thoughts of a wandering mind

dappled light, cool morning air

high on the ladder, red pail hanging by its handle, I'm hidden in a swathe of green and red

thunk, thunk, thunk, into the pail the handfuls of cherries go

the methodical repetition of picking them allows my thoughts to wander to the small room on the top floor where creativity happens...

in my mind I gather fine Japanese papers, vintage linen, threads in shades of blue/grey, white and off-white and drawing/painting supplies... looking and considering, laying a few of each aside to begin

twenty minutes later, at the potting bench, the cherries now in a large bowl, the sorting begins... good ones here, the rest there

here, my mind wanders again, now experimenting with printing on the papers... first digitally using edited photographs, then mono- and gelli-plate printing... ice lines flowing across the pages in silver or grey

inside now, standing at the kitchen sink - washed cherries to the left, a parchment-paper lined sheet pan to my right

pulling the cherries apart with my thumb, removing the pits. checking for worms (I found 9, in 175+/- cups of sweet and tart cherries)

at the same time,  the work upstairs has progressed, painted and printed papers depicting the frozen ice that lay along and partially over the Yukon River were being combined in various ways, here and there with added stitching or drawn marks... the work was absorbing and experimental, I was very much in a "flow" state of mind

as the last pan of cherries slid onto a shelf in the freezer, the images of creativity faded away, replaced by the hum of the refrigerator as I closed the door

it was wonderful while it lasted...

the next day, with a few free hours ahead of me I stepped into that same room and all of the inspiration I had been previously flooded with fell away, dropping at my feet as swiftly as the few errant cherries that had escaped my grasp the day before

I've had this happen to me time and again but on this occasion I was ready - all the work I had done ten days before to print photos, make notes, organize my thoughts - all of that was all recorded in my sketchbook, just waiting for me to finally show up

flipping to the pages where I had jotted down ideas of ways to depict the ice lines, I quickly settled on one close to the top of the list

expanding on the kintsugi-style trials I was doing on paper in the Spring, I wanted to try the same thing with silver leaf to portray the wind-blown lines of snow and ice

choosing a piece of drawing paper previously painted with a pale blue-grey ink, I began

silver leaf

building up the lines by adding more and more layers of the medium as each dried, eventually I had achieved a certain degree of relief that felt correct and as soon as it had dried enough I applied the silver leaf

next was to cover that with the specialty sizing that would allow me to add paint - this in an effort to break up the lines of silver somewhat and bring in the sense of crusted snow and ice

the photo makes the lines look very dark - in reality they are mostly a fairly flat silver though I took care not to put the sizing on all of it, wanting some of the brighter silver to shine through

with the sizing medium

next was to start adding colour over top of the silver in a stippling effect, using white and light grey

that took a lot of trial and error, first to find the right paint, and then the right brush

I finally settled on matte acrylic paints in white and black and a small, scratty brush, bristles somewhat stiff from being used as a glue brush over time and also from being cut into to create an uneven edge to it

first I stippled light grey here and there on the silver leaf lines followed by white - once that was done I added a few light grey stippled areas here and there between the lines, looking for a rough ice surface effect

with dry and white paint on the lines and in-between

I was beginning to feel somewhat pleased with the overall effect though it did seem rather "neat and tidy" so I decided to add one more layer

a fine white stipple over much of the ice area, crossing over the ice lines, overtop of the light grey already there - just a random pouncing of the brush with the barest bit of white paint

low exposure

I played with the exposure setting when photographing this stage in order to show the white stippling done at the end - it seems to be rather effective at bringing the piece to life

below is a high exposure photo which is probably a bit closer to the true value of the actual piece than the one above

so... I think next I'll print each of these last two images on a piece of fine Japanese paper and then have a think about what to do with them

I may not exactly remember all I made whilst up in that cherry tree, nor during the processing afterwards but it fed the creative spark, got me to just show up when I did have the time, and my previous planning helped me to get moving when I began to flounder

this small exercise in creative experimentation has given me a great big creative boost but the funny thing about it was... whilst working on the ice lines I was thinking of making cherry pies!

caught in the ice...

wandering in to the studio late one afternoon just over a week ago, wondering what I could do with the free hour I had... looking through a few things on my worktable but nothing clamoured for my attention

 by the time I finally chose something almost half of the hour was gone

feeling frustration starting to rise at the time wasted I thought back to a day not long before I went to the Yukon in May, when I had settled on re-visiting my work on the Yukon River and developing some new pieces

to the storage drawer I went, pulling out a few pocket folders and zippered storage cases filled with cloth and paper samples and snippets

within a few minutes I had sorted out everything that had to do with the ice lines I was exploring early in the year and decided to begin there

that evening I looked through the photographs I had taken on the day I first noticed the ice formation, set up a "River Ice" folder in iPhoto and transferred them all there

the next time I was between chores (staining the patio and/or picking cherries) I played with a few simple photo edits and then printed out ten favourites to work with

this past week I cut out the photos in preparation for drawings and a bit of mark-making, cut up some drawing paper and generally got organized for that

once that was all sorted I turned to the stitch samples in progress, thinking about which ones still capture my interest, what just needs to be finished and which ones provide enough information as they are and can simply be mounted in the sketchbook as a reference

to be sure I run the risk of making this all about getting organized - its an old trick of mine, used to dodge doing the riskier stuff like actually drawing, or starting a piece of work

to snap myself away from that I picked up a piece of linen I had done machine stitch writing on... it was from several years ago, a discard from a previous work

hmmm....

it was triangular in shape with a wobbled curve edge

a few seconds later there were three wobbled-edge strips - layered, they reminded me of the ice, the rough texture of it, the repetition of line

next is to add a few stitches along the raw edges

the idea of stitching words on the cloth with the machine holds more promise I think, and a few variations on the theme have already come to mind

jotting things down in the notebook I set up (like a bullet journal, with numbered pages and categories) will not only keep me from forgetting any random ideas that wander through my mind,  but will be a quick stop to find something to work on in those short periods of time available to me during this very busy month

it's all about cherries for the next while...

leading the way

scrolling through instagram the other night, looking at a few new-to-me feeds, I remembered something I read a while back...

"notice what you are noticing"

what I was noticing on that evening in particular was the beautiful work I was seeing in a few different disciplines, most especially pottery and weaving,  that had me entranced

there was an overwhelming simplicity to it; seemingly plain at first glance but with a complexity in texture and materials that I found profoundly beautiful

and I wanted that for my work

in looking and thinking it dawned on me that I could have it, in all the techniques I use, by keeping in mind the one single overriding aspect I saw in all the pieces I had looked at that night

the materials led the way

if every single thing I do follows that tenet I should be able to achieve work that would make my heart sing

immediately a small hank of old rope I had found on the shores of the Yukon River near The Ways in Whitehorse came to mind...

I dug it out and laid it on a piece of plank driftwood 

I had washed the dirt from it on arriving home, revealing a beautiful woven chevron-type pattern laid over a 3/4" thick core

I'm not sure if this would have come from one of the old riverboats, they last ran in the 1950s, but the icy cold waters preserve all manner of things that in warmer climes would have long since rotted away so perhaps it is

regardless of it's original purpose, it now resides on my desk, on it's board, to serve as a visual reminder that it's the materials I need to look to when finding my way

I've always thought of myself as a "process" person but this latest realization has shown me that its the materials that need to take the lead 

and if needed, the process will have to be the one to bend