Wow! It’s been a really long time since I’ve posted here. BUT I have been busy with studio stuff. First, I want to go back to the retreat idea. I have spent a bit of time on that. My first day was spent in the library, not the one closest to me, but in one a bit farther away. Why? Because it has individual study tables that are conducive to not being disturbed. I did a bit of studying, sketching, and researching. I found a design book by Miró that was interesting, and some books on prehistoric art. 

Because the weather has been so bad, my outside hikes with sketching have not happened. Soon I hope. The few good days we had were spent outside preparing beds for planting later, something that is good for my soul.

One of the things I wanted to explore was the idea of variations on a line. I’ve played with this before, but the post by Meg Nakagawa revived this interest. When I commented on Meg’s post about the book creations on this page, she sent me an actual book! The back of the envelope is depicted above. Lines! 

I have a whole folder of line ideas, so it’s time to focus. As I consider that, I have been weaving on a Baby Wolf loom in a strictly experimental way. One of the things I wanted to do was use wire or sticks as part of the weft. That experiment was a failure, but one I haven’t given up on. The others have been experimenting with hatching and color, just doing what ever with yarns on hand, and using a bunch of what I consider neutral, boring colors. More on that next week when I take that warp off the loom. By the way, a black warp is difficult.

One of the results from a few years past, experimenting with variations on a line :