Ananas Comosus c2010 by Patricia Vivod was accepted into Fiber: Twenty Ten.
Missouri Fiber Artists (MoFA) is cosponsoring this national juried show with The Foundry Art Centre in St. Charles, Missouri. The exhibition, which was juried from over 300 entries by Kay Khan of Santa Fe, New Mexico, will open MoFA's 2010 conference on Friday, April 16, 6-9 pm. The weekend will be filled with a number of workshops and Khan will be the keynote speaker at a brunch on Sunday. I am really thrilled to have a piece selected for this show. I'll be attending both the opening and the brunch and am looking forward to meeting many other fiber artists.
Ananas Comosus is a shibori rust piece. A long piece of silk was pleated and wrapped around a long pipe and tied in place. As always when I do shibori, I relish the surprise when unfolding the silk the next day to see the resulting shapes and marks imprinted on the fabric. The rust penetrates the pleated fabric easily and the silk is very receptive to the color. The mirror image patterns reveal all sorts of little creatures. A detail appears at the bottom of the page.
The Friends of Art Auction site has been updated with 2010 information. The cataloging of donated items will be done on the 28th and soon after the entire auction catalog will appear online in a lovely slide show so that visitors can get a sneak preview ahead of the auction which takes place Thursday, April 8. As of our FOA meeting last night, 145 items had been logged in with many more arriving tomorrow and early next week. On auction night, a preview time starts at 6 PM with the live auction beginning at 7 PM.
I've been donating one or two pieces each year to the SIUE Friends of Art Auction for the last ten years beginning when I entered grad school. Three years ago I was invited to join the board of directors for FOA which organizes the auction. Since 1980 proceeds from art donations have funded the visiting artist program bringing scores of local, national and international artists to the campus in every area of art. The money has also gone to fund an art scholarship, prize money for undergrad and grad shows, a high school art competition and the auction competition, the Lovejoy Library fund, conferences, travel stipends, student art organizations, the Mexica project, and ARTEAST.
Grad school was a fantastic experience for me, coming after 25 years of teaching art at the high school level. The experience was greatly enhanced by the incredible number of visiting artists I got to meet so I will gladly donate to support the cause.
I'm donating the piece pictured above. I've also posted the image under the event calendar for the auction at the right. The piece is called Sunfish (c 2008) It measures 77" long by 45" wide. Hanging brackets allow the silk to float away from the wall about 4". The blue comes from elderberries, the other colors and design were made with the rust process.
BTW, students, alumni and friends of SIUE Art & Design and artists in the community are encouraged to donate. Original art donations are juried the day of the auction. Students can compete for 5 prizes totaling $1250 and non-students have a chance to win a $200 prize!
The entire auction catalog will be online sometime after March 28 at www.siueFriendsOfArt.com. I'll post the updated link when it is up and running for 2010. You can also view the donations at the 6 PM preview the night of the auction. The live auction will start at 7 PM.
