Wednesday, January 29, 2014

There is some work going on - honestly

Excuse the Blue
This is work in progress.
The blue is masking tape lovely colour isn't it?

Sometimes I think I should just work on paper and forget the stitch.
This is a good example.
So I wonder how I will feel about it when I have finished these pieces.



Saturday, January 18, 2014

Early Warning System

SDA:Alberta meeting for  5 th March 2014.
Judith Dios is coming to teach here and I have convinced her to give us a talk.

Please block your diaries  Wednesday 5th March. 
Location as usual Atlantis Fine Framing and Studio.  7 - 9:30 pm.
There will be a small charge for entry

RSVP to ioftheneedle@me.com (for numbers)

 All photo credits - Judith Dios

An Unexpected Journey

"Judith’s passion for felt-making struck suddenly and unexpectedly and then transformed her life with the awakening of a long dormant creative side. Reconnecting with art has taken her on a journey full of surprising discoveries and led to new possibilities that she never imagined!"

Judith Dios

Website: judithdios.com

Thursday, January 16, 2014

Assemblage 1

I do seem to often create colonies and assemblages.
Karin Millson 2014
Assemblage #1
Indigo, Paper

For Epcor perhaps - Indigo Show

Just looking at what I have from the Indigo bath of June 2013 - Do I need to fire it up again.
Karin Millson 2013
Shibori Snail
Indigo, paper

Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Keeping me sane


karin millson 2013
Sanity Prevails

To rest my mind I do this.
It is interesting as I 'engineer' the warp to 'fit'.
I know that a weaver would find fault.
But not a Saori Weaver.
A Saori Weaver knows there is never anything wrong with a weaving.

Today I have dealt with so many things.
After a day-long workshop yesterday, teaching beginner and Nuno felting with some very interesting and talented artists I had much to work on - administrative duties that I have taken on re-SDA and Kreative Momentum.
If you are here on my blog because of notices about Yoshiko's Wada's workshops then you need to click on her name to find the blog entry you need.
At the end of an email-filled day I turned my mind to my own creativity, created the family's dinner for a start and then had a half an hour on the loom.

Very restful.
Thank you Judith. Thank you Terri.

Thursday, January 9, 2014

Shibori expert Yoshiko Wada teaching in Calgary in 2014

Huge Huge excitement.

Yoshiko Wada
Will teach workshops in Calgary in August 2014

http://slowfiberstudios.com

http://shibori.org
(Titles of workshops to be confirmed)

3- day workshop  23 - 25 August (approx. dates)
Sculptural (Shibori) workshop

2-day workshop 26 - 27 August (approx. dates)
Natural Dye Workshop


email your interest in signing up for a place on one of the courses asap 

Demand is likely to be high from Alberta and adjacent areas.


Yoshiko, is President of the World Shibori Network-World (WSN was established in Nagoya,Japan in 1992) and is the world's authority on Shaped Resist Dyeing.  She has writtendefinitive publications on the subject and produced a DVD "Arimatsu Narumi Shibori: Celebrating 400 years of Japanese Artisan Design." She leads study tours to Japan and has introduced many to the world of Shibori and inspiring creativity via her gentle style.  She is the founder of Slow Fibre Studios which collaborates with WSN and Michel Garcia on as series of Natural Dye Workshop DVDs.

Yoshiko is an artist, author, exhibition curator, textile researcher and film producer.  She is a long time exponent of traditional and sustainable practises in fashion and textile production.  she holds a BFA in Textile Art from Kyoto City Fine Arts University, MFA in Painting from the University of Boulder,Colorado Yoshiko travels the world giving lectures and workshops and participates in conferences to build greater insight into the world of fibre and textiles. 

Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Thank you Judith, Terri and Lyn

About 25 years ago I was gifted an old and battered up Dryad table loom from a local college.
I spent hours with wire wool, brass polish, sander and beeswax to bring it back to decency.
Then I warped it up and wove on it twice, not knowing what I was doing - following instructions from a Readers' Digest crafts book.
Since then it travelled the world with great plans but without weft or warp.

Thanks to Judith D. I was introduced to the word Saori last month.
And I thought "This is my type of weaving".
Terri Bibby gave me my initial taster (very generously).
And then Lyn P. helped me warp-up my darling loom up.

Looms are a bit like harps.  People give them personalities and even names I expect, if not, they ought to.  I am waiting for my loom to speak to me - my daughter did this before naming her harp.

There is a whole philosophy to Saori weaving involving freedom of expression and not getting hung up on rules - there are no mistakes and it is just pure pleasure to put up and down whichever set of heddles the hand falls upon and weave-in colour and texture intuitively.
So I though I would leave the loom accessible in the living room with various fibres from my stash piled temptingly in a basket and perhaps my friends and family would pick up some colour or thread they like and weave.
This is exactly what happened today in the stitching group.  I am thrilled with a warm glow.

Lyn and I warped up for a 3m narrow length of cloth so I can at least aspire to making a vest.
I thought I would weave some small pieces as samples.  But since the whole process is one of experimentation (my middle name)… why does this first weaving need to be considered a small sample?

The first few inches please me greatly… roll on the next yard.