of Ottawa art galleries was one of my best experiences, but I do not want to do it again until I have a new body of work to show. Because I am teaching and travelling a lot, it will take some time to amass that much work. My dream is to one day have an all-hosta show, but that means I need about another 10 pieces, and I hope my interest in this series will sustain me that long. Time will tell!!! The bottom line is that I am now in a place mentally where I can wait, and where it is OK to say no to certain opportunities. Sometimes we have to say no to certain things in order to have the time and resources to do other things that are more important to us, and sometimes we have to say no for our own well-being. What are you saying no to this year that will enable you to meet another very important goal?

This week I did spend a lot of time in the studio finishing my old oak tree, which at the moment is named "Invitation" because of the welcoming bench beneath it. The first time I met this oak tree in the Ottawa Arboretum, there was a pastel green bench beneath it, beckoning visitors to stay a while and enjoy the massive canopy of oak branches. It was early spring when the leaves were barely budding, so the tree was dark and stark, like in the finished quilt. You can see a close-up of the bench in the second photo. I did cut a curve between sky and land, to make the dividing line less stark, but in the end it seems that most of that curve ended up behind the tree, leaving the line still a bit too strong.

Invitation, 2013

Invitation, Detail, 2013

One thing I will be doing this year, is having the following work, "End of Days", travelling in SAQA's Metaphors of Aging show. I was thrilled to find out two weeks ago that the piece is one of 39 quilts accepted, out of a total of 160 entries, to travel in this show. The two venues so far confirmed are Festival of Quilts, Birmingham and Johannesburg Quilt Festival, South Africa.

End of Days, 2012

On the other hand, I also learned in the last couple of weeks that none of my three entries (below) to Fantastic Fibers at the Yeiser Arts Center in Paducah, Kentucky were accepted.  Only 54 of the 700 entries (a very competitive show) were accepted, and mine were not among them.  

Curtain Call 2, 2012

Red Stool, 2011

Red Stool Macro, 2012

That means I now have three works I can use to apply to other shows.

I feel that I get better outcomes by sending a few pieces a year to juried shows internationally than by having a solo show locally.  I think a solo show locally can be very important when you are trying to establish yourself as a serious artist in your city, or if you are trying to make a living selling your work. However, to expand my teaching I need to have my work out in the world. So like previous years, I will continue to enter juried shows, although I may enter fewer this year. One other thing I will definitely not be doing is having a work in the Canadian Quilters Association's National Juried Show. Very simply, I screwed up and missed the deadline because it was a bit earlier than usual this year. I feel that this is normally an important venue to show at as a Canadian teacher who makes the bulk of her living in Canada.

Another thing that is happening here in my world is that we've adopted a new kitty. Isn't she pretty? Poor thing almost froze to death on New Year's Eve, before Cat Rescue Network found her and placed her in a foster home. We applied to adopt her, were approved, and she came to live with us today. She is supposed to be a companion for our dear old Kissabelle, our only remaining cat. Unfortunately, today, Kissabelle is NOT amused by the scent and sight of a new cat in HER house. We will have to tread carefully and introduce them slowly.

Non-Celebratory Blog Give-Away

As you know, this month is supposed to be a month of celebrating my ten years of teaching/selling hand-dyed fabrics, and my five years of doing so full-time. Well it isn't exactly a day of celebration at our house today. Quite the opposite in fact. We had to euthanize our cat, Mr. McMenace. Although he wasn't my studio assistant in the way that my old cat Johnny, who died 9 months ago was, Mr. McMenace often did try to prevent quilts from moving when I was trying to free-motion quilt them.  His name says it all ... he was a challenging cat, and tested our patience at every turn over the last 14 years, especially over the last two as we had to medicate him for hyperthyroidism twice a day, and as we watched his temperament grow more and more mercurial. When we brought him to our home at 6 weeks of age, we named him Peaches because of his colour, but as he matured his name morphed due to his character.  He was a Jekyll and Hyde type, sometimes loving, but often full of piss and vinegar, but I loved him anyway.  We are left with only one cat now, Kissabelle, who is finally free of the violence bestowed on her by Mr. McMenace. Above is a photo of Mr. McMenace appreciating a warm pile of velvets fresh from the dryer.  In memory of Mr. McMenace, today's blog give-away is a meter of luscious silk-rayon velvet, custom-dyed by me.  Your choice on how you want it: a) a full meter of the same colour/s, or b) two half meters of different colour/s, or c) four fat quarters of different colour/s.  Leave a post by midnight EST on Friday, January 25, and you will be placed in the draw to win!

Mr. McMenace at the cute and peachy age of 6 weeks.

King of the Jungle

Handsome and often innocent looking!

Sleeping in the garden at the feet of an angel.

Correction to Last Post

Please note there is a line missing in the poem at the end of my last post, "Letting Go".  Here is the corrected poem:

"To live in this world
you must be able
to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it
against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it
go,
to let it go."

(from "In Blackwater Woods" by Mary Oliver)

Letting Go

Today was a beautiful spring day, just the kind of day Johnnie would have loved to sit on the back step in the sun, so I sat there in his place.  The garden is teeming with life, even though Johnnie lost his yesterday.  Read no further if you have never lost an animal companion and know the heartbreak.

Johnnie came into my life when I was only 33, that is THIRTY THREE; I am now 50.  He showed up in our back yard one winter.  He appeared to have no home, and only had the shelter of the neighbour's deck.  My husband started leaving food out for him, and gradually he came to trust us more and more, until by Easter 1995 he moved into our house.  He came with chapped paws and wind-burned ears.  I always admired and respected his resilience. He always appreciated having a safe and warm home.

Our vet placed Johnnie at one or two years old when he arrived.  He was euthanized yesterday at 18 or 19.  What does this have to do with art quilts?  Johnnie accompanied me through every quilt I made.  He saw me make my first quilt.  He sat on every quilt that was fed through my sewing machine and any finished quilt that was left within sitting distance.  He was my studio assistant, my apron string, and in many ways my best friend.  He inspired a quilt by his charming behaviour of being mesmerized by my aquarium.

The quilt was called "One Fish, Two Fish, Striped Fish, Blue Fish" (2004)

He also inspired many nicknames like Johnny Rockets, Johnny Pneumonic, and in his last few months, "Johnny on the Spot".

Sitting in the sun was what he loved best, well maybe next best to sitting on my lap.

Even when he went blind two years ago, he remained a contented cat, adapting to his circumstances, and proving his resilience again and again.  All of the following pictures show him happy and well despite his blindnesss.

 He loved being in the garden in spring and summer, and was never so foolish as to venture outdoors again in winter after being rescued from winter.

The house feels empty today, even though we still have two cats.  There is no one to sit on my lap the minute I sit in the living room, especially when I am icing my knee, no one to greet me at the door when I come home from trips.  Seeing his health decline in the last two years, I always worried I would be away on a teaching trip and not be there for him when his time came.  I am grateful we were able to spend this past Easter weekend together, with him glued to my lap, and I am grateful I was able to stay with him until the end.  A "mother" is supposed to love all her "children" equally, but I've never had such a bond with an animal before.

I am reminded of the last lines of the poem "In Blackwater Woods" by Mary Oliver,

"To live in this world
   you must be able
to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it
   against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it
go,
to let it go."

Letting go is indeed the hardest part.  Johnnie, you were the best and I shall miss you always!