My first piece of fiber art is an ode to Taos Mountain. The piece is H 17″ x W 20″ x D 1/2″.
The sun rises over Taos Mountain and even an average sunrise looks magical here.
This piece is wet felted. It felt like painting with wool and I loved making it.
Uncarded fleece was used as trim.
This art hangs next to my window that faces Taos Mountain. Since I’m a night owl I don’t see the sunrise often so this piece reminds me of how beautiful they are.
I also blogged about this piece here.
I’m making individual posts for my art pieces so I can better catalog them.
Lunar Life
Lunar Life honors the traditional Pagan phases of a woman’s life-Maiden, Mother, Crone. It also uses the Pagan symbol of the triple moon which represents the Goddess.
The Maiden is the top triple moon. She is a young girl dancing through spring. The trees and flowers are just beginning to bloom as is she. The spiral of life is in her chest since childhood is so full of emotional experiences.
The Mother is the middle triple moon. The woman is in the midst of her garden. Trees and flowers are in full bloom. The spiral is in her womb because she is creating.
The Crone is the last triple moon. The woman is floating upwards. The trees’ leaves have fallen and the flowers have died. The spiral is in her head because she is in the spiritual time of her life.
The branch atop echoes the trees in the moons. The ribbons tie the moons together as the phases of life are tied together.
For this piece I spun several of the yarns. Techniques used were needle felting, embroidery and hand sewing.
Lunar Life was featured in the 2009 Beyond The Fringe art show. It also won second place in the Embroidery Division at the 2011 Albuquerque Fiber Arts Fiesta. It is currently on display at Lori’s Yarn & Fibers in Taos.
The dimensions are 32″H x 18″W x 2″ D.
Our friend Cat had a solo art show at Cafe Tazza in Taos last month. She also got a great write up in the Taos News. Here she is by one of her paintings:
Please excuse the cell phone pics. I forgot my memory card at home so my normal camera was useless. Argh!
You can see great pictures of her artwork at her website here.
Thebes and I have two of her oil paintings. She had a new series of pen and ink drawings inspired by the recent political revolutions that were inspiring.
The show was pretty cool. It was so neat to see that every piece of artwork in the cafe was hers. Plus she had live drumming for the opening!
Congrats Cat!
Earlier this year my artwork got featured in the Taos Art in Town Hall program. Artwork is hung in the town hall for three months.
When people walked through the main doors my Green man was there to greet them.
My Lunar Life piece was hung in the hallway to the Mayor’s office.
I attached the moons to plastic canvas to stiffen them, sewed them to ribbon and then hung the ribbons from a branch I found while hiking.
Here’s one of my art tags. I love that it says my art is part of the “Taos art colony on display”.
After this year’s Beyond The Fringe show I wasn’t sure where to put Pearl. Thankfully Floyd offered to put her in his Des Montes Art Gallery.
It’s very exciting to have an art piece in a gallery!
Here’s part of a mural Floyd painted on the front of the gallery.
Somehow I forgot to blog about this news and it’s pretty exciting. Last year I was asked to submit a photo of my Green Man to Chokecherries.
“The SOMOS Annual anthology is a compilation of the writers, storytellers and local artists who have performed and shared their artistic talent over the previous years. Featured contributors have included such notables as Robert Bly, Martin Prechtel, Erin Bad Hand, Rudolfo Anaya, Mirabai Starr, Larry Bell, and Charles Strong, Natalie Goldberg, Mike Farrell, and Sean Murphy.”
I was thrilled to be included in the 2009 edition!
Abbey and I are collaborating with our friend Floyd. He’s a local artist and owner of Des Montes Art Gallery and Sculpture Garden (Facebook link).
Floyd creates large wire sculptures out of recycled materials. He made this lifesize ram.
Sieben is helping show the size. He’s also trying to lick the horns.
Floyd uses rebar to build the frame of his sculptures and then wraps them in recycled wire from farms. He often puts a skull inside the sculpture. Thus the ram has a ram skull. We’re going to leave the horns exposed.
A close up of the bottom and tail:
Abbey and I are going to knit and crochet all over it. We plan to debut this piece at this year’s Taos Wool Festival.
The Portal is a fiber art piece about transformation. The dimensions are H 39″ L 30 1/2″ D 1 1/2″.
The majority of the piece is neddle felted though the inner part of the waterfall is crocheted yarn handsewn down. I handspun several yarns for this piece. Glass beads are embroidered throughout.
The figure is entering the portal. Where is she going? To another dimension? Another reality? Is she dying and going back into The Void? The answer is purposely left vague so the viewer will decide. I left her nude because I feel if someone is going through a spiritual portal she leaves her clothes behind.
Clear beads coming out of the opening represent the magic in the Portal. But colorful beads are sewn on the ground and the cavern behind the waterfall showing us that there is magic in this reality as well.
I should address the vagina issue. Everyone who commented on The Portal told me it looked like a vagina. And I mean everyone. At first I thought it a fluke but then the feedback was so consistent that I had to look at the piece afresh. I never intended it to be a giant vagina though I can see what people mean.
To me the figure is going back into The Void and into the Goddess so I suppose the vagina inference is apt.
This piece is based on the El Salto waterfall in Taos. I blogged about the magical experience here.
The frame was custom made by a local woodworker. I love how his work compliments the piece.
I gave this piece to my friend Helen since she’s the one who brought me to the ice waterfall.
Just One More Row is made entirely with recycled materials. Essentially it is a Bucky fourth generation skeleton covered in knitting from recycled sweaters.
The skeleton is 5’6″ and is anatomically correct. This is the model that medical students learn anatomy on. If the skeleton comes out of the factory flawed they are sold as seconds. The fourth generation model is technically the lowest quality but is perfect for Halloween decoration or, as in my case, artwork.
Pearl, the skeleton, is knitting a DNA scarf. The scarf is unfinished and the yarn is coming from her tailbone.
This represents a paradox-does our DNA create our destiny or does our destiny create our DNA and who we are?
At the same time the piece is whimsical; it is a full size knitted skeleton after all. The piece captures both the seriousness and silliness of life. The title of Just One More Row captures this whimsy; it is a phrase often said by knitters to stall for a few more minutes of craft time.
The random stripes in the knit fabric echo the DNA pattern in the scarf.
A photo of me with my creation:
Just One More Row was featured in this year’s Beyond The Fringe art show.
The dimensions are 68″ H x 22″ W x 14″ D
