Posts tagged SAQA

Closure and Grace

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Yvonne in the GardenI have completed Yvonne in the Garden. She was surprisingly easy to do. I’ve reached a point where portraits are not difficult constructions for me. Giving the piece deeper meaning is more difficult, however, than the technical skill required to create a portrait. For Yvonne, after her portrait was completed, I was tasked with putting her in a space that was hers. To anyone familiar with her work, I have hopefully succeeded by drawing on the inspiration of her work. For Yvonne, red was a neutral so it was an obvious choice. She loved hot colors. When I didn’t have enough of the right red, I just supplemented with purple — which I think was actually pretty close to what Yvonne would do. I then freehand drew out her name and flowers and a few stars to give the feeling of her inhabiting one of her own pieces. Since her passing, I think she would be happy existing in a realm of her own imagination.

I currently have two pieces hanging at the Abernathy Arts Center in Sandy Springs, GA through June 17th — both The Canary and The Last Supper. The reception was more fun than I’ve had in ages. I believe I was the only fiber artist in the show, but I had a very warm reception from the other artists and a lot of interest in my subjects. I’m finding that putting clues in my work is definitely a successful way of drawing interest in a piece. The gallery was packed that night, and I was surprised there weren’t more people that approached me regarding my self-portrait, but later in the evening, as the crowd thinned, I had more people recognize me from my work.

And now here we are at summer. I think I counted 10 or 12 pieces that I’ve done in the last year which is double what I usually do. At this point, I’m entering shows — 3 on Sunday and a couple more to come in the next month. I think I’m going to take a breath now and consider my next piece. DD2 came home last night with a very large raven painting that she did in school, and it calls to me. I’ve always loved the grace of ravens.

Tweek!

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twitter.jpgAnother week in May. My mom was visiting last weekend and stayed through Tuesday — so I didn’t make my weekly goal of studio time. Always depressing — but sometimes life gets in the way. Hopefully, I will finish my small still life this coming week. I shared a pre-quilting shot of it on my Facebook Page a couple of days ago.

This is my weekly Twitter round up. If you want to follow me in real time, I’m @vsgreaves. You can also find me online through my social media icons in the upper right above the menu.

My first Tweet is about a couple that bought a warehouse in DC & decided to rent out space in it to artists for insanely low rents in the name of culture and small business growth.
“Off the Beaten Track provides affordable work space for D.C. artists”
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Edward Winkleman gives another delightful read — a review after a Christie’s auction. No one is more painfully honest about the art scene in New York.
“Post-Incipient-Vomiting (or, An Analytical Look at “If I Live I’ll See You Tuesday”)” — Artists as brands.

I’ve been told that this has already happened. I suppose once people figured out how to make money on the internet, it was only a matter of time until people developed speed lanes for the giants of industry.
Really really bad changes threaten to put your Internet in the
. Say no at (via )

Studio Art Quilt Associates (SAQA) is a professional textile artists group that has recently opened a new exhibit called Earth Stories at the Michigan State University Museum. I have several Facebook friends with pieces in the exhibit who, once the exhibit opened, were able to share how their pieces were created. It’s an extremely inspiring exhibit — not just on the theme of Earth Stories — but on the incredibly high professional talent in the world of textile art today.
SAQA’s Earth Stories exhibit opening Friday MSU Museum — incredible textile works.

A short article by 99U — but it covers the basics about the importance of starting and continuing.
“Vincent van Gogh & the Importance of Doing” Perserverance pays off — get to work!

Having spent a portion of my childhood as a people pleaser, I found Anne Lamott’s words really resonate with me. She also addresses the evils of perfectionism, another of my early faults that I thankfully excommunicated (having children really killed any remaining piece of that I still carried in my personality). “Shoot the moon.” I plan to get a copy of this book soon.
The Definitive Manifesto for Handling Haters:Anne Lamott on Priorities &How We Keep Ourselves Small by PeoplePleasing

Like many nuggets from Brain Pickings, I was unaware that anyone had ever declined the National Medal of Arts. I found Adrienne Rich’s letter to Bill Clinton interesting. I had a friend tell me that I have truly missed out by not reading her poetry — which I hope to rectify soon.
RT @brainpicker: Why Adrienne Rich, born 85 years ago today, became the only person to decline the prestigious National Medal of Arts

Not to get too political — but I did tweet this link about a Christian woman from Sudan who married a Christian and became pregnant. Because of Sharia law, she is considered Muslim because her father was, and so her marriage isn’t recognized — and after the birth and weaning of her child, she will be given 100 lashes and then  death — unless she recants her Christian beliefs. (There is disagreement about her degree of Christianity — but I’ll let you read the article and draw your own conclusions.)

This is a video about a man who went into the profession of a courtroom sketch artist — and how technology has made his skills increasingly obsolete. It is fascinating to consider the opportunity for an artist to make a living wage — and crushing to see it taken away and the artist morph into a security guard in order to pay his bills.
Watch: The Rise and Fall of a Courtroom Sketch Artist
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Irish artist Brian Maguire traveled to Juarez, Mexico and spent four years documenting some of the 1,400 women killed and lost in this area of Mexico. We like to think that this is a remote problem that doesn’t concern us — but I live in Atlanta and it has become a weekly occurrence for teenage girls to disappear into sex trafficking in our city. Maybe it takes the resounding drum of artists to give faces to the missing and exploited.
“Art from Anger: Portraits of Ciudad Juarez’s Lost Women” The importance of social justice art.

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