there's this quote
that found me this week. about spirituality. but but i say, it's about creativity, too. it's about the thing that wakes you up (past the murky-sludgy stage if you're like me) and says "LOOK goddammit" and get out the stuff and make that thought. fabricate. word made flesh. thought made materiality. maybe the language of spirit isn't far from the language of making. so: Authentic spirituality is revolutionary. It does not legitimate the world, it breaks the world; it does not console the world, it shatters it. And it does not render the self content, it renders it undone. Ken Wilber ~~~ so, I've been working on several things this while, ~ the madder dyeing ~ a couple botanical contact prints for my indigo shifu ~ tending a new small garden at the new place ~ finishing the cleanup and label of ALL the fiber ~ finding yarns for my new pipe loom ~ sorting cloth for Zone 4, my own work, and my fall papermaking class at SLU and ~ i'm going to Vancouver to Maiwa to take the five day dye workshop. yep. Vancouver.  to have a deeper understanding of the basics and then more, something i never had, except with chemical dyes. in the mid 70's. this week's red daylily flowers prompted the first quarter sheet contact prints in quite a long time.  (after realizing that my little red one has some lens damage)  after i removed it.  
and the newly dyed papers
being rinsed
 and just achieved more weirdness apologies. there was a lot of green. 
here the four are in blotters, under weighs
  yielded some lovely pastels on linen cloths   and then the oranges and then the cloths and finally the above bits.  and here are different fibers both cellulose and protein the big skein on the left is a darker rose. how do real photographers get their colors right???  the last five red daylilies as i begin a bundle.
If you see some wonky spacing here,
blogger seems to be struggling lately and sending up weirdness each time i post.
 of course today, monday, i have errands-a broken vacuum -my right rear tire picked up a 1.5 " finishing nail and had embedded it. yes, my second set of new tires this year and the same spot, though different tire as the one that had three nails simultaneously in it last year. and it's the one that had been replaced because of that. apparently i ride on back roads in the country where people haul around their waste haphazardly! |
gone and rain
i'd not been walking at the farm much (my place) because of
traveling
rain
traveling
and being Home.
and there it was--or wasn't.
the structure I'd laughed at and called barnhenge or woodhenge,
disappeared.
and so did this little one,
gone before it hatched
the most beautiful of blues.
except for all the other blues.
reading about color and how we respond to it, and what moves me,
i read about ochres, i add them to pulp, i paint with them,
i read about madder,
five new plants will go into the garden soon.
i read about the properties of dyes and pigments and lakes
and find i know so little.
but still i get extremely excited about it all.
two writers online have been exploring madder's properties
as dye and as ink.
(are you reading these two?)
(hint: Sally and Tim)
i recently ordered a new copy of Hiroko's book,
a second edition which includes more treasure.
i ordered it from Washi Arts
Linda Marshall's wonderful online store.
Linda carries Japanese Paper Place products for US customers
and she is a delight to do business with.
(and to know--she was in my Seattle North Country Shifu class last summer)
i got these little somethings in my package:
such beautiful wee samples to touch and use up happily.
here's the sample sheet of the kozo Hiroko favors,
added in right before the title page
and in the 2018 edition:
these samples of kami-ito,
one natural, one dyed
a special thank you to my PBI student James Spyker
who told me about the new edition
which included these kami-ito samples!
a soft rain happened sometime today after noon,
after some morning gardening and then mowing my lawn
one of the most dreadful jobs I have
isn't quite so awful anymore.
anyway, off my porch i saw this little one
unafraid in the beginning rain
munching grass in my porch perennial garden.
this baby needs to be watchful and wary
(there is a narsty disheveled old he-cat who ambles by every now and then)
but little cottontail was quite calm so close to human me.
yesterday i saw a doe with two beautiful fawns, in, of course,
the middle of the road.
i had no time to get the camera, watch the three on the hilltop, and watch for traffic.
a dangerous place to be pulled over.
so you will have to imagine them
in their cinnamon and white spotted legginess,
mamma all legs and exquisite ears herself.
on the road,
on a hilltop,
the north woods holding them in close
disappearing into the green at the beep of my horn.