Finally, the air takes on a chill. Winter isn’t far away when it starts getting dark at 4:00 in the afternoon. The rabbit constellation resides at Orion’s feet. She is either hunted (by Orion’s dogs), or a wily trickster — perpetually running just ahead of the hunter’s bow across the winter sky. Visible in February.
I used an old star chart for reference… And though I have no real attachment to the story of the rabbit, I like that it IS a story… I like that I stitched on top of a deliberate exercise in obfuscating personal narrative. (Before). Often a period of reflection is required before finishing a quilt.
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15 thoughts on “Constellation”
jude – It seems I might communicate something through cloth making. I hope so.
spiritcloth
i ave to admit, i had to look up obfuscating, i am a small word person. i like it and think it is a story both ways.
a small word, big idea person, you mean. It is a story both ways… something about that spiral we all travel… I act as though I haven’t made quilts that are personal and narrative — and it’s not true. I’ve made quite a few. But I can’t quite put my finger on what it is I am reaching for now. Maybe it’s more about style. Having a style.
Here’s Brett Whiteley’s (an Australian artist who died 11 years ago) advice to the aspiring artist –
”aim at virtually whatever is in front of you… and then one day you’ll see something that you have truly never seen before and that is the beginning of yourself & that heralds the beginning of difficult pleasure.” http://aso.gov.au/titles/documentaries/difficult-pleasure/clip3/
(NB Difficult pleasure is how Brett described painting, or creating art: Art is an argument between what a thing looks like and what it means.)
These words have helped me find my way through the long dark nights many many times in the past 25 years!
I will follow link, and thank you, as always, Mo. Maybe I will post about this later — but I want to note that the desire for integration that I am feeling, for clearing space and creating more breathing room… is really pretty much about integrating previously-learned machine techniques with hand techniques. How to bring the learning of the last couple of years back down into the cellar, where the machine lives. I am curious. I want to see what happens.
I like this idea of ‘aiming at whatever is right in front of me’… That advice sweeps aside the ‘explaining of oneself’. And it includes the idea that by looking at whatever is right in front of you will take you to your core anyway….
hi Cindy… these are the stars that started out as beads, and, after reading your post about simplicity and stitching stars, I pulled them out and worked with thread only… thank you!
No. I meant the words in the background. But the whiskers… I probably would put them on both sides–but I have this self-limiting thing about symmetry. 🙂
I thought a breath after responding that you might mean the words. I think the lack of symmetry offends here a little too. Is that a self-limiting design choice? I like that phrase even though I know you use it as a way of describing a weakness. But is the desire for symmetry a weakness ?
Hi, Dee. I thought this was cool the way you went into an old piece. Just wanted to tell you that I referenced you in my MulticoloredSnippets blog today.
i ave to admit, i had to look up obfuscating, i am a small word person. i like it and think it is a story both ways.
a small word, big idea person, you mean. It is a story both ways… something about that spiral we all travel… I act as though I haven’t made quilts that are personal and narrative — and it’s not true. I’ve made quite a few. But I can’t quite put my finger on what it is I am reaching for now. Maybe it’s more about style. Having a style.
Here’s Brett Whiteley’s (an Australian artist who died 11 years ago) advice to the aspiring artist –
”aim at virtually whatever is in front of you… and then one day you’ll see something that you have truly never seen before and that is the beginning of yourself & that heralds the beginning of difficult pleasure.”
http://aso.gov.au/titles/documentaries/difficult-pleasure/clip3/
(NB Difficult pleasure is how Brett described painting, or creating art: Art is an argument between what a thing looks like and what it means.)
These words have helped me find my way through the long dark nights many many times in the past 25 years!
I will follow link, and thank you, as always, Mo. Maybe I will post about this later — but I want to note that the desire for integration that I am feeling, for clearing space and creating more breathing room… is really pretty much about integrating previously-learned machine techniques with hand techniques. How to bring the learning of the last couple of years back down into the cellar, where the machine lives. I am curious. I want to see what happens.
I like this idea of ‘aiming at whatever is right in front of me’… That advice sweeps aside the ‘explaining of oneself’. And it includes the idea that by looking at whatever is right in front of you will take you to your core anyway….
there is something haunting and lovely about the white.
hi Cindy… these are the stars that started out as beads, and, after reading your post about simplicity and stitching stars, I pulled them out and worked with thread only… thank you!
I like your little whispers in the background. I hadn’t noticed them when you posted this in the forum.
do you mean ‘whiskers’? and if so, do you think I need to add them to the left side of the nose, too?
No. I meant the words in the background. But the whiskers… I probably would put them on both sides–but I have this self-limiting thing about symmetry. 🙂
I thought a breath after responding that you might mean the words. I think the lack of symmetry offends here a little too. Is that a self-limiting design choice? I like that phrase even though I know you use it as a way of describing a weakness. But is the desire for symmetry a weakness ?
I think it could be a weakness. I see what Jude does sometimes–a what if I don’t go as expected and it always works in what she does.
Maybe tinkering like that brings in whimsy and the unexpected.
Hi, Dee. I thought this was cool the way you went into an old piece. Just wanted to tell you that I referenced you in my MulticoloredSnippets blog today.
Thanks! Will check it out.
adore this one!