29.10.09

Strange growth
















































Have I been visited by the ghost of Georgia O´Keefe...?
Can´t remember anything - but here it is, a strange
and rather ambiguous object (about 26 x 24 cm)...

And a second one already in the making. The pleasant
rosé shade I dyed with some leaves (copper-beech perhaps)
I´d picked up on a walk.

27.10.09

KunstSTOFF

Went to see an exhibition of quilts (quite a
rare thing around here...!) in the
local Kommunale Galerie, a municipal gallery




































Shown are works by quilters from Sutton, England,
Gagny, France, and from the Berlin area - they´re
the results of a challenge, each one 1 m x 1 m and
including these four fabrics:













All rather on the conventional side, but good to see,
nevertheless...

(KunstSTOFF, till Nov. 8)

23.10.09

Another dye try...
























Turmeric (nice, just a bit too yellow for my taste...)













Turmeric + tea batik (fun, but rather retro...)













Pine cones (a light, but very pleasant beige)...

21.10.09

A patch of laughter

























A Calmer. There´s a bit from an old book
behind the latticed lace, it says: It is a long
way...


"Wind rips splendor from the trees
and lays it at our feet.
Some of us hungry,

some of us lucky to be upright at all.
Season past sweetness.
Stuck in the throat with a fork.

A speck in the spectrum
spins into a wet little planet
studded with heartlust,

flooded with pamphlets
for classes on how to forget.
Where Keats sees a reaper

asleep on the granary floor,
her scythe set by quietly,
wind playing games

with the husk of her hair,
I see a dead squirrel.
It’s the end of October

and I don’t have a costume.
Past lives clutter my closet
a long way from home.

There’s a hole in the ground
where my house used to be.
A hole in my head

where my heart used to be.
I’m climbing a hillside,
a green patch of laughter."


(Suzanne Buffam: Romantic Interior)

19.10.09

My heroes have always been...




































Meet a new member of the family - I call him
the Dukeling...


"Tomorrow is the most important thing in life. Comes
into us at midnight very clean. It's perfect when it
arrives and it puts itself in our hands. It hopes we've
learned something from yesterday.”

(John Wayne)

16.10.09

Old October




































Some development on this "playing around with a
traditional pattern"- piece...
There are dark grey blots on the linen patch with the
October embroidery (hardly visible here, though), produced
with tea and iron dye, a method I stumpled upon last month.
Here`s some more of it, on cotton:

























It´s done with a small amount of big leafed black
tea and an iron-pill, just putting boiling water
over it all and letting it sit for two hours or so.
The iron seems to have the effect of encouraging rather
distinct blots just around the tea leaves.


"All things on earth point home in old October;
sailors to sea, travellers to walls and fences,
hunters to field and hollow and the long voice of
hounds, the lover to the love he has forsaken."

(Thomas Wolfe)

11.10.09

Pretty in beige...













A little neck pouch...













A peek at a series of mixed media things
I´m making...













A beginning of the next traditional pattern
adventure...

And a very good start into the week to you all...

8.10.09

Rainy weather...

... and I like it

"With those black clouds over me/ it makes me
feel that I can be/ just who I want to be..."
























I thought I´d like to make some small pieces
starting from traditional patterns, here a simple
Diamond in a Square, and then play around with
it. The tightly packed center in this one made
me feel a little claustrophobic I guess - or was
it rebellious...? Anyway, I cut into it...

6.10.09

Shorter days













The little September farewell piece from last
week got a dark brown addition - reaching over
into October ...














"den tagen geht das licht aus
und eine stunde dauert zehn minuten.
die bäume spielten ihre letzten farben.

am himmel wechselt man die bühnenbilder
zu rasch für das kleine drama in jedem von uns:
den tagen geht das licht aus.

dein grauer mantel trennt dich von der luft,
ein passepartout für einen satz wie diesen:
die bäume spielten ihre letzten farben.

eisblaue fenster - auf den wetterkarten
der fernsehgeräte die daumenabdrücke der tiefs.
den tagen geht das licht aus,

dem leeren park, dem teich: die enten werden
an unsichtbaren fäden aufgerollt.
die bäume spielten ihre letzten farben.

und einer, der sich mit drei sonnenblumen
ins dunkel tastet, drei schwarzen punkten auf gelb:
den tagen geht das licht aus.
die bäume spielten ihre letzten farben."

(Jan Wagner: herbstvillanelle/autumn vilanelle)


the days´ light is running out
and an hour lasts a mere ten minutes.
the trees were playing their last colours.

in the sky the stage set´s changing
too swiftly for the little drama in each of us:
the days´ light is running out.

your grey coat separates you from the air,
a passpartout for an sentence such as this:
the trees were playing their last colour.

ice-blue windows - on the weather maps
of the tv sets the thumb prints of the lows.
the days´ light is running out,

and the empty park´s, the pond´s: the ducks are
being reeled in on unseen threads.
the trees were playing their last colours.

and a man carrying three sunflowers
feels his way in the dark, three black spots in yellow:
the days´light is running out.
the trees were playing their last colours.


(transl. G. Paul)

4.10.09

Don Leafote




































He calls himself a leaves protector
- a futile but very brave and necessary task.

(they´re out there again with their noisy
blowers, chasing defenseless fallen leaves
with machine power...)

And it´s windy in Berlin.



"Wild nights - Wild nights!
Were I with thee
Wild nights should be
Our luxury!


Futile - the winds -
To a Heart in port -
Done with the Compass -
Done with the Chart!


Rowing in Eden -
Ah - the Sea!
Might I but moor - tonight -
In thee!"

(Emily Dickinson: Wild nights - Wild nights!)