Being In The Position to Recieve....

Detail from Snowflake Installation, 2012

 Last Monday I headed to the Morris Museum to pick up my Snowflakes after the Art In The Atrium Exhibition closed. Riding home, all I could think about was how was I going to store these large pieces of art...


Creating my first installation  was both challenging and accelerating. I must confess though, it has left me wondering "What next?" Where exactly do I go from here? The process of working wild silk threads into my papers was intriguing and filled with potential. Especially the ability the material lends to GOING BIGGER with my papers... I mean - what's not to like about that!

Then, a couple of things happened. Just days after picking up the Snowflakes. I was visiting the clothing boutique where my friend Michelle works. When Laura Barker, the owner, asked me if I would consider hanging the installation in her store Dot Reeder. Click the link and you will see the shop's old storefront with its pink awning. The new store however, has been relocated one block over to a corner space with a row of large plate glass windows on either side of the door. Can you imagine! I am so jazzed about the idea of reconfiguring the installation to fit in the windows or to flow throughout the store around her unique assemblage of clothing and accessories. I will be the second artist to grace the space after the current installation comes down, sometime in late spring... I'll keep you posted!

The second thing that happened occurred the other morning, while leafing through the fall 2011 edition of Cloth-Paper Scissors STUDIO magazine. There I found a resource called Treenway Silks...

Image me coming to the end of the raw silk threads I brought back from Turkey last summer. The material that is so wonderfully holding my snowflakes together. Never having worked with unprocessed silk before, I had no idea where to get it....Wouldn't you know it. Just as I am coming to the end of one resource, the universe opened the path to another... Treenway even sells silk cocoons you can unravel yourself.

If you have read some of my past post about the Dard Conference, you may remember that each year we have a keepsake folder. Where members are encouraged to produce 200 samples of a  paper for the folders. Which is then distributed to everyone who participates. What you end up with are a truly delightful array of all kinds of papers....

This all leads me to the last thing...  On October 17, 2012, members of IAPMA (The International Association of Papermakers) and FDH (the Friends of Dard Hunter), the two paper making organizations I belong to, will join together for the first time in Cleveland, Ohio for a 5-day international conference. Which will be hosted by The Morgan Art of Papermaking Conservatory and Education Foundation.

This year being such a special event of the national and international groups, I am purposed to produce (somehow) 200 (or perhaps more since as it is a joint meeting) tiny snowflakes to represent my work for 2011-12 season. Having access now to several varieties of silk, will most certainly provide me with multiple ways to experiment in getting just the right effect for the tiny flakes.

So what's my point? I think there is a message in here somewhere; "If ye be faithful over a few things He will make you a ruler of many"  (Matthew 25:23). In other words, I am impressed again by this Bible passage. That, if I faithfully use what I have, the more I need will present itself to me, at the right time...

 So what is it you need? Open your hands to let go of the old. I am convinced in doing so you will also make room for your NEW you need to flow in!

HAPPY SPRING! ♥