Loss, a fiber installation

(Above: Loss, a fiber installation.  Click on any image to enlarge.)

Yesterday was magical, truly overwhelming with the widest range of emotions imaginable.  I've been dreaming about this installation for over three years.  Intuitively, found objects were collected. Here and there, a threaded needle was pulled through the antique garments, long running stitches in burnt red wool and masses of Colonial and bullion knots.  Tiny seed stitches now cascade down one, tiny infant's gown.  Many threads were left tangling, as if weeping.  I already had the hundreds of wrapped and tied pieces of lace.  They were leftovers from other projects.  Yet, until yesterday this installation was just a foggy vision.  I didn't even have its title until I'd suspended the work.

(Above:  The photo shoot in the remains of Vista Studios.)

One of the garments was stitched during a winter art residency at PLAYA in the remote Oregon Outback.  The two infant gowns were stitched at Bill Mishoe's auction house while watching the remains of other people's lives being sold.  In the back of my mind, I played with potential names for this installation:  Miscarriage and Estrangement were at the top of the list.  Why? Well, these are personal experiences.  When I suspended the four garments, however, I realized that this was a community of grief.  The work expresses more than my sadness.  It embraces all sorts of motherhood realities:  a stillborn baby, giving up a child for adoption, the "Empty Nest" syndrome, an abortion, infertility, and even death.

(Loss, detail of the four suspended garments.)

This work is flooded in tears, but yesterday did not find me crying.  I was HAPPY ... subtly, quietly, untroubled ... in a state that is best called "bliss".  I had returned to my element, a place in which I am very comfortable.  I went back to the remains of Gallery 80808/Vista Studios.  All the partition walls are now gone.  It is now just a big, empty warehouse with four wonderful skylights over an area that had been an atrium for art exhibitions.  The landlords are looking to sell.  I moved out over two years ago.  My first and former studio (for something like thirteen years) is just a tiny patch of dark blue paint on the massive floor.  In the photo further above, it is the location on the left in which the 8' ladder is standing.

I love this space, especially now that it is empty.  I love the natural light.  None of these picture have been altered except by cropping.  No fancy lighting was required (which is a good thing!  I don't own any!)  It is the perfect place to snap pictures.  While working for three hours, I thought about all the art I've photographed in just this place.  I felt like a pro!  I knew my "foggy vision" was becoming a reality.  From mind to matter to actual installation!  Yesterday was wonderful.

I snapped over two hundred and sixty images.  I culled them down to only a couple dozen.  I shot the installation as a group of four but also ...

... as individually suspended works ...

... including detail images and even a video of how these pieces slowly turn with the air conditioning system.

I shot every garment suspended above all three cradles, one at a time.

I shot various angles, looking up and looking down.

I also shot just one adult sleeping gown with just one infant garment.  Motherhood.  A family friend once said, "Children are closest when a woman is pregnant.  From the moment of birth, a child is not just growing up but growing away."  She couldn't have been more right.  This is Loss, in all its possibilities and for all those women who know exactly how it feels.

I am linking this post to Nina-Marie's "Off the Wall Fridays", a site for sharing fiber arts.

Rescue Rug

 (Above: Rescue Rug.  Framed 27" x 63". Inventory # 4308. $650.  Click on any image to enlarge.)

I'm usually very good about taking in-progress images. But not this time! Honestly, I didn't think I would end up with anything at all.  It was a long shot at best, a hair-brained idea, an adventure down a "rabbit hole".  It started just over two weeks ago while at Bill Mishoe's Tuesday night "walk-around" auction of used household items.  I go most every week but am not always successful.  In fact, I never even raised my hand to bid that night.  Yet, I saw a pretty hooked rug among the "junk" sitting on a card table.  I don't know who bought this lot, but whoever it was left the rug outside the building in a pile of broken glass and under several pieces of wood that had once been a cheap cabinet.  At least that's where I found the hooked rug the next week.  I picked it up and threw it in the back of my van.

 (Above:  The reverse of the center section.)

The next day, I tossed the rug into my washing machine.  It was filthy after all! Sure, I knew that the wool might felt and the burlap my disintegrate.  Cleaning this hooked rug was a risk, but I had nothing in it.  After an hour, I opened the lid to the washing machine.  It was quite a mess!  The rug was tattered and torn, and the sides of the machine were covered in felted mush.  It took at least fifteen minutes to remove all the debris from the washing machine.  What was left of the rug did not look promising.  I hung the rug outside to dry.  Being dry it did not really improve it, but there was "something" about it that I still liked.
 

 (Above:  Rescue Rug, detail.)

Still having nothing to lose, I started cutting up one corner.  I removed the burlap from the areas that had once been wool ... all the wool that felted into the machine.  I was left with a "fragment" and decided to apply GAC 400, a fabric stiffener.  I applied it liberally on both sides and placed it outside on a piece of silicone coated paper.  Every hour, I flipped it over ... allowing the hot summer sun to work magic on the polymer emulsion.  By the end of the day, the product had dried to an invisible clear and the fragment was nice and stiff.  I showed it to my husband Steve.  He liked it too.  The next day, I cut the rest of the rug into two, slightly larger fragments and applied GAC 400 to them too.

 (Above:  Rescue Rug, left side of the piece.)

Soon, Steve and I were talking about how we'd like to frame it.  Amazingly, I had a bolt of cheap, synthetic upholstery fabric in the perfect golden color.  (It came from Bill Mishoe's auction several months ago and set me back a whole six-dollars for the entire bolt!)  I mounted the fabric on an over-sized piece of foam-centered board cut to 20" x 60".  We ordered a chunky, deep brown moulding with a unique inner lip.

(Above:  Picture frame moulding from Decor's Cappuccino line.)

The face of this moulding is a full half-inch higher than where the artwork is placed.  What does that mean? Well ...

(Above:  Upper left corner of the frame.)

... this is the depth that is created.  Because the upholstery material and the piece require no glass, I didn't put glass into the frame.  Yet, the artwork isn't "sticking out" in front of the moulding.  It is "set back" as if in a shadowbox.  The piece looks amazing!  It reminds me of fragments of Roman mosaics.  I thought I would title it was some historic reference, but Steve and our moulding rep both said, "Call it Rescue Rug!"

 (Above:  Rescue Rug, right side of piece.)

Actually, this is an appropriate name.  Not only was it rescued from the side of an auction house, but it was also the result of recycling when initially created.  This hooked rug wasn't made from just one type of material. It appears to have been made from strips of old clothing or household textiles.  Some of the fabric is cotton, but not all the cotton seems the same weight or weave (or some might be a heavier linen).  The rusty red fabric seems to be a more densely woven wool blend ... which is why it didn't completely felt onto the sides of my washing machine.  From the looks of it, this was a "recycling" or "rescue" project from the start!   

(Above:  Rescue Rug ... how it looked sitting outside my back door for its photo shoot.)

Had I known that this hair-brained idea would turn out this well, I would have taken "in process" photos ... but I would have never guessed that the rescue would be so successful!

I am linking this post to Nina-Marie's "Off the Wall Fridays", a site for sharing fiber arts. 

Large Stained Glass LXXXV

 (Above:  Detail of Large Stained Glass LXXXV.  Click on any image to enlarge.)

I finished Large Stained Glass LXXXV last Saturday.  My husband Steve came into the garage just at the perfect moment to capture still images and a couple videos of the final melting steps.  I posted these to Facebook and got lots and lots of positive feedback.  Yet, I couldn't take final pictures for my blog until today.

 (Above:  One of Steve's photos from the melting stage of melting.)

Until this morning, I've been waiting for my weekly delivery of mat board and moulding.  Pieces this size have to be stitched to over-sized mat board in order for me to photograph.  So ... here it is:

 (Above:  Large Stained Glass LXXXV.)

Large Stained Glass LXXXV measures 56" x 16" unframed and is 63" x 23" framed.  It was created from layers of polyester stretch velvet fused to recycled, black industrial packaging felt.  Free-motion machine stitching is done using only 100% cotton thread.  Then comes the FUN part ... melting!

 (Above:  Detail of the top of Large Stained Glass LXXXV.)

I first spent hours melting holes through the fabric using three different sizes of soldering irons.  Because all the layers are made from synthetic material, the heat from the soldering iron just melts straight through.  Then, I flip on my industrial heat gun and aim toward the space between the polyester velvet shapes.  This is the "thinnest layer".  It is simply the industrial felt ... also a synthetic.  It is often difficult to explain this in words which is why THIS VIDEO is helpful.  

 (Above:  Detail of the "rose window" portion of Large Stained Glass LXXXV.)

Want more of the melting process? CLICK HERE for a continuation of the melting!  Please notice that I am wearing a carbon filtering ventilator mask.  The fumes from melting polyesters is toxic.  

 (Above:  Another detail of Large Stained Glass LXXXV.)

The success of my work is based on the fact that synthetic materials melt and natural materials don't melt.  Each of my works is stitched using only 100% cotton thread.  The cotton thread doesn't melt.  It stays and holds the various shapes together!

Here are some of the still images that Steve took in the garage.  Generally, I melt from the reverse.

I hold the heat gun rather close to the packaging felt and aim for the space between the shapes.

The final step is using one of the soldering irons to release the piece from the stretcher bars.  I always have my work stapled to stretcher bars because the melting process would otherwise shrink the artwork!

Lucy Stone, finished!

 (Above:  Lucy Stone, a contemporary, 3D art quilt inspired by the original 19th century daguerreotype of the early suffragist.  Open:  26" x 40"; Closed 26" x 20."  Image transfers on fabric with self-guided, free-motion machine embroidery, hand stitching and beading, trapunto, buttons, metallic and cotton threads, hinges, custom frames, upholstery tacks, recycled black industrial felt, faux-finished watercolor paper and letters clipped from mostly vintage ephemera.  Click on any image to enlarge.)

Returning from my five-week art residency at the Rensing Center meant I was also returning to an important project that was left unfinished for all those weeks.  Before leaving, I'd completed the photograph of suffragist Lucy Stone and blogged about it HERE. This portrait occupies only 25% of the total surface area, but it was the most labor intensive and obviously the focal point of the whole.  I was excited to finish the piece but knew it had to "go on hold" until this past week!

 (Above:  The left interior side of Lucy Stone.)

During this week, I collaged the paragraph I wrote onto a heavy piece of watercolor paper.  I faux-finished the paper to resemble orange marble.  This is half of the sheet.  The other half was used for Pandora's Box.  I had all my words written on tracing paper to use as a guide, but sometimes "something bad" happens ... especially when going from the end of one line to another ... especially when the words all start with the same letter.  When this happens, it is easy to accidentally skip and entire word.  So, if you enlarge the image, you will see that I accidentally omitted the word "husband".  (It was supposed to go between "her" and "Henry" ... all words starting with the letter H!) I didn't catch the error until those lines were completely dry.  What's an artist to do?  Like any student forced to longhand write an essay, I just "crammed" the missing word into place ... very small and at the end of the line. My husband Steve found this particularly hilarious and totally appropriate for a suffragist who insisted on using her own surname.  To Steve, "husband" should be especially small in this case. He said it was "conceptually correct".  I'll go with this explanation!

 (Above:  The exterior of Lucy Stone.)

As a work of art, Lucy Stone is meant to resemble the original 19th century daguerreotype owned by the Library of Congress.  Like a real daguerreotype, my work is hinged and the exterior is another image transfer on fabric of an original daguerreotype case.  This image is NOT the original outside of the daguerreotype of Lucy Stone.  That image was not available.  I found many others and settled on this one.  It did require quite a bit of work in Photoshop to make it the correct size.  I free-motion stitched each side with King Tut's beautiful, cotton, variegated Cedars, #983 thread.  Along with Pinecone, #992, these are my very favorite threads.  To be honest, I'm pretty sure I accidentally used a little of both on these two sides.  They are so beautifully subtle that they blend perfectly together.
 

(Above:  Lucy Stone, exterior, detail of the edge with upholstery tacks and melted felt.)

Another "favorite" thing to do is to attach my work to the frame using assorted upholstery tacks.  The excess substrata of black industrial felt is then melted away using a soldering iron.  The tiny "white" line on the outside of the tacks is where the soldering iron also melted away the black paint I'd applied to the frame.  It adds a nice touch!  I'm so very, very pleased that this piece is finished and ready for Deeds Not Words: The Power of Persistence, Celebrating 100 Years of Women's Suffrage, an exhibition being curated and organized for a national tour by Sandra Sider and Pam Weeks.

Hansel and Gretel's Witch: Hoping for a Michelin Star

(Above:  Hansel & Gretel's Witch: Hoping for a Michelin Star.  Framed: 15 1/2" x 37 1/2". Inventory # 4305. $300.  Click on any image to enlarge.)

During my very first week of an art residency at the Rensing Center, there was a potluck dinner to which most of the invited guests brought very exotic, locally sourced, organic delicacies. I blogged about it HERE ... complete with photos of a meringue coated red snapper and descriptions of a roadkill venison tenderloin prepared according to The Sioux Chef recipe book. Anyone who knows me well knows that I don't generally cook at all.  In desperation, I brought deviled eggs in an ice cube tray and felt very much like a "fish out of water".  Yet, the experience got me thinking, especially about fusion cuisine, farm-to-table dining opportunities, and all sorts of alternative ways some people look at food preparation.  I knew that all the other guests would be horrified to know that for most of the remaining days at the art residency, I would be nuking frozen pizza and pulling aluminum foil from the top of ready-to-eat fruit yogurt containers. My priorities aren't necessarily "wrong", just different ... alternative!   

(Above:  Hansel & Gretel's Witch: Hoping for a Michelin Star, framed and sitting on my window ledge for photo.)

Within a day, I had an idea for a new piece headed to a springtime show with Flavia Lovatelli and Olga Yukhno called Alternative Storytellers. Within a week, I'd purchased a couple of vintage cookbooks at the Pickens County flea market.  There will be two more pieces made about Hansel and Gretel's witch.  This first one uses a 1940s instruction booklet for a General Electric oven.  Each of the five pages I used is altered with letters clipped from the rest of the booklet and from other vintage sources.  It was really, really fun to imagine a witch who was into exotic, locally sourced, organic delicacies ... and hoping for a Michelin star!

 (Above:  Binding the pages together using a curved needle.)

Each of the five pages has been fused to fabric for stability.  Each has been mounted to a piece of acid-free foam-centered board before being glued to the mat board.  This allows the pages to look as if "floating" above the background mat.  Between the pages, I used a metallic ribbon and stitched them in a criss-cross fashion using a curved needle.

By enlarging the photo above and the two below, all the words should be legible.  Enjoy the amusement.

Pandora's Box

(Above: Pandora's Box.  Antique chest collaged with my childhood stamp collection. 10 1/2" H x 24" W x 11" D.  Click on any image to enlarge.)

Since returning from my art residency at the Rensing Center that included last Thursday's reception for The Cocoon, the work created during the prior five weeks, I've been itching to act on several ideas that have been otherwise "on hold".  You see, being at an art residency is a definite "high".  It is the "gift of time"; it is an opportunity to focus on a new body of work; it is a chance to devote one's days to a particular goal.  I love this ... but there are also drawbacks.

One cannot just "switch gears" and work on something else.  Focus is great!  Productivity is wonderful!  Dedicated time is amazing!  It just doesn't always allow for new hair-brained ideas to roll into reality.  As ideas bubbled to the surface, I could only write them down ... save them for the future.  Over the weekend, I planned to let this happen.  I planned to start working on three new ideas for my upcoming group exhibition called Alternative Storytellers.  I was bursting with ideas about Hansel & Gretel's witch, King Midas' fictional cousin, and Snow White's nightlife.  I'd been thinking about these ideas for WEEKS.

(Above:  Pandora's Box, antique chest collaged with my childhood postage stamp collection and the framed "alternative" story with a feminist twist.  Framed work: 28" x 19 1/2"; unframed: 23" x 15".  Collaged letters clipped from vintage ephemera on faux-finished watercolor paper.)

Yet, something happened with my careful planning.  Another alternative story popped up on Friday night with the purchase of a small, antique chest filled with turn-of-the-last-century photographs.  I bought them for the photographs but unexpectedly found instant inspiration in the chest ... Pandora's Box!  All earlier ideas are still "on hold" but I will get to them!

Even with so many other ideas brewing in my head, I couldn't help myself.  I knew exactly what I wanted to do and say through this old chest.  I sanded all the wooden surfaces, got out my childhood stamp album, and loved every minute of the transformation.  My husband Steve watched in horror and fascination. As a kid, he collected stamps too ... and wasn't about to let me touch his album or the one he inherited from his Dad.

We talked about the lazy weekend days adhering little, gummed hinges to the reverse of canceled postage stamps.  Steve daydreamed about finding a rare, Inverted Jenny, the 1918 mint accident that depicted an upside down Curtiss JN-4 airplane.  He hoped his collection would become valuable.  I never thought about money when pasting my collection into the album.  I dreamed about all the pretty pictures and hoped to have at least one stamp from every country.  I wanted to fill the pages.  I liked the colors and the idea of touching a piece of paper that had traveled to a faraway place before I was born.  So, for me, dismantling that album into an artwork seemed appropriate and wonderful and a way for my stamps to continue traveling the world.

(Steve couldn't help himself.  He lent a hand.  He soaked off some of the stamps still attached to corners of envelopes.  He offered advice ... and one day he might decide his stamps will become art too!  I have high hopes because it was so much fun!)
 

Alone, an antique chest covered with old, canceled postage stamps is not necessarily "art" nor does it tell an alternative story. I knew this. So, while collaging the chest, I thought about Pandora and her box.  I thought about all the evils of the world being unleashed.  I thought about the remaining virtue of hope.  I did a little research.  I read plenty of articles that documented translation errors and dual meanings.  Then, I wrote the story!

Here it is:

Pandora's Box

Dear John aka Epimetheus: Foolish Titan of Greek Myth

I know you told me not to open the special box because it would unleash all sorts of evils, but I did! There are now dirty dished in the sink, dust bunnies under the bed, mildew in the shower, and every stitch of clothing needs washed. The evils of a patriarchal society have escaped.  I have taken the box with me and will travel the world spreading awareness of equality. I leave only HOPE behind. Treat her well and she might stay. Since I'm gone, you will tell a different sotry, but this is the TRUTH about my box.

Pandora

I had a wonderful time making this piece and am looking forward to the ideas I put "on hold".  In the meantime, I'm playing catch up with all the custom picture framing work that piled up in my absence during the art residency.  Time away is grand. Time back in my home studio is equally grand.  Focus and exploration are needed in equal measure to keep the creative ball rolling!

The Cocoon, a fiber installation by Susan Lenz

The Cocoon at the Rensing Library

 (Above:  Me stitching inside The Cocoon.  Click on any image to enlarge.)

Last Thursday was a wonderfully exciting day.  Not only was my installation, The Cocoon, already receiving visitors in the Rensing Center Library, but Libby Dallis, a multi-media specialist with SCETV (South Carolina Educational Television) came to interview me on film.  It was quite amazing to see the professional equipment being erected and put into use.

(Above:  Libby Dallis, setting up her equipment.)

Libby had already sent a list of questions.  We talked about my concepts, my TEDx talk that inspired this installation, the SC Arts Commission grant that helped fund the project, and the hopes that The Cocoon will find future venues.

 (Above:  Libby interviewing me inside The Cocoon.)

Libby was quite thorough and spent several hours capturing detail images and watching people view the installation during the evening's reception, including ...

... the children who really did add one of the available yoyo-s to the existing panels.  

 

It is my fond hope that more people will want to share stitches and embellishments to the installation.  Yet, I know that few will actually get to experience The Cocoon in person.  My husband Steve suggested a video.  He even shot one!  CLICK HERE for this You Tube video of The Cocoon!

(Above:  Steven Chapp posing beside his mother's 1948 satin wedding gown.)

One of the best moments of the day was a visit from printmaker Steven Chapp.  Steven donated his mother's incredible satin wedding dress to the installation.

Another special touch was the delectable canapes and deviled eggs served beside colorful flower arrangements.  The Rensing Center's board member Ron Few was in charge of hospitality.  I am so very, very grateful for his time, attention to details, and theatrical arrangements.

(Above:  Staff members/volunteers for the Oconee Cultivation Project viewing The Cocoon.)

On Friday morning, fifteen teenagers from the Oconee Cultivation Project came to the Rensing Center to learn about bees and other pollinators. Before embarking on this activity, they toured The Cocoon.  Because it is a bit tricky to receive permission to photograph and blog/publish images of minors, I took only images of the staff/adults!  (It was easy to ask the parents of the children attending the reception ... but not on a summer camp sort of workshop!)

(Above:  Katrina Black, a Parks & Recreation PhD candidate at Clemson University specializing in youth programming development.)

So ... I couldn't snap pictures of the teenagers but I could capture the dreamy look of one of their supervisors, Katrina Black, who recently became engaged and found the nostalgia of the wedding dress a perfect way to remember her family's sense of "home" and all their marriages!

Shortly after taking this picture, Steve and I had to dismantle The Cocoon.  It took only one-hour-and-fifteen minutes to take down all the panels, fold them over the heavy-duty hangers, walk the hangers to the cargo van, dismantle the pipe structure, and say good-bye.  I'm now back home putting the finishing touches on the final report for the South Carolina Arts Commission's successful grant!  Soon, I'll be working on an exhibition proposal and hoping to erect The Cocoon again!