More from the World of Threads

 

 

I have shown you my two pieces from The World of Threads Festival. Here are some more. I managed to make my opening and went again with friends to see alot of the work in Oakville. We didn't venture into Toronto. It was all I could do to visit all the sights in Oakville. Every time I got out of the car, I got dizzy. not sure if that is the chemo or what.

 

One of my favourite Canadian artist Alice Vander Veenen. I connect to her canoe imagery and like her use of mixed media

 

There were four tapestries by Peruvian weaver Maximo Laura. Spectacular pieces with alot of 3D elements.

Another favourite is Leisa Rich, a Canadian by birth but now living in the US.

 

This one was hysterical, an animated piece..she just kept knitting and knitting. By Liz Ashton

 

Etching and French Knots by Liz Menard

 

Felting by Majolein Dallinga. I love her pieces in her interview page for The World Of Threads Festival. Large pieces set in the woods.

 

The next two pieces are by Emily Jan, my choice is the delicate deer. The Rhino was made of old lace and doilies.

 

Another felter was Jodi Collea, she was the favourite my friend Christine.

 

There were  six locations in Oakville, so this is just a sampling. Looking forward to next year.

 As I continue my chemo I find myself living vicariously through others. In this case my sister just returned from a trip to India, where she met up with her husband who was coming from Africa. Wow, I can only imagine. She sent a few shots, my favourite one is the picture of parasols. I'm attracted to colour so you can see why I'm attracted to these photos.

 

 

 

 

 

 

They made a stop at a jeweler's shop in Jaipur, can't imagine the weight of the piece my sister is wearing. Love to see them in the rest of the outfit.

 

 

 

Then for a change in scenery they returned to Canada and visited Dave's daughter and son in law in B.C. Here's a picture from Whistler. Talk about a switch.

 

 

Old Friends

On Monday of this week I had to deliver my pieces for The World of Threads Festival, which opens tomorrow night. Due to my chemo treatments a gracious friend drove me down and back. We decided to make a day of it and we made plans to have lunch with my sister and some old friends from college days. It was a boisterous group of six women, all very creative. As one friend said,"gee if we could harness all the creativeity at this table, WOW!"



Pat Hertzberg Fibre Artist



Linda Lundstrom Fashion Designer

Wendy Orr Fine Artist

 

 

 

We were also joined by my sister who is the Director of Urban Planning for the city of Mississuaga as well as our 2nd year pattern making teacher "Mrs. B". Really Margaret Broadhurst, but after another college friend  got only a B+, rather then his usual A, he started calling her Mrs. B+. It just got shortened to "Mrs. B" and I"ve never been able to call her anything else. A delightful warm and caring friend.

 

After lunch Pat gave us a tour of her studio space at the Living Arts Centre. She too has work in The Festival of Threads, which is how I managed to find her after so many years.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The World of Threads Festival is opening on November 2nd ,in Oakville, Ontraio, Canada  and I have these two pieces in one of several exhibitions. I'm excited yet  humbled with the company I"m keeping.

 

 

 

"Sentinel" is a mixed media piece consisting of an old cage, branches, shoe lasts and a stuffed torso with drawings of birds on the coffee stained muslin. The head is fabric feathers over a clay head. And yes, there is a bird nest with eggs on the inside.

 

 

Guradian #2 is a birch bark corset sewn on industrial felt with organza and velvet trim. The bark came from my cottage in Haliburton where the beavers have felled trees for the small branches and left the rest to rot. So no trees were harmed on this project. I simply shook out the rotten insides, slit and soaked the bark.

 

 

 

An old friend from college days also has a piece in. This is Pat Hertzberg's portrait of Hazel McCallion, Mayor of Mississauga, Ontario. She is a fiesty 90+ lady who still straps on her skates in the wintertime. she also used to play women's hockey when she was young. Quite the character.

 

 

 

 

Now can someone explain to me why I can't centre this photo.

This is week 3 of Stratofrd summer Music and the introduction of the pianos for "Play Me I''m Yours", My piano is 3rd from the end and will be on the main block of the main street.

Several local artists were asked to paint a donated piano for the event. Friend, Erik Sansom was resoponsible for getting us together. His is the last piano, the sunny yellow one. It was a fun project although it was cut short for my by my stay in hospital.

It's been ages since I have made a blog entry, sometimes life hands you a few curve balls and this was one of them. I went into hospital for a routine colonoscopy and when I came to the Dr. informed me I wasn't going anywhere. The next day I had surgery to remove a walnut size tumor and about 1 ft of colon. they had hoped to just reattach me but I ended up with a bag for 5 weeks. The whole experience was full of disasters from beginning to end. After 5 weeks I was reatatched,YEAH! 2 surgeries in 5 weeks was a bit much and I"m still recouperating. At the end of the month I have to go to the cancer clinic for chemo. A precautionary mesure apparently.

In between the 2 sugeries was the encaustic show I was doing with Anna Koot and Wendy Orr. Having missed a few weeks of productivity it wasn't until the last week that I found the energy to finish off some but not all of my pieces. I had to give up on 2 of them. Here are some of my pieces from the exhibit.

Rusty Gate

White Birch

Old Staircase

Ancestors

Chinese Lanterns

The opening of the exhibit was at the same time as the opening of the Blyth theatre's summer season. the opening show was called "Dear John Deere" a Canadian play for sure, something that Blyth does so well. When we got ther , a parade of old tractors was coming done the street to celebrate the opening. The theatre and the gallery are both in the old opera house, you can just get a bit of it in the last photo.. It was great fun finished off with a great meal at the Blyth Inn. It looks like an old local hotel/bar, not known for it's decor but the food is fantastic. It was made all the better by the friends and family that joined us for the evening.

Tractor parade down the main street

Parking the tractors

SOLD

Well I"m a happy camper today. Last night at the Gallery 96 opening of "Curent Sea : Currency" I sold two of the three pieces I did for the show. There was only one other piece sold. If you look a little farther down the blog you will see the two pieces....both Tidal Pools. Unfortunately the acrylic box for the third one did not arrive despite UPS promise of 2-3 days. Might have sold that one too.  It's a sculptural piece and is sitting on  a plinth, sans box. I don't want to say too much in case I jinx things , but that is good news two days in a row. Yeah!

Now I just have to wait to see about Art in the Park.

World of Threads Festival

I just got notice that two of my pieces have been accepted into the World of threads Festival in Oakville later this year. I'm really pleased as this is an international show.

Felting

I'm working on my application to Art in the Park, Stratford. I was a member a few years back but had to give it up due to neck paint. I want to try it again with my needle felting. It should be easier, smaller display unit to haul around, smaller pieces of artwork. Cross your fingers. Her is a piece I did for my sister at Christmas. She just got it framed and is going to put it on her office wall, which I gather is red.Rather a large piece. but I intend to do more of my usuall smaller pieces and have a few of my3D pieces to view as well. The smaller pieces are a good price point and easy for tourists to pack, so I'm hoping sales will be good dispite the poor economy.

Shoes, shoes and more shoes

Loved the window display on the left. Looks like it was made out of mylar.

About once a year my sister and I manage a girl's weekend, no men, no kids. This was the weekend. Started off Friday evening with lots of chatter our favourite family or d'ouveres and the movie , "The Help". Great movie by the way.

Saturday we went to the Bata shoe Museum in Toronto. It was started by the Canadian Bata Shoe family. Mrs. Bata collected shoes from all over the world and from different eras in history. They are all housed here .

Guess what these ones were used for? Give up? Crushing chestnuts, like to see them in action.

Don't know how you take a step in these Chinese Dragon slippers.
Then there are these great wooden ones by artist Garry Greenwood. Loved these.

Here are a pair by Andre Perugia in the current display of shoes from the 1920's.


Here are another pair I could't walk in without spraining my ankle, which I've done recently and without the aid of stilts. These are Turkish, guess they keep your feet out of the muck.

These are a pair owned by Canadian Author Margaret Atwood. I'm always partial to anything with peacock feathers. Ms. Atwood obviously has tiny feet.

I could go on and on, but you get the idea. Fantastic to go visit. The displays have lots of explanation and are well set up.

The weekend continued on with lunch in Yorkville and a trip to Whole Foods. Now that was an eye opener for me, never been to one before. We were there to get raw organic food for one of my nephews who has gone raw vegan....just watch the grocery bill grow. We also picked up some food treats for our dinner and for the next day.

Sunday we spent working on encaustic painting. I had brought my supplies down so we could play. Although mine was serious play as we have that exhibit coming up in a couple of months. This is the first realy large one and it isn't going to be easy. More on that later.


Monday was back to Stratford with a stop at Curry's to buy art supplies for the artists in Haiti. My son's girlfriend's family go several times a year to help in Limbe  and surrounding area. Gallery 96, the co-op I belonge to donated a nice sum of money to purchase art supplies for Haitian artists . More on that when they return.