Ferns: weekly photo at cougar mtn, 4/21

Those of you with calendars will probably note that I'm late posting these photos too. My last couple of walks at Cougar mtn got me lots of pictures of the ferns growing out of the moss that grows on the trees. I have a couple of pieces percolating right now, and I'm printing photos on fabric today so that I can work on them this weekend while I'm on Whidbey Island with the Seamsters Union. I don't think I'll be using the first photo because there's too much going on in it. But the second one, the closer one with the little fern, it will definitely be used in some way.

This one is here so people can possibly understand why I'm so obsessed with these ferns. I think it's just amazing, the layering of green that happens in the woods here.



And this one was the first of the close ups of a very small fern growing next to a tiny streamlet. I can't help but wonder if it will survive the summer when the stream will dry up.

microcredit comes to NYC

In my email this morning was this news from dailygood.org. I pass it along because I think going small (and relocalizing) is the best way out of the current economic problems for most of us.

My greatest challenge has been to change the mindset of people. Mindsets play strange tricks on us. We see things the way our minds have instructed our eyes to see. /--Muhammad Yunus/

*Good News of the Day:*
Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus, known as the "banker to the poor" for making small loans in impoverished countries, is now doing business in the center of capitalism -- New York City. In the past year the first U.S. branch of his Grameen Bank has lent $1.5 million, ranging from a few hundred dollars to a few thousand dollars, to nearly 600 women with small business plans in the city's borough of Queens. People around the country are struggling to repay mortgages and credit card debts, but Grameen America says its loan repayment rate is more than 99 percent. [ full story here ]

Backyard Bushtits series finished! Finally!

So here are the completed 4 pieces that were all done starting with the backyard bushtit photo I blogged about earlier, when I finished the first piece. It's taken me over a week to get the photos taken so I could blog about them, and I'm not completely happy with the first photo, but it's "Ship It!" time so here they are.

The first 2 pieces are both about 8 x 8 finished size. And all four are put on stretcher bars so they are ready to hang. I haven't done any pieces this way before and that was a learning experience. (This shot came out a bit darker than I'd like so I'll probably redo it, but not today. I'm itching to go work on my new pieces.)


Backyard Bushtits #3 is approximately 10" x 20" and was my first attempt to explore the theme of birds living in the nooks and crannies that we leave them.


This turned out to be the one I liked the best after it was finished. I didn't completely like the batik fabric that I intercut through the picture as I thought it made it too jangly and disrupted. So I added the silkscreening after I'd already pieced it. (And after #4 was halfway done...) And that didn't quite do it, so I added some more stenciling and watercolor highlights on top of it all.
I think this is the one that gets across my idea, and has the most coherent design.

After being unhappy with #3, I thought about just doing intercut fabric in one direction. Thus, I came up with #4. It's okay, but not as appealing to me as #3. It's also not as big as #3 being only
9" x 17". I did like the effect of silkscreening on the fabric I used to slice up the bird photo and I'll probably be doing this some more in future work.



Frankly, this was an exercise in doing a series, to stretch my own process, and experiment with working multiple interpretations of an idea at a time. I learned a lot about how I work, and got some ideas tried out that had been bubbling in my head for a while. It was worth the effort and I hope, in addition, some of you like some of the pieces that resulted.

Earth Jurisprudence: Legal rights for Gaia

I blogged about Ecuador adding legal rights for nature in their rewritten constitution. And here's a link to an article about where else the idea is catching on, including Vermont (no surprise there) and Maine, where local communities are using the idea to fight corporations (such as Nestle) who want to use their aquifers for bottled water without regard to the local communities' desires or the aquifer recharge rate.

Read the full article here.

I am particularly excited to hear about the folks at the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund (CELDF), based in Pennsylvania. They're providing legal assistance to communities both locally and internationally. I'm intending to look at what I can do to support them. See their webpage at www.celdf.org. If the rules aren't working, and I believe they're not, then we need to change them rather than wait for disaster.

Weekly photo: Larsen lake greenbelt, 4/11

Having successfully recovered after surgery and the almost neverending flu, I have resumed my weekly photo taking. I took the camera along to Larsen Lake, and was fascinated by the pussy willows budding out. I don't know what the yellow things I photographed are called, but I really liked their shape and contrast against the grey stones on the greenbelt trail. This one was taken using the macro lens on my camera.




And here's a more distant shot of the same things still on the bare branches of one of the many willows along the lake.



I'm mulling over how to use the macro one in a fiber art piece. I'm thinking I'll work smaller, probably 8 x 11 and see what happens if I focus on the textures and contrast of the colors.

Here's hoping you're finding your own inspiration this spring!

Tidal power test in BC

Today's email brought a story about British Columbia testing tidal power generation in the islands off Vancouver Island. Since I live in the Pacific Northwest area, I follow water power ideas. I think each region will have to find alternate power sources that suit their strengths. Solar in Arizona, hydro in the PNW. Apparently, some of the folks in BC think the same.

First few paragraphs:

North Vancouver Island will soon be home to the first commercial-scale tidal current electrical turbine in North America.

The B.C. government announced last week that it is giving $2 million in funding to Canoe Pass Tidal Energy Corporation for the project.

Company officials said the turbine will be running before the end of 2010 in the tidal channel between Quadra and Maude Island, north of Campbell River.

To read the full article, go here.

I'm Back! with electric vehicle updates...

I seem to finally be over the dreadful flu and post-surgery lassitude that has overwhelmed me for the last couple of months. So, I'm starting off my return to blogging with a couple of links about electric vehicles. One is Segway's 2 seater version of their personal transportation. Since it has 2 wheels, and no motor, is it legally a bicycle? I'm looking forward to trying one out. Check it out here.

The next bit of news is about a trial run of a fully electric car in Vancouver BC. The vehicle is freeway capable, and is from Mitsubishi. It's being tested in several cities. Read the full article here.

Wow, this is sure happening fast. And a good thing too, if the recent articles about Antarctic ice melting are any indication.

Gratitude is good for you...

Today's email brought a link from DailyGood on gratitude and its effect on the parasympathetic nerve system. Turns out it's good for you physically to think about things that you feel grateful for, that enrich your life. Good thoughts, good health. What a concept.

Read the whole thing here.

Artists reinvent the world, sustainably...

I'm not doing much art myself right now, as I suffer through what is apparently the longest case of flu on record, but I wanted to share this article about artists in Detroit buying up abandoned houses and turning them into off-grid homes. I was talking about this sort of idea to my husband when I heard about houses in Cleveland going for $2000 on ebay. It's an interesting idea, and I think we'll see it spread. Housing is a huge part of normal living costs. If you can slice that down to nothing, and you make your living through galleries or the net, well, it makes a lot of sense.

Here's a teaser paragraph:
"Although it is small consolation in the face of overwhelming economic strife in Detroit and elsewhere as the foreclosure crisis continues, this story gave me a real feeling of hope and renewal. To me, this example and other corresponding cases – like the artist-driven re-imaginings of shopping malls and big box stores seems symbolic of an even larger cultural shift. The arts community isn't just moving into one downtrodden urban neighborhood; rather, they're taking on the ruins of the unsustainable. They're taking on big box stores, shopping malls, and grid-connected homes in the car capitol of North America. And they're not just creating new art. They're seizing the opportunity to turn old shells of buildings into independent, renewable energy-powered, 21st century-ready spaces."

Talk about recycle, reuse or make do! For the full story, go here.

Friedman on moving to a sustainable culture

Today's email from Culture Change brought a column from Thomas L. Friedman, the nationally syndicated columnist. I guess if even the East Coast intellectuals are catching on, it must be true, eh? I liked the commentary that Culture Change had to make so I'm passing on the link for their reprint rather than the direct link to the column.

I particularly liked this paragraph:

Let’s today step out of the normal boundaries of analysis of our economic crisis and ask a radical question: What if the crisis of 2008 represents something much more fundamental than a deep recession? What if it’s telling us that the whole growth model we created over the last 50 years is simply unsustainable economically and ecologically and that 2008 was when we hit the wall — when Mother Nature and the market both said: “No more.”


Read the whole column here.

Junk Cars morph into green manufactured homes

Okay, that headline caught my eye in my morning email. An interesting lead, especially for someone married to an engineer type, made me go read the whole article. Super energy efficient affordable homes made from scrap cars. I can only applaud...

Read the article here.

Herbal chai, tasty and fights colds

As my winter cold is dragging on and on and on, I'm realizing that I haven't been drinking my cold weather daily cup of herbal chai. Could be part of the problem. And since I'm hearing from friends that they too are having cold/flu problems, I thought I'd share the recipe. I got this recipe from an acupuncturist when I was living in Boulder. I found it did indeed help me feel warmer and fight sinus congestion. And it's very tasty.

1.5 inches fresh ginger root (peeled or unpeeled, doesn't seem to matter) sliced thinly
8-10 cinnamon sticks (I split mine in half to get more exposure to the water)
10 cardamon pods (or about 50 cardamon seeds if you can't get pods) Split the pods open slightly
10 whole cloves
5 peppercorns

Put everything in 5 cups water, Boil for 30 minutes total. I bring it to a boil, reduce the heat and put a lid on the pot with a slight gap at the edge of the lid. Add honey, lemon, milk or rice milk to taste. I have also used heated herbal chai as water to make tea with when I want the kind of chai you get at a latte stand.

Yields about a quart of chai.

Recycling pillows and green living tips

One of my regular emails is a green living tips newsletter. This time, I did let myself get distracted by the sidebar link to one about recycling/repurposing foam pillows. With my allergies, we do this regularly because of accumulated allergens and dust mites and it always gives me a twinge to toss them so frequently. I especially like the post from Sheila in Texas about repurposing multiple things. Lots and lots of tips from all sorts of people make this a very useful place.

Check it out here: green living tips. They plant a tree via Trees for the Future for each new subscriber so just subscribing will help the planet. How cool is that?

Backyard Bushtits #1 finally finished

I've obviously been trying to go faster than my body wants, as I'm struggling with a cold in addition to the surgery recovery so it's taken me quite some time to finish up Backyard Bushtits #1. BUT, it's done, finished, even ready to hang and it will be put on my etsy store sometime next week.

I learned a lot from doing this work in a series and I'll post later about the rest of the pieces as they finish up. Right now there are 4 of them. I've put the word "LESSON" in caps throughout my post for the things I've learned.

Here's the photo I started with. The bushtits travel in large flocks, up to a couple of dozen little birds, and they tumble across backyards here in western washington. (Probably elsewhere, but I'm not motivated enough right now to go look up their range map. I leave it as an exercise for the reader.) I really liked the way the four of them looked like a puppy pile so I snapped the photo through the greenhouse window in my kitchen and played with it in adobe until I had it cropped to a pleasing composition. LESSON #1: my technique of cutting up photos and doing a textile collage with them works better when I don't start with a good composition. It's much harder to create one that's different from the photo when I like the photo just fine to start with.




Here's the top without much done to it. I was not happy with it, and did a little in the way of paintstiks and stamps to try and rescue it with varying the colors and tones a bit. LESSON #2: remember the one rule (vary all intervals) from the beginning. The photo has more contrast and variation than the fabric printed version of the photo and I ended up having to add that back in. When it prints on the fabric and loses all the variation in color/tone that it had to start with, maybe it's time to switch to another photo or idea. It's not like I have a shortage of them, anyway....





Then I did more surface design work on it, and quilted it lightly, then put it on stretcher bars. I'm okay with how it looks, altho the composition is still more static than I like. LESSON #3: Get the composition right to begin with, improv work can go on top of a good composition but can't correct one I don't like to start with. LESSON #4: don't put the batting all the way out to the edge of the fabric for stretcher bars. I don't like the bulk on the sides and corners when I wrap the fabric around with the batting going all the way to the edges. We'll see if I can get this one better on #2 which is now in the quilting phase and should be finished before Monday.



I'll just point out that the yellow added to the birds shows up much stronger in the photo than it does in person. I'll have to play with the photography before I list this piece on my etsy store. I'm not entirely sure it's fixable as part of the problem is the reflective quality of the silk I printed the photo on. The other possibility is that the watercolor pencils I used reflect differently enough that they will always pop out visually in a photo. We'll have to see...

weekly photo: Larsen lake 1/31

I'm late posting last weekend's photo, which is just as well, as I didn't get photos this weekend because I'm having a delayed reaction to having surgery. I'm spending a few days curled up in my pj's and reading rather than doing much of anything. But, last weekend, I took some photos at Larsen Lake. The first one is another interesting one of the great blue heron. It's official, I am obsessed with him.



The second is a possible starting point for a piece based on "urban decay". It's not really the typical urban shot, but Larsen Lake is within sight of a major street, and in the middle of a city, so that sounds pretty urban to me. I like the reflections on the water and may end up using it for something else if I find something more appropriate for the urban decay piece.

Going green: high speed rail

While we're looking at spending money on national infrastructure and building the future green economy, here's some thoughts about how we can try to catch up with others who already have high speed rail. The source of this excerpt, Plan B 3.0 by Lester Brown, is one of the books being used by the folks in Washington and other places to push for a comprehensive restructuring of the US economy. I think they're aiming in the right direction so it's worth checking out.

http://www.earthpolicy.org/Books/Seg/PB3ch11_ss5.htm

Weekly photo: Larsen lake greenbelt, 1/25

There's been a great blue heron at Larson Lake around the time I normally walk about half the time over the past 2 weeks. He likes a stump that juts out of the lake fairly close to the pier I go out on when I walk. But he doesn't like people being too close. So when I go on the pier, he flies across the lake to the quieter part on the other side. I've been using my photos of herons a lot lately - I seem to have a thing for them right now. I'm already planning how to turn this photo into a piece. I like the lines and colors of the bare branches and the reflection of the light on the lake.




Since the heron shot was at a distance, I decided to do a closeup shot of something. I'm in a facebook art group that's talking about texture right now so I tried to find something that showed the texture of the woods in winter. Here are 3 shots of the same spot with the log shifted in the view. I'm trying to decide which I like best as a composition. Comments on your choice are welcome.

First, I spotted the log, liked the texture of the cut end, and the moss growing on the side. So, like any snapshot, I put it in the center.


Then I decided to focus on the moss, so I shot it with the cut end to the right side of the view.


And last, I decided I liked the parallel line of the snag in the background so I shot it with the mossy log on the left.


It was definitely an interesting exercise in looking closely and thinking about composing with the camera. I think I'll learn a lot this year from doing these weekly shots. And it should be a fascinating look at how my local spots change over time. My opinion: I think #2 is the most effective composition, but I'm not entirely able to say exactly why.

Art: Working smaller, adding texture

I sent off a piece to the SAQA 20th anniversary traveling exhibit yesterday after facing an interesting couple of challenges in creating something for it. I had 2 new constraints: an 8" limit on the size of the final image, and a square format. I usually work in a much larger rectangle. But, this is an important exhibition to participate in, so I dug in and went to work.

First of all, here's the piece that went off, Tiny Dancers #1. It was my second try at a subject after I was so unhappy with the first one. I feel that I managed to work smaller with this piece and still have my love of color and sense of design show well. I've also combined motifs from two earlier works so in addition to working smaller, I'm doing a series. That's a realization from hindsight.



The idea came to me in that foggy pre-sleep time in bed on Friday night. It was fused, stamped, stitched and photographed by Sunday noon. This working smaller could become addictive...

Also, this finished at 9.5" square and will be matted so that only 8" shows. I'm hoping they realize they should cut off the bottom of the globe, not the outstretched hand of the dancer. At least, that's what I'd do. I'm looking forward to seeing it in the exhibit of work by all us studio art quilters.


My first try at a piece was completely unsatisfactory. I didn't take a picture of it and now wish I had so I could show the before and after. I started with a photo of bushtits in my backyard. I loved the texture of the lichen on the tree branches and the way it echoed the color of the tiny bushtits. And I loved the way the 4 little birds were almost doing a puppy pile. But, when I cut the photo printed on fabric up and fused it to the background hand dyed fabric, it was all a monochromatic blur. I wasn't happy. And running it by my husband, the red green colorblind family member who aids me as a tonal viewer, verified that it was impossible to see anything but a dappled green square. So I set it aside, and fretted about what to do, and then had my aha! moment which resulted in the Tiny Dancers #1 piece above.

As part of Tiny Dancers, I pulled out some fabric dye crayons and stamps and texture plates to pull things together a bit. The spirals I added to TD this way aren't as noticeable because of the richness of the background fabric. But, I liked the effect enough to start wondering if this wasn't a way to rescue the poor bushtits. So, I went to town, experimenting with everything that seemed likely and using lots of different colors. I really like the result. The visual texture I added between the photo pieces highlights the lichen texture on the branches that I absolutely love. And the orange and navy bits make the green and grey less bland. It's still a calmer piece than is usual for me, but I no longer want to burn it so I'm calling it good.



It's 11" square right now, so there's quite a bit on the edges that I was considering excess. I'm thinking I'll put it on stretcher bars so it finishes to the 8" square size that is intended. And then move on to the next experiment using this photo and see what else I can discover about how I work.

Going from greed to green

Today's email brought an article "7 Fixes from the Green Economy" which I thought worth sharing. There's a discussion of what to do as individuals, how it fits into a bigger plan, and how to pay for the changes without furthering damaging the economy. Since one of my goals for this year is maximizing energy efficiency in our house, I'm interested in sources that relate to that. This looks like a good one.

2009 Goals

In the course of a wide-ranging discussion of New Year's resolutions, one of my fellow quiltart members recommended a book entitled Your Best Year Yet. I checked it out of the library and found I already knew most of the material, but realized I hadn't been applying it as well as I'd like so I decided to come up with a goal list for this year. And stick to just those goals. My problem being that I tend to overcommit my time and energy.

Here's my list for this coming year, focusing on the major 3 areas I want to work in:

ART

Redo webpage using plone or other cms

• Add galleries with thumbnails
• Create separate blog for sales or add shopping cart to webpage

Increase productivity/skills

• Work in studio daily
• Take classes (digital camera, painting)

Produce income

• Teach classes
• Add shirts for sales
• List small pieces for sale online

SELF

Take Reiki Level 3 training

Chakra owner's manual work

Lose 20 pounds

• Return exercise to base level
• Cut back on extras in diet (less wine and chocolate)

Declutter life

• Focus on main roles/goals
• Get rid of stuff that's not being used or creating beauty in my life

HOUSEHOLD

Increase food production in garden

• Plant perennial veggies
• Increase food preservation skills

Maximize energy efficiency

• Garage insulation
• Energy audit

Paint exterior

• Get quotes
• Estimate labor/costs to do ourselves

Investigate IRA land possibilities


The book recommends 10 goals and I've exceeded that limit slightly. How typical. However, all progress is made one step at a time so this is my first step.