The job of little girls. Figuring things out.

This week my mind has been filled with images and thoughts of little girls.

In my studio, I am slowly working my way through a large work that places two little girls in an environment that’s like a dream or memory: windows, doors, archways  and buildings connect with one another in ways that that could not actually occur. The girls are in a place where they must figure things out.

At the same time, since I’m enjoying more reading than normal as part of my stay-at-home-experience, I have read two thought-provoking and stirring accounts of real little girls.

“Becoming,” Michele Obama’s memoir, is warm and rich in details and experience. A lot of the story focuses on her pre-famous days as a girl growing up in Chicago. Clearly, she was smarter than the average kid. Not crazy-genius smart, but smart. And competitive, and motivated, and – increasingly as she grew – capable. She grew in an environment where love and support and nurturing were poured into her with abundance, and she gratefully accepted all of it. A strong and devoted chorus of voices told her: You are important. You can do it.

As an adult, she was able to look back and see how that formed who she is and formed in her the desire for the same opportunities for all little girls.

“I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings,” Maya Angelou’s memoir of her life up to aged sixteen, is a book I had read many years ago. It leapt off the bookshelf in a recent trip to our local used bookstore, an invitation to discover it again. What a wonder! Her story has so much to absorb.

Maya’s childhood was one of being thrown out into the world to make the best of it if she could. The chorus of voices she heard most loudly was telling her that she was not important and not anybody special. Somehow she discovered a love for books. That opened up worlds for her. She began the process of figuring things out and discovering her voice.

So, I’ve been thinking about little girls.

The two girls who inhabit my new (work-in-progress) art quilt are based on a family photo of myself and my sister when I was three and she was four. As the work progresses, I’ve been looking at them a lot. They have evolved.

(Just this week, when I thought that portion of the work was done, I collaged over the girls and changed them around). I repositioned their bodies and redid the drawing and shading.

Most of what’s left in this work will involve adding layers and depth in the environment that surrounds them. I’m working slower than usual and giving it time. I want to hear what the chorus of voices behind these two is saying. I’m still figuring it out.

Thank you for reading. I always enjoy questions and comments.
--Bobbi
bobbi@bobbibaughstudio.com

BLOG POSTS: If you would enjoy receiving blog posts by e-mail,  please subscribe here:  I post blogs once a week. BLOGS-BY-EMAIL

NEWSLETTER: If you enjoy more detailed behind-the-scenes stories, as well as FIRST LOOKS at new works and members-only discounts, I hope you’ll become a Studio Insider.  You’ll hear from me about once a month.  NEWSLETTER

---

1 - 2 - 3 - 4 Collage-in-progress

Time for a little collage!

This is a festival-prep week for me. I will be in DeLand’s Fall Festival of the Arts this weekend. At my last Festival I was very happy to have a good response to the small, matted collaged pieces I was showing. So, I need more. (What a wonderful problem to have!) Since I will be showing a few large storytelling quilts in DeLand, I want the smaller works I show to be compatible, to look like part of a unified body of work. I have already created some photo transfers that I like. Now it’s time to put them together.

Starting with two elements

The window will be the dominant element in this work. It takes up a good deal of the space. So, the image will actually be about the window. Everything else is to accent the window and tie things together. Here, I’m collaging the window onto watercolor paper with matte medium. The blue transparent fabric on the left softens the image and implies water.

I use a brayer to get a good bond. The background piece is 140# watercolor paper.

I am weighting the composition with some heavier fabrics at the bottom. These two pieces are muslin that I created with acrylic paints, using stencils and resist.

I especially like this piece. Even though it’s a very simple pattern, when I painted the stencil I was working wet-into-wet, creating nice fluid edges on the shapes. I like the way this pattern can connote either rock-like forms or bubbles.

Now I want to add some transparent texture over the window to soften the edges and tie it in to the rest of the composition.

That’s as far as I got today. I will be adding some painted textures over parts of the surface, and possibly another recognizable object or two. I need to let thing s dry and look at it fresh tomorrow.

Stay tuned.  Next week I’ll post a picture of the finished work.

If you would like to see some of the larger quilts
I have created that use similar imagery,
I invite you to look through the gallery
 “Home is What You Remember”
On my website HERE

If you are near central Florida, please visit the DeLand Fall Festival of the Art this weekend. (Nov 23-24, 2019) It’s my hometown and I am very proud to be in this event. Downtown DeLand is a great place to visit, and there is an impressive group of artists exhibiting. See you there!

Thank you for reading. I always enjoy questions and comments.
--Bobbi
bobbibaughart@gmail.com

BLOG POSTS: If you would enjoy receiving blog posts by e-mail,
please subscribe here:  BLOGS-BY-EMAIL

NEWSLETTER: If you enjoy more detailed behind-the-scenes stories,
as well as FIRST LOOKS at new works and members-only discounts,
I hope you’ll become a Studio Insider.

---

A Back-and-Forth Dance – Between Painting and Quilting

Almost finished this one! (Pause for a celebratory sigh of accomplishment.)

As I’m working on my 2018 series, “Home is What you Remember,” I’ve been doing a lot of process experimentation. And it seems to fit what I’m after in the meaning of the works.

“Home” is a rich, deep, resonant, layered, emotional word. Everyone feels something about their home. In this series, I’m intentionally turning the word over and over to discover new ways to address the concept, new ways to get to the memories and meaning. So, playing with different methods has felt like a natural way to go.

Some of the works I’ve created so far are heavy on collage and applique. They tend to be thicker, with lots of texture. Some have been more painterly, flatter, working on gessoed muslin or sheer fabric.

This one turned out to be more painter-like. I did not work in sections – but on whole cloth. (A little more challenging for me because I have a small-throat regular sewing machine.) I used some wet-wash paint layers, some stencils, and some direct painting.

I kept the camera handy to record progress. I hope you enjoy.

(In case of any technical difficulties with loading or seeing the video, you can follow this link to see it on You Tube.)   https://youtu.be/19DzsTFFtPE

BLOG POSTS: If you would enjoy receiving blog posts by e-mail,
please subscribe here:  BLOGS-BY-EMAIL

NEWSLETTER: If you enjoy more detailed behind-the-scenes stories,
as well as FIRST LOOKS at new works and members-only discounts,
I hope you’ll become a Studio Insider.
You’ll hear from me by e-mail every two to three weeks. 
Subscribe here:   STUDIO-INSIDER-NEWSLETTER

What happens if I actually read -- and follow -- my own “Notes to Self?”

I started this week with a note-to-self about content.

Working in the studio, it is easy to get involved in process and technique. That’s the day-to-day work of artmaking. But, I felt the need this week to remind myself, to remember, that it’s the thought and memories that are the whole reason for artmaking.

I have a number of works-in-progress right now, all dealing with the concept of home. Home is what you remember. Because this is such a personal subject matter, a number of times I have been absolutely stopped short by an image.

When I was creating the art quilt of row houses, I was overwhelmed by nostalgia. I grew up in that neighborhood. I have walked a sidewalk in front of those homes and looked in the windows. I rode my bike in the alley behind the houses. To see those images come to life on my worktable was an act of remembering.

When I created the art quilt based on photos of an abandoned house n South Carolina, I remembered standing there by the side of the road. I remember now the smell of pine and the sound of the pine needles beneath my feet. It was an off-the-beaten path road with little traffic. The house was overgrown with vines; the roof was gone. A fire, probably. I found it hauntingly beautiful, rich with somebody else’s life and memories.

This week, I’ve tried to give myself time to have some of those stop-dead-in-my-tracks moments on purpose. The shapes of houses. A small child drawing. A distant house through the trees. A large detailed bird nest. All are filled with meaning. I don’t want to get too busy to see and remember.

---------------------------

BLOG POSTS: If you would enjoy receiving blog posts by e-mail,
please subscribe here:  BLOGS-BY-EMAIL

NEWSLETTER: If you enjoy more detailed behind-the-scenes stories,
as well as FIRST LOOKS at new works and members-only discounts,
I hope you’ll become a Studio Insider.
You’ll hear from me by e-mail every two to three weeks. 
Subscribe here:   STUDIO-INSIDER-NEWSLETTER

A chicken or the egg kind of question… and does it make a difference?

If the order of making gets changed around… does it make a difference?

As an experiment in artmaking with textiles, I recently tried reversing the order of the whole process. It's been  revealing and interesting

My textile works have some of the characteristics of a painting and some of the characteristics of an art quilt.  I always start with blank fabric, creating my own fabrics with acrylic paints. I monotyope print, stencil, stamp, use relief printing and paint directly. But, generally, I am making batches of fabric, then cutting them up and incorporating them into a collaged and stitched composition.

There’s a lot I like about this way of creating. But sometimes, by starting with individual pieces, I feel like I lose sight of the overall composition, especially big shapes and values. If there are things I need to correct, I don’t always see it till I’m pretty far along.

So, with a piece that’s still a work in progress, I started with the big picture first. I cut a large piece of muslin a little bigger than the finished size, (about 36"H x 48"W) then ripped it into five random sections. I taped them back together (on the back) so that I again had one large piece. I gessoed the fabric to stiffen it up then treated it like a painting canvas. Using hand-cut stencils in the shape of houses, I painted with a roller to get the overall composition roughed in.  It felt quite different – working more like a painter and less like a quilter. At this point, I could see the finished composition. I knew what was successful ad what was not right from the beginning.

THEN I untaped the sections and worked on them individually. I added some texture with paint, collaged in some new fabrics, and added stitching for texture over the whole piece.

THEN I sewed the sections back together again to recreate the whole. Now, I felt more like a quilter.

For me, this has been like adding a new language to my studio vocabulary. I will continue to work in the reverse order on some pieces, and sometimes combine the two procedures.

My studio “note-to-self” this week says “Creativity demands experimentation.” Yes.

---

NEWSLETTER: If you enjoy more detailed behind-the-scenes stories, as well as FIRST LOOKS at new works and members-only discounts, I hope you’ll become a Studio Insider.
You’ll hear from me by e-mail every two to three weeks. 
Subscribe here:   STUDIO-INSIDER-NEWSLETTER

BLOG POSTS: If you would enjoy receiving blog posts by e-mail, please subscribe here:  BLOGS-BY-EMAIL

Abandoned… Rediscovered… Remembered…

Discovering this abandoned house in South Carolina was an art inspiration. I blogged about in January, writing that the experience of finding this spot was a gift discovered by taking the long way, the off-the-highway path driving home to Florida.

Since then the house stayed on my mind. A work-in-progress in the studio now is beginning to take the images and create a new reality. (Video below in this blog post.)

What was so compelling, standing there by the house, was looking through the door and the broken windows and seeing trees and vines growing up inside the house, filling it. In a strange way, although the growth filled the space, it emphasized the emptiness. Homes are expected to hold people and life, not overgrown vines.

What interested me was this feeling of unreality. Instead of depicting the house realistically as we discovered it, I wanted to translate it into a dream-like memory.

Photos of the paint-peeled door and the overgrown windows have been transferred onto muslin. (I use a gel medium transfer from a laser color printout, pieced together to fill the size I need. These are tedious, but I like the final effect.)

The photographic images are being placed in a childlike, two-dimensional house shape, along with other fabrics, colors and textures. I will be adding tree forms behind to recreate the sense of loneliness the place held for me.

As I work on all the pieces in my “Home is what you Remember” series, I am trying to listen. To the images. To the memories. To what they stir inside me.

                  What happens when the people leave the house?
                  Something else will grow there.

You can watch the process unfold in this video.

NEWSLETTER: If you enjoy more detailed behind-the-scenes stories,
as well as FIRST LOOKS at new works and members-only discounts,
I hope you’ll become a Studio Insider.
You’ll hear from me by e-mail every two to three weeks. 
Subscribe here:   STUDIO-INSIDER-NEWSLETTER

BLOG POSTS: If you would enjoy receiving blog posts by e-mail,
please subscribe here:  BLOGS-BY-EMAIL

Half awake… and what was revealed.

Half awake, half asleep, I was thinking of tangled tree limbs seen through broken windows. I knew they were waiting to be revealed.

And so in this morning’s quiet I began the process of removing and revealing. There are gentle sounds associated with this studio work. The spray of water from the hose onto outside concrete wetting the paper. A gentle breaking of the surface of the vinegar- soap solution with the dipping of my cloth. And the rhythmic rubbing. Rubbing. Peeling away the paper to reveal the image on the muslin below.

Discovering the images as they emerge is itself a new way of seeing. Before I transferred, the paper copy was a mirror image of what will finally be revealed. Rubbing away the paper film is a discovering of the shapes that interested me from the onset, but now reversed, patterned in a new way.

As I rubbed, discovered, revealed I remembered the experience of shooting the photographs. We were in rural South Carolina, and an abandoned, roofless, vine-filled house was waiting for me. The walk to the house was through a thick bed of pine needles. Wind whispered in the pine trees. The photos I recorded capture that feeling of stillness and loss.

Who lived there? How did the house become abandoned? How long has it been decomposing? Does anyone visit this place? What memories might it hold?

Once the images are assembled as part of a large quilted work, I want the composition to invite the viewer in by conjuring up questions. The questions will become another layer. Memory layer. Captured photo layer. Composed layer. Fabric layer. Dream layer. All held within the tangled tree limbs and broken windows.

---

To receive Studio Insider Updates:  SUBSCRIBE

Talk it through… “Someone who has found a process”

I like to talk. Generally, I do not find it scary. But this weekend on DeLand’ Studio Art Tour, I re-discovered some wonderful things that happen when talking specifically about my own artmaking.

Clarification. Refining. Deepening.

In addition to friendly chats and welcomes to my studio, I had the chance to engage in some great conversations about the series I am beginning now: the meanings of home, as represented by shapes of houses. I have done a lot of thinking abut this already, as part of my own personal journey. But, as I answered questions and described the processes (both the technical how-to processes and the sketch-to-art thinking process,)  I was able to enrich my own thoughts. The very experience of the talking deepened and improved my own understanding.

Poet William Stafford describes poetry in a similar way, and I love this:

'A writer is not so much someone who has something to say as he is someone who has found a process that will bring about new things he would not have thought of if he had not started to say them.'"

Things I would not have thought of till I started to make art about them.

The creative process is an experience with many levels. One of the great realizations about this discovery is that we don’t have to have everything all figured out before beginning. We can begin. We can listen to the work. We can talk about the work. And all of that becomes part of our own understanding.

The magic that occurs during a studio visit

I’ve just been working on some promotions for the upcoming Studio Arts Tour in DeLand. It’s caused me to remember some of the visitors I had last year, and why it is so important to me to show people what I make and how I make it.

I remember several times last year when I had as many as fifteen people at a time in my tiny studio. (I’ve moved since then, and there’s more room.) The visitors had such great questions! I was working on a large fabric-pieced quilt the weekend of the show. Since it was in 6” squares, it was easy to keep busy in between visitors. When guests arrived, I was either collaging pieces on the small squares, or moving the squares around my worktable to develop the composition of the piece. Things that I take for granted are really interesting to studio guests. What kind of glue do I use? What kind of paint? Why do I choose certain colors? Where do I get my ideas? Every question caused me to think through my process so that I could supply a meaningful answer. It became a process of clarifying my own work. I was so grateful for the attentiveness and interest of those who visited.

I had some great experiences like that during outdoor Festivals last fall. I especially enjoyed several visiting groups of students. What great questioners they were! They went straight for content. They wanted to know about meaning, and the symbols I use, and whether I draw on stories or mythology. A few had been in art class enough to know terms like value, balance and contrast, and we had good discussions about those elements in my work.

So… I’m getting ready! I always enjoy showing art, and I really enjoy selling art! But even more, the tour will be an opportunity for me to think about my own artmaking. I can’t know in advance what thoughts I’ll have. But my visitors will guide me!

Life Lesson: Artists know there’s more to work than what you learn in school

My undergraduate art degree simply did not include power tools 101. But an artists-as-entrepreneur learns what every other kind of entrepreneur learns. Sometimes you’ve just got to do what needs to be done. Today, it’s sanding and painting frames. Not creative. But part of the process. And, as a change from my usual artmaking routine, a very pleasing task.

If you ever review a resume and see “independent studio artist” as part of the work experience, this should go in the “plus” column. Studio artists need to be problem-solvers. We need to be self-motivated and self-directed. We need to work under deadlines. We need to balance long-term projects with immediate concerns. We take pride in our work. We have, almost always, experienced failure, and learned from it.  We need to understand budgets and product pricing. We need to be good researchers, studying art history, contemporary trends, materials, our competitors, gallery opportunities and sometimes even glue adhesion properties. Many student artists are both right-brainers and left-brainers: envisioning and creating the product, and then doing the marketing, bookkeeping and inventory associated with it.

Like most stereotypes, “artist-as-flighty-snowflake” is a myth. We work hard at what we do.

And, of course, sometimes we get to play with power tools!

Being a Citizen… From Inside my Art Bubble

This morning in the studio I was sewing on a new art quilt with NPR news on in the background. As I stitched, I thought what a strange juxtaposition this was. Here, in my self-contained world, in a room in which I have a fair amount of control over outcomes, I am creating. Meanwhile, stories that are big and important, over which I have very little control are unfolding and being reported. Meaningful immigration debate has evaporated – at last for now – in a slew of ugly, racist words by the President. Other countries are reacting. A US ambassador has quit in protest. And the list of important issues facing our country remains a large stack of untouched “to-do’s” in the congressional inbox.

And I am merrily sewing along.

Each of us, as we go about our chosen work, is faced with this same juxtaposition and decisions about what to do.

After setting up this situation, I realize, of course, that I have no magic answer or prescription to offer. Living in a complex world is hard. Living in a country that allows tremendous freedoms along with tremendous responsibilities is hard. It is tempting to retreat entirely into the bubble of what I can control or what I enjoy. But it’s not a solution that would be right for me. Living so deeply in the world of external events that I become unable to create artwork would also not be right for me.

For now, I do what I believe most caring, thoughtful citizens do. I engage in the greater world to the best of my ability: as a volunteer, a giver of what money I can donate, a voter. And I continue to create work that is meaningful to me.

Is it enough? I feel the need to keep asking that question.

Is Juggling a Good Idea?

For me, in the studio, I believe the answer is yes. I looked around this afternoon. There are at least five projects working. One on the easel is one in the midst of collage layers. One is a sketch tacked to a board. One is in pieces by the sewing machine ready to stitch. One is nearly finished and awaiting hand stitching of the binding. One awaits a fabric-painting session, which I am putting off till I have a few hours of sun to paint outdoors.

I love the energy of multiple projects in the works. Perhaps it’s because I feel good about the source of these works. I’ve been sketching and thinking and composing a series for awhile, and I am now in the process of creating the work. So I am watching the ideas unfold. I am using the quiet time of hand work to think ahead about the next piece. I am allowing the movement back and forth between works to keep the whole process alive and interesting.

It’s not really so much like juggling. It’s more like a dance – an old-time reel. Moving in a patterned way from one partner to the next, coming back to the beginning, moving in a new way, then over again. The studio dance.

Last chance – last dance - new creating – no mugwumps

The rhythm of artmaking and life as a human being feels just about right today. The day is cold and drizzly – about as much experience of winter as we get here in Central Florida. The newspaper is full of taking stock, putting aside and looking ahead. A local sports team is ready for last game – last flame – last chance – last dance. (Who new sportswriting could be so poetic?) Merriam-Webster announced its word of the year for 2017. (“Feminism.” But has that not been important for quite some time now?) And words the language analysts are eager to put aside. (“Fake News.” Amen to that one. And “drilling down.” Also Ok with letting that one go.) I’m a little disappointed to see that “gauche” and “mugwumps” are no longer useful and fashionable. I especially like mugwumps.

And in the studio… what I needed to happen over the holidays has happened. I put all my work aside for a bit. Then I completed some works that have early-2018 deadlines. My worktable is cleared for new creating. I have revisited my sketchbook, worked out ideas on paper and in Photoshop, and I am full of new plans for artwork that interests me. For me these dance steps of change are necessary and pleasing. OK 2018. I’m ready.

May what you need and what you hope for be yours as well this beginning of 2018. Happy New Year.

NOTE TO SELF... RISK-TAKING

NOTE TO SELF – Thinking this evening about the projects I want to work on in the studio this week. What do I need to risk? I need to risk the chance that working in a new way may create a finished project that goes in the “Nope!” pile. Risk the chance that I will spend hours – when every minute is so priceless – going down an unproductive path. But those are really the easy risks. I have begun to think more deeply about the story I want to tell in a series of pieces. I have taken at-bats at the concept of a girl’s inner journey. But there's much more to say. Many more emotions and memories for grappling. Artist-as-storyteller-archaeologist is a daunting role.  May this little taped reminder be a way to keep focused.