twice in my artistic journey I've been overwhelmingly captivated by something I've seen whilst out in nature
something that inspires me so greatly it grabs hold of my creative thinking and refuses to let go
the first, a frigid early spring morning, a few days after a wind storm blew through our town
branches yanked from nearby trees lay strewn over the lakeshore, many frozen in place, caught in the shore ice that melted and re-formed daily as part spring's fickle rhythm
the second time was a phenomenon also caused by wind - the icy windrows that formed on the surface of the shore ice of the Yukon River during an extremely windy snowstorm
over the years I have worked with both of these events though the windrows along the Yukon River continue to hold my attention two years later
in part because there is so much I want to explore and so many mediums I'd like to do that in
and then there's the growing pile of already begun explorations that need finishing
this week I finally faced the one I began with... it has sat for almost two years now, an overwhelming fear of messing it up holding me back
I was so pleased with the effect of the addition of tiny textural stitches scattered here and there near the main lines that ran from one side of the cloth to the other and though it was going well and with each area completed my delight grew and grew I was still sure eventually I would do something irrevocable that ruin the work entirely
and so it sat
this week I finally got fed up with the silliness of it all, picked it up and finished the rest of the textured stitching over the course of the next two evenings
I want to finish it as a pouch, but as this was meant to be a sample for my sketchbook the fabric is rather small
a strip of ink dipped linen, also from two years ago has been attached to the lower edge and solved the size issue nicely... I have just a few last stitches to add along the edge and I'll be able to bring this to completion
finally
interestingly, the more I turned over the work to secure the thread the more I came to like the stitching on the reverse... it was a constant effort whilst doing the stitching of the ice lines to keep a random, irregular look to them which I never really did achieve
but on the wrong side it looks exactly like what I had wanted
there are one or two more iterations of this in my future, and with at least the first one I'll be working the stitching from back to front
and both will be made a good deal bigger
now that I'm pushing myself through my ever-present fear of messing things up perhaps I can make some headway in breaking my habit of always working too small
Take care,
Jillayne
2 comments:
So often it seems to me our brains and thoughts can be our art's worst enemies. Coming to understand what fear does, what perfection does, what the little shadow on our shoulder telling us we are sure to stuff it up does, can only help to move past them. I think acknowledging it and deciding to go forward with the work is a great result. As is the result of the work. You went nowhere near stuffing it up! It is so good and so right and the addition of the linen at the bottom is spot on. Have fun working wrong side and right side next time.
It's tempting to just say you need to trust yourself more, but that's harder to do than it is to say. Maybe what I can say is that now you have come back to it, found it still pleasing, and not only completed it, but found it giving you ideas for more, you can believe in the instinct that lead you to create it!
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