Virginia Greaves
textile paintings
Hoping for Fat
011 years ago
by Virginia Greaves
in Exhibition
Back when all exhibit notifications were mailed, you knew if a piece was accepted by the size of the envelope — a skinny one was a rejection — a fat one was an acceptance (brimming with forms and instructions). Now we get email — which is faster — but I still think of them as fat or skinny. (An irony given that our culture values skinny over fat — and in this ONE case we hope for fat.)
Yesterday, notifications were scheduled to come out for the International Quilt Festival: World of Beauty show in Houston. Due to technical difficulties, they did not come out until today.
And the news is . . . . . . . . . . . . . One fat — and one skinny.
Worry was accepted.
Golden Moment was not.
Although I’m not sad, I was surprised. This piece recently won first place in an art exhibit.
But hindsight is another matter. I had originally made this piece for the special exhibit It’s Raining Cats and Dogs — also in Houston at the same time as World of Beauty. I have been in this exhibit the last couple of years and was caught by surprise when they added a virgin rule — thereby excluding my entry from consideration (I had already published in process and completion pics of it on my blog when the rules were published). I was sad — but decided that this piece was one of my best ones for the year — and entered it as one of my two into World of Beauty (no virgin rules for this exhibit).
In retrospect, I realize my mistake. Dogs and cats as subject matter would be among the first logical cuts made. As a judge, I realize you wouldn’t want the entries in World of Beauty to compete with the other special exhibit.
Or — I could be completely wrong and it was some other reason entirely. No worries. I’m already planning its entry in another show. Rejection is part of the process.
I did receive the good news lately that I was accepted as a Juried Artist Member (JAM) in Studio Art Quilt Associates (SAQA). After seeing all of the SAQA exhibits at Houston last year, I definitely felt left out. I spent quite a while working on my resume and tracking down details I hadn’t included before (you’ll see a lot more detail on my Resume page now) to finish my application properly. After waiting several months, I was excited to receive my acceptance from Martha Sielman herself.
I continue to work on abstract pieces with Leisa Rich. I’m taking her the draft of the latest piece tomorrow. It’s her birthday and we’re planning to have lunch to celebrate. Good friends — a little art — a little food. What more could you ask for?
Making Friends with Abstract
111 years ago
by Virginia Greaves
in Design
For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been busy working on another piece inspired by a pic taken by Leisa Rich. I know — I haven’t finished the last one — but I wanted something to work on when I handed the other piece off to her. I don’t like to have more than one project open at a time — but in working collaboratively, it just happened.
This one is much bigger — it’s about 42″ wide by 36″ high.
I didn’t take a ton of in process pics. It just doesn’t make as much sense as it does when working in pictorial. I tried to take pics for each color group, but I ran into a problem with that. This piece was pinned on my drafting table with the ironing pad. I pinned it there so it wouldn’t shift around. I couldn’t construct this piece in sections — the entire piece had to fit together like a puzzle. However, it’s so large, if I stood on a chair and took a picture of the top, I couldn’t get the entire piece in the frame and everything would be skewed. Therefore, I took a lot of pics, many of which were terrible — and I got to be friends with the Delete All option on my camera. Unfortunately, in doing that, I inadvertently deleted an all yellow and all red pic that I had taken and planned to use. C’est la vie.
That yellow with the pink is really horrid. I think that this was the worst stage — with all the hot colors and none of the cool colors (there was a little bit of purple and green but not enough to balance the hot).
Then I started adding the blues. It made a world of difference. Adding the cold colors gave life to the hot colors. I also needed the intensity of a deeper value. That comes in the dark blue — and then ultimately in the black.
I took this picture while it was tilted on the table. For the previous picture, I had unpinned it from the table and set it vertically on the design wall for a good pic. Unfortunately, it shifted everything around in my puzzle — so I wasn’t going to do that again until the end.
And here is the final pic of the top — vertical on the design wall — with all of that deep black.
I am very fond of this piece. I am using the skills that I learned in making pictorials but applying them to abstract design. 
Lessons Learned with Bleeding Fabrics
011 years ago
by Virginia Greaves
in Dyeing
This week I pulled out the huge enameled pot that someone gave me to dye polyester fabric in some time ago (someone gave me bolts of the stuff — still don’t know what to do with it) — and I started an experiment on some of my reds. I knew that several of them have been crocking in my finished quilts and I was on a mission to stop it.
I should start by saying that I pre-wash — I bring my fabric home and throw them in the washing machine, set it to hot water, and add blue Dawn which has synthrapol in it — which will pull out excess dye molecules that may be present in the cloth but that haven’t bonded with the cotton.
So all of these reds, at one time or another, had gone through the pre-washing with hot water and synthrapol — but I had read a blog saying that you could take a crocked quilt and soak it in boiling water to fix it so I decided to try this with the fabric.
I pulled the darker reds for the piece I’m currently working on. (At this point in the week, I was still cutting yellows.) I boiled water in my massive pot and then added some blue Dawn. Once it was at a roiling boil, I added my first suspect. Immediately, the water turned wine red.
This was definitely the guilty party in several of my pieces. I boiled it for a few minutes and then set it aside to cool. When it was room temperature, I poured out the water and rinsed the fabric.
Here was the surprise — it almost immediately ran clear. I rinsed it thoroughly — even put it in more water to sit for a while — but all of the excess dye was now gone.
I did this same process with two other reds. One of them wasn’t bad — it ran a little in the beginning — the other ran a lot. Not surprisingly, the two that ran a lot were ones that I had dyed myself years ago — although in my defense, I definitely have some commercial prints in my stash that are also bleeding.
The result of this batch was the same as the first. After boiling and then cooling, the water ran clear.
The only difference between this process and what I’m doing in the washing machine is the temperature of the water. I could jack up the temperature on the water heater — but I risk boiling an innocent victim in the house. I don’t think that all fabrics need this extreme care, but there are definitely some that do. I’ll have to think on how to best identify which is which when I bring them home — maybe put a swatch in water after the washing machine cycle.
I also found the infamous bleeding green fabric in my stash this week. I thought I had thrown it away. I had bought it years ago in Florida and it runs like crazy so I vowed to never use. At the time, I washed it many times, and although the color faded, it never stopped bleeding. Now I’ll just boil it. I’m sure that’ll fix it.
Tweek!
011 years ago
by Virginia Greaves
in Twitter
I did not post a Tweek last Sunday — I had had a long day entertaining and then spent three hours painting my daughter’s room. I was just too tired — so this post covers the last two weeks.
What else have I been up to? It’s summertime and the living is easy. I am not quite up to my usual studio speed but I do have more time than I’ve had in previous years. I’ve found that my teenager sleeps all morning so if I can get myself in gear, I can pack a couple of hours in.
I have been expanding on my car wash series collaboration with Leisa Rich and set her up a couple of days ago as my first contributing author on the blog. We met earlier this week to discuss what to do with the first piece — but I admit I’ve already put my attention into another piece — a bigger one. I’m almost done with the drafting. Hopefully I’ll have some pictures up on the blog by next week.
These are my tweets for the last couple of weeks. If you would rather follow me in real time, I’m @vsgreaves. I have several social media icons in the upper right above the menu.
Although leasing work is probably not a good consideration for textile work (given its added limitations on exposure to direct light and its ability to absorb smells), I found this article about leasing artwork to be a great marketing idea for most artists.
Have You Considered Leasing Your Artwork? – http://www.artsyshark.com/2014/06/12/leasing-artwork/ …
Wise words of Winkleman — he always has a pulse on the art world. As an MBA graduate, I was fascinated by his analysis of why the art market is an exception to many economic principles.
“Applying the Rules of all Markets to Art” Why economic principles don’t apply to the art market & unethical flipping http://feedly.com/e/JQarmMqG
I found this court case to be disturbing. Although it is wonderful that there will be more books digitized for the blind, I find it unconscionable that a judge would take away the rights of the authors as to whether or not their work would be digitized (and thus its subsequent inevitable pirating).
“Digitized Books for Disabled Don’t Need Authors’ OK – Bloomberg” Good for disabled — bad for authors. http://feedly.com/k/1pYwO8S
Another author making a case for doing work and not waiting for inspiration to strike.
“Don’t Waste Your Time on Inspiration” http://feedly.com/e/Msi0Qdk1
It’s not often that I find a fiber artist highlighted on My Modern Met. Ana Teresa Barboza’s work is striking. I love the one of the fiber lion placing the drawn woman’s head in his mouth.
Inspiration: “Artist Uses Colorful Embroidery to Explore Natural Forms” http://tinyurl.com/ka9rzr3 via @mymodernmet
I don’t usually refer people to music videos, but this one certainly qualifies as performance art.
This is genius performance art — check out OK Go’s new music video: http://tinyurl.com/lhaaolb @Colossal
I was fascinated by this article about Gauguin and that he often painted still lifes to bring home the bacon.
Even Gauguin needed to pay the bills. “Previously Unknown Gauguin Reveals a Lot About the Artist” http://feedly.com/e/NNfApeXh
This is Leisa Rich’s article on my blog about our collaboration. I’ve added a feed from my blog to Twitter. It occurred to me that I routinely tweet articles that I’ve read, but I haven’t been tweeting about my own work. It’s ironic that my first syndicated post is not written by me.
Ruminations on Collaboration http://wp.me/paQW6-1tC
Famed designer Massimo Vignelli who passed recently put forth the idea that all creatives need vision, courage, and determination to be successful.
“Massimo Vignelli: The 3 Traits of Great Creatives” Vision, courage, & determination. http://feedly.com/e/ofnU8ehr
Ruminations on Collaboration
011 years ago
by Leisa Rich
in Collaboration
It’s been so wonderful embarking on this creative adventure with Ginny! Collaborations stretch individuals in a variety of different ways. I also feel like I am making a new friend…and one can never have too many of those. Especially artists. We face a lot of rejection and need others to frequently bolster our self-esteem and pat us on the back!
Specifically for me, it will be a great lesson in getting better at sharing. Ginny has such great ideas and mad technical skill; I have much to learn from her dedication, sense of direction and focus. I am a strong-willed artist used to working mostly on my own, with a great passion and excitement about what I do, so giving up control for someone else’s idea, and staying focussed on ONE idea, can be a challenge for me. Ginny has expressed the scariness of tackling the larger format and abstract nature of my car wash photos we are using as a departure for the concept, so that will be the hurdle she will overcome through this process. We will both surely grow from this experience!
As we pass these pieces back and forth and engage in creative conversations about them, we will both have to think in new ways. I hope you, the readers, will gain something from our experience!
Struggling with Abstract
011 years ago
This week I met Leisa Rich at Abernathy Arts Center. We picked up our work from the Georgia Artists show that closed last week and spent about an hour talking about our abstract piece. She has added a bunch of stitching and it looks amazing.
I love the vinyl on the piece — it makes it look a lot like water. She took these pictures. I admit to having a problem photographing it. The vinyl is very reflective and cannot take direct light. But I was so pleased at the different life that it has now taken on.
These are detail pics.
I can’t get over how much its character has changed. I love it so much more than what I would have done with it.
She handed the piece back to me and we talked about what to do next with it. We’re considering making a larger but more realistic piece that this would fit into — but I’m having a problem working out value problems. There is so much huge contrast in this section that it’s difficult to resolve the focal point issue with the entire piece. Obviously the focal point should be the abstract. I’m still working out in my head how to accomplish that in light of this other idea.
And while I was waiting on Leisa to do her part last weekend, I started another abstract piece — a much larger one — and to be honest, I’m struggling. I can’t rely on my usual practice of logic to determine where colors go. I usually have no problems turning my value studies into colors — but that system doesn’t work very well here. It was an issue with the small piece, but I was able to work around it. It’s harder to do in a piece 45″ wide.
I’m telling myself that there are no wrong answers. It can be whatever I want it to be.
Right now I’m marking all of the sections on my pattern with colors. I’ll hopefully finish that later today so I can move on to picking fabrics. Maybe I’ll even come up with an excuse to take a trip to Red Hen!
And let’s face it — it’s summer. There are numerous distractions to take me from something that isn’t holding my attention very well. Even in art we have to slog through difficult tasks sometimes.
One last thing — Leisa has asked if she can be a guest writer on this blog to which I happily agreed. Given that our work is a collaboration, I definitely think that her point of view should be shown as well. I’m looking forward to having her contribution.