Residual Impact at the Jacoby Arts Center

RESIDUAL IMPACT

October 12-December 23, 2017

Artist Reception on October 20, 5 to 7 pm

I am honored to have been invited to participate in this exhibit with renowned potter Arthur Towata and Eastern Illinois University professor and sculptor Ann Coddington at the Jacoby Arts Center in Alton, Illinois.  

Residual impact explores our interconnectedness to the environment, the imprint we leave in nature and somatic memory. It hopefully inspires reflection and encourages the protection of our natural resources.  

I have eight large pieces in this show which are beautifully balanced by remarkable knotted and netted sculptures by Ann Coddington and the incredible textures and shapes of Art Towata's pottery and paintings. The show is gorgeous and thanks to curators Sun Smith-Foret, Penny Schmidt and Jane Sauer, who brought us together, it is the first time in many years that I've been given the opportunity to "speak" to my environmental concerns within a show devoted to same.   I've included my statement below.

A peek at Dakota, shibori rusted silk, 92"x48" in the background through
Ann Coddington's netted piece (title ?) in foreground.

Broader view rear of gallery with a sample of all the artists' work in view.

As a printmaker over 15 years ago, I experimented with fabric to lift prints from rusty farm tools. It was love at first sight! I embraced organic printing, as I called it, because it inspired spontaneity and informed my ideas about process and content. Treating fabric as a vast landscape, I adapted arashi shibori techniques to wrapping rusted pipes, tucking leaves into folds to create additional resists. I prefer to work with silk because it is beautiful and deceptively fragile, but capable (to a point) of surviving the assault of rust printing. Rust is a gorgeous medium, offering an array of colors and exciting, unpredictable patterns when tempered by tea and tannins that defuse the corrosive power of the rust resulting in permanent and stable marks on the fabric. This unsettling recipe of rust and silk goes beyond mere design, however. It is a fitting metaphor for both the fantastic beauty of our earth and the assault on the environment that we are perpetrating to our own detriment. 

On Saturday, October 21, starting at 2 pm Ann Coddington and I will be participating in a gallery talk with demos that I hope will bring that statement to life for those in attendance.  If you click on the showcard above with text, you can read a brief statement of Ann's.  

Arthur Towata has been making pottery for many decades.  His work is the embodiment of his experience defined by the environment that surrounded his forced internment as a child during WWII at Manzanar.  On Friday evening, Oct 20, beginning 7:30, after the main gallery artist reception, there is a special event Hidden Histories with films and discussion on the Japanese internment camps where Arthur can share his very personal experiences.  

More photos of the exhibit can be found at the exhibit page for JAC here. 

I was also invited to populate the gift shop at Jacoby with a number of new scarves and wraps that I've been making such as this very large sheer silk wrap in which I incorporated elderberries.

52"x78" silk wrap with elderberries

The Jacoby Arts Center is located at 627 East Broadway, Alton, Illinois 62002.

Please visit the website for more information about Residual Impact and the concurrent exhibits in the east gallery as well as other events associated with the shows.  

Composite

You know the trouble with memory is that sometimes you misplace it. Forgive me if I've posted something similar before. I've been gathering some images tonight and thought I'd finish a composite of scarf details that I started some time ago and that shows the wide variety of marks that can be made with shibori rusting. You may recognize some of the designs or colors from past posts. The blues were created with elderberries. One blue piece in the center also has some yellow created by turmeric. The rest is just the the usual rust and tea with whatever tannin I had handy.

Protecting the Crop

I used to compost fabric with walnuts and berries in various locations around my yard--a favorite spot was next to a firebush not far from the patio.  Elderberry seeds made their way to the center of the bush via birds I suppose and now a very nice cluster of elderberry seedlings has grown up the center of the firebush using it for support.  Last year I discovered birds had eaten practically the whole crop--starting before berries were fully ripe.  And ripe is what I wanted then and now.  But this year I am protecting the crop.  With the help of my niece Karen, 2 ladders, a couple of broom handles, three pieces of netting connected with twisty ties and some bricks we were able to cover the entire bush.

I'm hoping the birds will not be able to land on top and feed.  They will certainly be foiled from getting the berries on lower branches. A day or two before I got the mesh, I watched a bird sit below, fly up to grab a mouthful of berries and land on the ground again.  The bush is loaded!

Berries are ripening ahead of schedule with the heat and I've harvested some, but many on top are still quite green.  The ones above look ripe from a distance but aren't quite black yet. Karen and I constructed a sort of cage with the netting weighed down by bricks on the ground so birds can't get up inside the bush to feast. The netting is so fine it can't be seen from a distance so I got up close with the camera here. You can see one of the clusters has been picked over by the birds, but don't worry, the birds won't go hungry. There are more elderberries ripening nearby at edge of my property.

Fabric for a dress

Tried another large experiment on dupioni with elderberries and shibori rust (I did a 15 foot long piece last summer--click on the Farm Girl Landscape page to see it).   This 4 yard length of fabric is destined to become a dress...or not.  Depends.  Sassafras leaves were used for the resist.  To my surprise, they preserved the magenta color that initially came from the berries.  The fabric is in my tin box to cure and has not yet been rinsed or washed. 

On the pipe, but ready to come off. 

Off the pipe, wet and not unfolded yet.

Sassafras leaves preserved the elderberry magenta color.

The rest of the elderberry color oxidized to blue.

Wet, unfolded completely, resting in the shade.

Wet and hanging on the clothesline--sun is behind the piece.

Fabric is dry now.  Detail

Detail of string marks and chevron pattern (dry).

Close detail of leaf resist and tea marks (dry).

On the pin wall and floor of my studio (dry).

Detail of dry piece.

 

Warm

The snow is melting finally and it's like an early spring day for now.  Who knows what the weather will blow in later.  But the warm is so welcome.  Made me think of elderberries.  Hope to do more things with them this year.

I'm back!

Didn't mean to be away so long, but the solo show and ARTEAST snapped up much of my time this fall, and since I last posted I acquired a new computer (the old one died a slow death) for which I have to update the camera software for downloads.  At last one is taken care of, but the bulk of my art exhibits are on the big camera which is still untouchable. 

I plan to share the pics from the solo exhibit on a new page coming soon.  In the meantime I'd like you to see the largest piece I've ever attempted.  This piece was made specifically for the tall wall at Kaskaskia College.  In September I posted about another piece, Round Bales, which at the time was the largest piece I'd made.  This one tops that one by nearly 5 feet. 

Pond Ripples c2010
Shibori rust on dupioni silk
with elderberries and tumeric
173" x 55"

New Scarves for ARTEAST

Haven't posted in a while because I've been working to get ready for ARTEAST which takes place next weekend--October 16/17.  Lots of scarves-- and some new wall pieces--not quite so big as I made for the Kaskaskia show.  These are easily "house" sized.  Those haven't been photographed yet, but here are some details of the new scarves hot off the scanner.

A little turmeric goes a long way--bright bright yellow here.  I'm trying to figure out a different way of applying it with more control.

This scarf has a lovely purplish cast to it with pinkish gold areas.

I bought a few crepe scarves to try and above is one of them.  The others are all silk satin.

Elderberries have created a spectacular blue, but this piece has not been washed yet.  Not quite sure how much will be retained.  I've been waiting as long as possible before the event.
This is a very large shawl at 22"x90"

It always amazes me when I unwrap the silk to discover what design has been made.  This one was particularly puzzling to me with the oval shapes appearing regularly through the length of the scarf.