slowing down again

Hand stitching slows down life. It is a finishing stage of my work. The added texture, detail and color creates a nuanced meaning to the work. It requires a higher level of concentration. There are two pieces in my studio that require this level concentration now. 

Hive

For over a year this piece has developed into a study in consciousness, serendipity and connections. It is an assemblage of cast offs and stitching that weaves across the surface in chaos. For the last month it has stared down at me with a level of confusion that stopped the work. It was too chaotic, too disjointed. And, because I decided a while back that it needed to be a two-sided piece the complication of that made me a little dizzy. If I added an element on one side it affected the other. So it stopped. 

Then, just as I was leaving for a bike trip with friends, I had an AHA! moment. I realized I needed something that would tie it all together, knitting the elements into one organism, back and front. 

Thus was born a hive pattern. Hand-stitched over the chaos, through both front and back. 

The 50m orange-red top-stitching thread glows on the dark side of this piece. 

The same orange-red thread on the light side of the piece is more graphic. The color stands out in some areas but disappears in others. Two inch hexagons create mini frames of details in the piece. 

Immigration

The flag quilt is getting its layer of hand stitching in a different way. The gnarled, intertwined texture of the stitches is defining patterns of growth, migration and connections. I think of mending when I work on this piece. Mending the edges of communities, mending the rawness of connections. 

Slowing down time allows calm and supports meaning. I recommend it. 

stars and bars

I made some progress on the hand stitching for this flag quilt over the weekend. I debate each addition of detail with these questions:

  • Is it worth the effort?
  • Am I adding detail for a reason?
  • When does decoration move the piece away from meaning?

I think I need to add one more star. It's hard to count them when they are so scattered. Saw in the paper today that on this day in 1870 William Seward signed a treaty with Russia to purchase the territory of Alaska for a little over 7 million dollars.

A friend of mine called the large basting stitches between the rows Frankenstein stitching.  Though it is hard to see here, the stitching is in alternating colors of red, white and blue. A visual metaphor for the patriotism that stitches this nation together, however loosely.

While channeling my inner Jasper Johns, Betsy Ross and Faith Ringgold, I am also watching the news about personal freedoms, states rights and race relations. The raggedness of this piece feels right for the era in which we are living. Does it seem to you that we are hanging be a thread? Unraveling?

How much should I tidy up?

Tenuous links

This piece got a lot of attention yesterday due to a post on Facebook by a group called the Anartist community. They (he? she?) post some compelling and diverse images of artwork but don't really do anything to identify themselves. It's an international community as evidenced by the quotes in various languages.  A web search yields no other clues. The About section on the facebook page says: "An artist is never poor" (or "Un artista non è mai povero" if you prefer) to which I tend to agree.

I'm always mystified by how among millions (or is it billions) of people on the web sending out messages and images, does my work find a spot? What tenuous links are there that make one piece send out its feelers so that someone else is interested enough to look? These links intrigue me. They are a continuing theme in my stitching, a thread that binds all my ideas together. A link is a happy chance at connection that is at once mysterious, powerful and throbbing. It feeds my curiosity. It starts a conversation, binds together continents, and bounces from one to another.

Heartfelt, repurposed linen dress with hand and machine quilting, Paula Kovarik

density

I spent a couple of hours yesterday finishing up this little study. It had lingered on my side table for over a year. I am calling it density. Slowing down to stitch by hand is a way to organize my thoughts.

Density, 10.5" x 10.5", hand stitched on cotton napkin, Paula Kovarik

the [ is it worth it? ] debate

Inevitably, at some stage in every project, I come to a point where I have to ask: is it worth it? Yesterday was one of those days. While working on the continent portions of this world map quilt I decided to add a running stitch horizontally across the space defined by the continents. Thus:

horizontal hand stitching

horizontal hand stitching

Those horizontal hand stitches added a nice texture that contrasted with the machine stitching nearby. Needless to say, there are a lot of continents on this map and the time it takes to add the running stitch is not inconsequential. Then, I experimented with another set of running stitches at a 90 degree angle. Thus:

90 degree stitching for new texture

90 degree stitching for new texture

Double the texture, double the time. And, did I mention the number of threads I need to bury where the machine stitching hits the continents?

So, is it worth it?

I decided yes.