Bit by bit

My first post about anything creative in four weeks. Four weeks ago today my gorgeous mum died and it hasn't been a time for making and creating much at all.

But I have visited the studio and sat quietly in my space.  I have spent much time wandering the garden and looking at flowers and beauty.

My good friend Gemma send me this beautiful weather gram to hang in a tree in memory of mum and we managed to do that over the weekend, in a beautifully scented frangipani, just next to the studio.

And this week Barry and I will be sharing studio time with some young friends on school holidays so I have been fiddling around trying to get some gothic lettering together for them to do. Not much but it's a start.

Otherwise flowers and vegetables have been my main interests of late. Our garden has been ever so productive and we have been eating lots of our produce as well as making preserves with it and freezing it for times to come.

A gorgeous orchid we managed to grow.

Evidence that I have actually been over at the studio - a sweet native violet in a moss pot of its own hanging outside and making me smile...

Beautiful bounty - our first pumpkin of the season.

 And corn...so much corn!

 And all this greenish goodness. Green tomato chutney tick. Spinach and feta triangles tick. Basil pesto tick. Stewed rhubarb and apple tick.

 I have never enjoyed or appreciated our garden as much as I have over the past few weeks...

Thursday Thoughts...

“When you recover or discover something that nourishes your soul and brings joy, care enough about yourself to make room for it in your life.” 

Jean Shinoda Bolen

At the beginning of a new year, as I seek to try and set the framework for the year ahead and to to set down some thoughts about things I would like to do; places to visit; things to achieve; things to commit to; this quote speaks to me of art.

I think for many of us, most of us probably, we find the space for art and making art in amongst the gaps in time and space that the rest of our life allows.  It is hard to carve out time to focus solely and purely on the art which brings us such joy and wellbeing.

I think however, that Ms Bolen gives us something to think about - that moment when we really knew how good sitting down with our art practice was for our souls and our spirits.  She reminds us to pay attention to those moments when we felt most alive, most real, with the truest expression of who we wish to be played out in front of us.

And she asks us at these moments to hold that thought. To recall how good that was for us. To remember how uplifted we were. And then she says - care enough about yourself; value yourself highly enough; respect yourself enough to make time for you to do it again. and again. and again.

It is lovely to be reminded to be gentle with ourselves and care enough to find the time to do what lifts us up, what nourishes our soul and what sets our spirits soaring.

Some of my most enjoyable moments last year - sitting and fiddling with feathers and threads and paper for my Under Construction pieces. Lovely moments spent far far away in my mind, emerging refreshed and inspired from time spent with my work.

2015 Favourites...

This time of year is good for stopping a bit, reflecting a bit, pondering bit. Looking back and looking forward.

As part of my regular practice I go back through the work I made last year and consider which ones were my favourites.  I never list them 1-10 (too hard!) but simply do a Top 10 alphabetically.

A lot of work this year was focused on our Pas de Deux exhibition; but odd random bits appeared that made me smile.

So from the 2015 archive we have:

1. Amongst The Clouds I

These long thin works that are made to hang from the ceiling and sway in the breeze try to capture the wonder of living in, above and below the clouds as we do here on the mountain.  They will be shown in an exhibition in May this year and I was excited to do my first 'real' letterpress work for exhibition - plus I loved the paper!

2. Beyond bombs and burning...

Early in the year I was invited to participate in the Al-Mutanabbi St project. I had to postpone the delivery of my books, but I finally sent them off in December.  These books remind us that even books are burned, the ideas and thoughts within them survive...

3. Fragile Gains 

I decided to create wall pieces to accompany one of my favourite books Fragile Gains. The seven pages were individually burnt and then mounted on aluminium (like the book's covers) and held in Perspex.  They are a strong, quiet statement about women's gains across the world...

4. Letterpress play

My love for letterpress grew last year as did my collection of type and drawers and cases and composing sticks and ink and quoins and leading and spacers and furniture and....

I committed to spend most of my time in preparation - in cleaning and preparing the type so that in 2016 I could go to town. When Caren Florance came to stay for few days however it was into the studio to play - and I love how this scrap of printing looks - it inspires to do so much more.

5. Memorial to birds having flown

Pages of small feather prints on Goyu paper, dipped in sweet smelling beeswax and arranged within a Perspex box.

6. Silence helps no one

An unexpected book that came out of attempting a new binding. This book is hard to get into to. It is hard to read. It is awkward. A bit how bystanders feel when they observe family violence - how do I get in? How do I make sense of this? How can I help?

7. Time For Change

Unique patterns created by burning, watch parts included to reminds it is time for change, bandages holding it together with written reminders that women killed by the partners or former partners were mothers, daughters, sisters and friends...

8. Time To Change

This library of 52 small hand made books holds individual records of women killed by their partners or former partners in Australia in 2014.  Hand stitched counting, embossed crosses, letterpress words and unique patterns burned with watch parts added. A tribute.

9. Too Many Poppies

By April 2015 I had really really seen too many poppies. I was overwhelmed by the poppies and all that they signified, and just had to do something.  Five wall pieces and five small books emerged - too many poppies, too many deaths, too many poppies, too many deaths written over and over and over again. And still we go to war...

10. Under Construction

My admiration for wee birds and the amazing work they do building nests got a thorough investment this year with 5 large wall pieces and 5 large books, then some smaller books as well.  I enjoyed the stitching, the creation of short poems, the calligraphy, the printing, the feathers...it was a just a lovely way to spend a fair bit of time.

Thanks for joining me in this meander along the path of artworks through 2015. It surprises me how often I go "Oh I had forgotten about that!" so I really do appreciate the process of review.

New Year wishes

Well here we are at the beginning of another year.  Barry and I have long ago given up sending Christmas cards to folk; but we still enjoy sending people wishes for the new year. We usually use the time between Christmas and New Year to make our cards and then try to sit down and write them early.

This year we both decided to do letterpress cards. Believe it or not they are black on white!

And here's the locked up chase ready to print, and some detail.

And lots of images of the cards in progress...

We smiled at the end of it because we realised how the same paper, the same ink and the same parameters (2016) can be interpreted so differently by two people and the results that emerge reflect them so perfectly!

Here are Barry's...he used antique wood type and his BSA (Barry Smith Art) stamp.

And this was a test run for placement and positioning of both type and embossing! Now acting as a coaster in the studio.

 Sending you wishes for a year filled with magical moments, happiness, health and creativity.

Thursday Thoughts...

“Because it is occasionally possible, just for brief moments, to find the words that will unlock the doors of all those many mansions inside the head and express something – perhaps not much, just something – of the crush of information that presses in on us from the way a crow flies over and the way a man walks and the look of a street and from what we did one day a dozen years ago. 
Words that will express something of the deep complexity that makes us precisely the way we are, from the momentary effect of the barometer to the force that created men distinct from trees. Something of the inaudible music that moves us along in our bodies from moment to moment like water in a river. 
Something of the spirit of the snowflake in the water of the river. Something of the duplicity and the relativity and the merely fleeting quality of all this. 
Something of the almighty importance of it and something of the utter meaninglessness. 
And when words can manage something of this, and manage it in a moment, of time, and in that same moment, make out of it all the vital signature of a human being – not of an atom, or of a geometrical diagram, or of a heap of lenses – but a human being, we call it poetry".

Ted Hughes

Thinking about books, I read this and all that is says so beautifully about words and I decided it fitted well enough to be my thought for pondering.

I think Ted Hughes has expressed so beautifully what a magical piece of writing (poetry true, but also prose I think) can do - what it takes account of; what it merges and meshes and what it produces. It's a miracle in this world I think that we are fortunate to have those that produce this kind of alchemy - that gives rise to the fullest expression of emotion and observation and lets us know we are not alone.

I have spent a lot of time with John O'Donohue's words these past few weeks - he was special. A man who could understand the deepest of emotions and express them in such achingly beautiful and meaningful ways. He meets you where you are and lets you simply be there.

"Something of the inaudible music that moves us along in our bodies from moment to moment like water in a river". 

As we finish 2015 and begin 2016 - I wish you a year of joy, of peace, of togetherness and of creative and magic moments. See you there!

Thursday Thoughts...

“A tiny bud of a smile on your lips nourishes awareness and calms you. It returns you to the peace you had lost. A smile is the most basic kind of peace work.” 

 Thich Nhat Hanh

I have skimmed over this thought before; but it has come to hold more meaning of late.  I know for myself that if I am feeling down or cranky or even angry - if I can physically form my face into a smile that something changes.  Something changes within me and I automatically feel different. Not cured for sure, but better.

No doubt there is some chemistry stuff involved; no doubt some psychology stuff involved; and probably a tad of just who knows what involved, but I have found that in a small way, it shifts something in me.

Maybe it can also shift something in somebody else.

I think Thich Nhat Hanh is right that it returns you to the peace you had lost - those words capture beautifully for me, the fleeting re-calibration that occurs.

It is Christmas time and I wish my friends across the interweb, the world and nearby, a time of togetherness, of sharing and of peace.

Our family will be gathering but without our centre - my mum died ten days ago and we are bereft.  I try a tiny smile every now and again.

Our Christmas tree decoration this year - Barry's metal peace doves...

Thursday Thoughts...

“I feel that art has something to do with achievement of stillness in the midst of chaos. A stillness which characterizes prayer, too, and the eye of the storm…” 

Saul Bellow

Art and stillness. I often turn to stillness in my making and my enjoyment of art. I'm not one of those people that needs my senses stimulated or over-stimulated by art; I often turn to art for quietness and stillness. For contemplation.

My making is also often meditative, taking time. There aren't many big, flamboyant body gestures with me - I am just sitting quietly, small movements, going slowly.

It would be special I think, if I could create art that felt like a prayer for folk; or the eye of the storm as we wait within it.

The end of the search for rainbows and colours has finished for the year. Jennifer and Julie kindly allowed us to choose our own colour for this month, so I chose white, and peace for stillness. Hop on over to their blogs to see what other colours folk chose...

Happy campers

I had the good fortune through the week of taking off for a couple of art-filled days with friends.

It is such a busy time of year, and everybody I know is running this way and that, wondering how on earth can we fit another thing in?  In a serendipitous moment a few months ago, one of us mentioned this lovely place to visit and afterwards the others thought, we should try to do that.

Months out we pencilled one night away into our diaries, hoping it would hold in amongst the madness that explodes onto the diary pages about now.

And it did.

So we packed our bags with a bit of food, plenty of water and of art supplies and not much by way of changes of clothes which was great. All very low-key and comfortable.

We spent time in a beautiful landscape, surrounded by history and stories and from generations past.

It was special.

We all sat quietly by ourselves and did what we do. Some photographed, some drew, some sketched, some painted, some rubbed, some wrote.

In amongst the hurly burly they were stolen moments of quiet, and solitude.

Such lovely reminders...

Thursday Thoughts...

“My diaries are letters from my former self to my future self. My poems are replies to those letters.” 

Vera Pavlova, from “Heaven is Not Verbose: A Notebook,” 

As my thoughts on Thursday turn to books, I liked this quote even tho it is slightly tangential to books per se.  But diaries are books and poems too are often found in books, so here we go!

Isn't this just the most remarkable way of thinking about the role of words in a person's life?  I have never been a very good diary or journal-keeper; I seem to have done it in fits and spurts but never consistently.

But what a delight to think that the words of the past are written to the future you - for the future you to stop, read and reflect upon them.  And then, for a poet, to think that their present words are replies to those thoughts - are responses to the lessons learned, the problems never solved, the issues considered and pondered upon. Just so delightful.

No doubt this doesn't hold true for everybody; but one of the things I like most about it is that she has captured the essence of how she sees her work and her experiences and tells a beautiful, simple story of them that lets us understand and know how she goes about her work.

Almost the perfect artist statement I think!

My most recent attempt at capturing a diary/journal type document - my daily doings book. I collected all my daily to-do lists for a year and bound them into a book. It's true, that as I look back over them I reflect on who I was and what I was doing at the time - altho not quite writing notes to my future self.

Studio sharing time

At the Open Studio on the weekend, I had set up my small Adana letterpress so that people could have a little play, print a card and take it home.

I did all the preparation before they got there - I figured it would take too long for me to fiddle and faddle getting all the type and spacers and furniture together whilst folks were watching and waiting. And maybe I just had a little bit of performance anxiety given I am so totally new to the whole game.

So as they say in tv cooking shows - here's one I prepared earlier!  The chase with the type all locked in nicely.

I used that beautiful Gothic typeface that no one knows the name of, and which incidentally I managed to finish cleaning and putting in it correct case over the weekend so I am now on to my third last case of dirty old type to clean. But I digress.

I grabbed some scraps of paper and got them to the right size and people all had a play and printed themselves a sweet little card.

Loving that texture.

I chose red because of the whole Christmas time, as well as the words.  They seemed to go together well with the typeface, and it was lovely getting folk to create a little bit of peace on earth whilst they were with us.

I enjoyed the different light play as I tried to photograph some of them afterwards.

I didn't get to photograph any of the action - but here are the only three I had left after we finished.

Open Studio time

Well, here we are on Sunday afternoon, tired and happy. A good combination!

We had a wonderful weekend with the Studio open for drinks and nibbles on Friday evening, and then all day again on Saturday.

The week leading up to an Open Studio is often full of cleaning - more so than ever for me this year as the studio space was like an archaeological dig - layers and layers and layers of stuff that I had placed one on top of the other as I went along getting all the work done for the exhibition at Noosa. It felt all consuming, and I rarely had time to catch my breath and clean up totally - it always seemed to be just putting away enough stuff to clear a space for me to do the next thing.

So last week was the week - the moment of truth and more.

I must confess that I actually relish the Open Studio time as it gives us a real chance to get stuck in, clean, sort and organise and then enjoy people's company and sharing our work.

So, one of the funniest things was we ended up water-blasting (or gurneying as I call it) the concrete carport and outside areas, and then couldn't stop and went and cleaned the top of the concrete water tank that supplies the shed-studio. I am not sure it had ever been done before; we certainly haven't done it in the 10 years we've been here...

We were almost finished when I couldn't help myself and let loose with some writing...

Amazing how effective the cleaning is - the before and after are stark. In fact you almost need your sunglasses to gaze upon that tank-top these days; it's sooooo dazzling!

Here is where we got to setting up the downstairs areas with our work...

Barry's jewellery was all 20% off and looked sumptuous.

He made lots of sales which was great.

I had some books and some prints..

Only one of these prints is still here.

This image shows how I simply moved everything off my working desks onto this desk for the duration - pens, scissors, pencils, glues, papers, candles...the lot!

Friday night was a hoot - lots of folk and lots of fun and the odd little bit of buying frenzy and people seemed to enjoy getting together and having a glass of wine or bubbles to celebrate the end of the year.

Saturday was more settled - but lots of folk still visited and many of them stayed for a few hours so we were busy chatting and demonstrating and sharing the block with people all day.

Today, the shed-studio looks like this.

Slightly transformed, but by no means complete - the next little while will be all about resettling into the space.

And this was an accidental shot as I was tidying up beforehand - but I just loved the light on the threads...