Artists Archives - Page 3 of 5 - Sherri Woodard Coffey

Category Archives: Artists

That busy time

We all know how busy this time of the year is. No exception here, especially now that my house is full of extra people, but I am so fortunate that they are able to fly here and stay for ten days. My house is not decorated for Christmas and not many decorations will go up at all. It’s all about the family time and enjoying the moment. Of course, I have done a bit of Christmas prep. In the buying gifts department.

These scarves are felted with alpaca on silk and come from Deanna Curry-Elrod at Sapphire Sky .

I discovered her scarves while in Golden. I bought one similar to this one and have received so many compliments, that I wanted one for my daughter. My sister also wanted one also, so Deanna was kind enough to order the silk and create two ones for me. Now if they’ll just get here by Christmas!

The towels here were woven by my friend Margaret Humphries. Aren’t they beautiful?

The one on the right is from that book that folks (weavers that do this kind of thing, certainly not me!) have been talking about, Echo and Iris. These towels just make me smile. It will be hard to give away even one of these!

A wish for everyone is to be able to spend time with loved ones.

Rabbit holes again

The second of the two pieces being woven at the same time. I’m using metallics for the first time. Not so sure about that.

First, weaving news. The plan is to finish the two small pieces that I’m weaving at the same time. I’ve also sent out a newsletter for the first time since July. If you want to see it, subscribe here.

Lately I’ve been exploring a lot of rabbit holes, via the internet. Have you ever heard of the Martha Stewart Made in America awards? I hadn’t until I received an email, and off I went, limiting myself to only fiber-related businesses. Lo and behold! One of those businesses won! Explore Ricketts Indigo–I think you’ll find it interesting. Look at the pictures of Chinami’s kasuri process and Rowland’s sculptural pieces. Quoting from their website,

Rowland and Chinami Ricketts use natural materials and traditional processes to create contemporary textiles. Chinami hand-weaves narrow width yardage for kimono and obi. Rowland hand-dyes textiles that span art and design. Together we grow all the indigo that colors our cloth, investing ourselves and our time in our textiles because we believe this way of working to be an essential part of the material’s integrity and authenticity.

Here are other companies I liked

Blueprints on Fabric the magic of cyanotype
Silk and Willow plant-dyed silk ribbon
Lana Plantae alpaca farm, naturally dyed yarns

A short trip

Last week, after flying to Denver, I drove to Golden, Colorado, where I attended Art Biz Makeover by Alyson Stanfield. About 80 or so artists attended, so there was lots of creative energy. Plus, it was nice to see faces in person that I’ve only seen online and get to visit with new faces. I stayed at Table Mountain Inn, where the event was being held. I don’t know if Table Mountain is considered a boutique hotel because I’m not sure about the definition of a boutique hotel. Whatever category it is, it’s a nice hotel.

Table Mountain Inn

Unfortunately, I did not see much of Golden, but on my last morning I took a short walk before heading back to Denver. I’m sorry I didn’t get to drive into the mountains or walk along the stream because the pictures look beautiful.

Wait for seating on these benches outside pizza place.

Wait for seating on these ski benches outside pizza place.

Shop window. Love those fishes!

A single fish

Quilt museum

Artist statements

Heist While weaving and taking care of my floppy warp, I’ve been listening to The Heist by Daniel Silva. There’s a lot of art in this book, kind of spy novel, art novel, heist novel. The main character is an art restorer of really old art, when he’s not a spy. Pretty interesting overall. After reading Silva’s bio, I realize that I’ve never read on of his books before, and I’m late to the game as far as the main character is concerned. He has been in Silva’s last nine books.

For the last couple of weeks I have been thinking about artist statements, you know, that gobbledygook group of words that seem to be a requirement for artists. How can one make those words more interesting? What can those words be that would engage someone in the art, not the words? Have you ever read an artist statement that really “spoke” to you? How did it speak to you? Got your attention?

Public art

Last week I went to a presentation about public art hosted by Fort Worth Public Art. Usually I put these kinds of things on my calendar, and then talk myself out of going when the day arrives. In my effort to get to more art activities, I made myself go–yes, MADE myself–and I am so glad I did. The presentation was by a representative of Franz Mayer, a German company that constructs architectural glass and mosaics. A slide show of the many artist-designed projects was inspiring, and the process of creating those large art pieces was interesting. Getting the right colors by combining tiny bits of glass in a mosaic, laminating different kinds of glass for a particular design, painting on glass, airbrush, stained glass, mouth blown glass, you name it, it’s all done. There were brochures with examples of the work. Above is a pic of one of the brochures. I was captivated by this tree, but then I opened the brochure and saw this whole scene from a subway tunnel. All I can say is, “Wow!” Artist Norie Sato was at the presentation and talked a bit about her designs for columns on a new parkway in town. Her work is beautiful and worth a visit to her website.

Another of my new favorite things to do is to use the interlibrary. I recently found out (through the interlibrary) that our local museums all have art libraries that are quite extensive and are available for anyone. This comes in handy when you’re thinking about buying an exhibition catalog or other expensive book. I have wanted to see the catalog Matisse, His Art and His Textiles for a long time, and there it was, just waiting for me to check it out! Artsits-and-textiles

There was also Artists Textiles 1940-1976, so I requested it also. It’s an interested book, with fabrics designed by artists. Some are really ugly, but that’s because they just don’t appeal in this decade. There are just some fashion decades that should be obliterated!

Both of these books have interesting bits, and perhaps even inspiring bits, but I am not going to buy them.

Shuttle, Spindle, & Dyepot

Just in case you missed it–and I know it’s of vital importance (ha ha)–here’s a picture of a couple of pages from Shuttle, Spindle, & Dyepot‘s latest issue. I always look forward to seeing the pictures of the many varied works that others are making. Years ago, I was somewhat frustrated with these pages because it was so hard to find the description of the work. The picture would be on one page and the description pages after that. Now it seems to be more organized, at least as far as my brain is concerned.

The magazine can be accessed from HGA’s website, but I think you have to be a member to actually view the magazine. Oh, and by the way, Fort Worth is misspelled.

Books, Part I

Colour: a workshop for artists and designers

I’ve been thinking about a series based on how color interacts and appears with other colors. I’m also interested in the phenomenon called simultaneous contrast. Not having ever had any formal study of color, I usually just go with my gut, and frankly, I kind of don’t want to mess with that.

Anyway, I pulled a book on color off the bookshelf, and it’s exactly what I wanted. In fact, I may actually do the exercises! Gasp! The book is called Colour: A Workshop for Artists and Designers. The exercises utilize gouache paints to try out the different principles in the book. Then, by the time you’ve done a few exercises, you will have a pile of painted papers to use for the other exercises. This appealed to me because I have often thought about painting papers with colors that I like and then combining them to make a design, like Matisse did later in his life. You can see a bunch of those compositions here.

Maybe I’ll set up a card table in the spare room and play with paints. I’ll keep you posted.

Museum visit

Instagram picture from the back of statue at Kimbell

As a reward for all the experimenting with food and ikat I’ve been doing, I took myself out on a date to the Kimbell Art Museum, where there’s an exhibition from the Chicago Art Institute. It’s called The Age of Picasso and Matisse: Modern Masters from The Art Institute of Chicago. This exhibit covers a span of time from 1903 almost to World War II. As you can imagine, a great deal of different art categories are included in this span, from Picasso’s blue period to surrealism from Dalí. There were several paintings that stood out for me, but since the collection does not belong to the Kimbell, no pictures allowed. Instead, I have

Looking at tree trunks and shadows

trees from the courtyard and some links. One of my favorites was Spanish Dancer by Nathalija Gontcharova, although I thought the painting depicted a bride until I saw the title. The lace in this painting is beautiful. Are you ever amazed by how painters can paint with the shadows and lights of something like lace? Reminiscence of a Cathedral by Frantisek Kupka is also interesting. I’m not sure this was the intent of the artist, but to me it looks like a church tower with the stained glass on outside. An offshoot of Cubism, Orphism? I still don’t understand, except for the most part I’m not fond of Cubism. Or Surrealism as depicted by Dalí. But I do enjoy Miró–go figure! Klee’s Dancing Girl (1940) and Sunset (1930). Music was inspiration for many of these painters, but from what I’ve read, not just an appreciation but a knowledge of musical composition–something way beyond my understanding. I’m glad that Klee’s sense of humor was mentioned in the description of Dancing Girl, because she certainly looks exuberant to me. His signature at the bottom was made with a monogrammed handkerchief. Fun! And just because I’ve only mentioned a few pieces of the art doesn’t mean there weren’t others. And the color!

What to do…continue or not?

This is what I’ve been weaving the last few days, off and on. I’m not happy with it, but can’t decide what to do. Cut off? Continue? Unweave and try again? What I may do is weave this half of the first section (up to the top of the lines drawn on the warp) because that will give me another number to develop a formula for MY ikat measuring. The drawing on the right is what this section is supposed to look like. I realize the colors aren’t the same, but obviously, improvement needs to be made, either in the ikat itself or the weaving. So, maybe go back and weave this as tapestry?

Tera Muskrat is a New Mexico artist who paints large pieces inspired by Mexican calendar girls (or New Mexican). I think only certain generations will know about calendar girls, but maybe I’m wrong. For some reason, the name Jane Russell comes to my mind, but maybe I’m wrong about that too. Marilyn Monroe, even not from the 30s, might be another example. They may have also been called pin-up girls. I have to admit that one of my favorites is is a woman holding a Chihuahua against here bosom. I also like ChannelingGeorgia. Maybe the attraction is the humor in her paintings, I don’t know. I would have bought one, but they are large, and I don’t have a place for a large painting. So, I did the next best thing–I bought her calendar for 2014 on Etsy. I like that it’s in Spanish (I’m really hoping to refurbish my Spanish this year–not using it plays havoc) and has large pictures for each month. The page below is for Octubre. The text along side it is La Viuda, the widow.

Adiós, farewell, goodbye

Yep, we’re here again. Time to say adiós to anther year. Farewell, 2013, to all the good and the not-so-good. And you know it’s a new year when you start getting huge catalogs, like the left. Of course, this one REALLY got my attention. It’s funny, I don’t even shop at Pottery Barn.

I don’t make resolutions or choose a word for the coming year. But I’ve made my to-do lists for 2014, and as usual, they are long, long, long. They are broken down into categories: House (outside and inside), weaving, dyeing, etc. Having these lists would seem overwhelming, except that I have a history of crossing through 75% or more of the items.

One of the things that I want to continue and improve, is my systems, something started in the class with Lisa Call. I always had systems, just not in such an organized way. Now I have my dyeing, ikat, and finishing procedures written down and in a binder. I can note any improvements or changes for next time–and find them!

I didn’t have anything better to do (ha ha), so I played around with telephone cases on CafePress. I thought these looked pretty good. However if you go to the link, you can’t see them, so here’s a picture of the other iPhone cases that I played around with.

At left is a beer label from Flying Dog brewery. From the name of the brewery, you can see that this label is not made to be offensive. Ha ha! I think it’s banned in a couple of states, though. Love the label. The beer? Not so much. They’ve also got Snake Dog and Underdog. May have to try those and others that they brew. I’m not much of a drinker, so those tastings will wait a while.

2013 was actually pretty good to me. What about you? Do you make resolutions?