Monday, September 26, 2011

Yet another in the Violent Winds series










This piece is called Etesian after the winds that sweep south out of northern Europe into the Aegean. It started with a yard of cotton I dyed in the bright reds and oranges. I then added more, smaller, hand dyed shiboriied lengths to create the ground fabric. I had the blue screen printed yardage I'd done about a year ago and spent a long time at the design wall ripping it up and auditioning it onto the base. Then I built a couple of screens with the wonky "donuts" and did the printing to unify the piece. I thought it was visually quite flat in spite of the bright colors so cut out, hand stitched and quilted all those individual donuts. Still not content, I brought in the expert eyes of my artist friend Cynthia Catlin and we mulled and auditioned various things. I settled on the black spirals which add visual depth.

2 comments:

  1. Love those spirals--great piece with the color. I've always thought that spirals dead-ended themselves, but maybe when they begin in mid-air, there is more movement, a way out.
    best, nadia

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  2. Just saw a documentary about Maya Lin (the architect/sculptor) and she has been using spirals in her work as they imply a sense of eternity to her. She did a piece at Yale which uses them honoring the women who've attended. They may be a female symbol historically.

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