Can I complete one piece of work a week for the year?????

My latest finished piece "Migration" put together a couple of weeks ago, sewn yesterday and today I'm hand sewing the backing in place.  12" wide by 16" high stretched, wired on the back to hang against the wall.  Most likely I'll take down to the gallery next week and install.  I'm trying to do a new piece a week, which means I should have 52 pieces done by the end of the year, but I don't think I'll be able to keep up the pace as some work just takes longer.  And then were the heck am I going to store 52 more pieces of work, I'm maxed out as it is already.

I drove over to Blue Line Art Gallery in Roseville to see the last day of the Crocker-Kingsley Exhibit and was really very disappointed.  Both my daughter and I submitted work to the jury and didn't get in, which is okay, but then when I saw the work that was selected, I was stunned and amazed as some looked like first year art school work.  There were several pieces that were worthy of being in this exhibit....some that was just stupid and some that was so sloppy and crazy you have to wonder why it was called art.  There was only one juror and for a well known exhibit as Crocker-Kinglsey is known to be, I was surprised at that....and that's the reason the show was "the same"....everything was abstract in one way or another and the juror is an abstract artist...thus the show was as it was.  Something I really noticed was that in the prospectus there was no mention of multiple items that could be accepted and every artist in this exhibit had up to three pieces of work displayed, something that wasn't talked about when entering the exhibit.  Oh well, it is what it is...they had their exhibit and on to the next.  Only a few were sold...the pricing was very HIGH for what you got. 

Spontaneous New Project

 I was cleaning up some of my fabrics and came upon my collection of Asian fabrics that I have collected for years....and I mean  years.    One of my fabric shopping trips in Berkeley, CA., we visited a Japanese fabric shop and I purchased what was a fabric book of Japanese fabric samples.  Each page was a piece of cotton indigo blue/white fabric 18"long by 12"wide and probably near 100 pages marked with a Japanese marker in English and Japanese.  And over the years I have used a good amount of these pieces of fabric, storing those that I've never touched.

 At the same time I have been reading and looking at these fabrics thinking maybe I'd start a crazy quilt using Japanese fabrics...and then I remind myself that I really struggle cutting random sized pieces of fabric, placing them together and then embroidering their seams randomly over the fabrics.....and because the surface design on the fabric is so intense, all of that would be lost.  So I drew a 10" square and create my own design to cut/sew and using the color images in yardage that I found, developed these square with the idea of sewing them together into a nine patch or long eight patch (four on four). 

So I dove into the project and created each block one by one.   Now I need to sew the blocks together with the thought I'd then add smaller images randomly over the sew together surface and then in the border that is planned.  We will see what actually happens once I sew the blocks together.

 

And so here I go again with another project to add to the others I have going here and there and everywhere in my studio.  With the big question:  why do I continue to add new projects one after another?   It's not that I don't finish project, I do.  But my mind keeps telling me "you only have so much time left on this planet and you need to create as much work as you can between now and when the end happens to be"....it's like I can't get enough of everything...........and I really need to relax a bit.  Hard for me to do....even when I watch tv I am either reading while watching or knitting while watching or writing while watching.  Knowing that I'm doing this I am going to try to conscientiously try to RELAX!    I know it will be difficult and I'll fail from time to time, but I am going to give it a try.  

I am a terrible blogger.......

 I am a terrible blogger...I start the blog thinking I'm going to post on a weekly basis and the next thing I know it's been months.  I keep myself so busy I don't think about writing into my blog, just like I never did very well creating a journal.    I started this blog when I turned 70 in October and here it is February already and I haven't blogged much at all.  Maybe I just doesn't have much to say, but I find that strange, because I always seem to have something to say. 

 These new floral pieces I just finished and they are up on the wall in the art gallery in Old Sac..."A Single Flower" and "A Couple of Flowers".........I'm not a big fan of duplicating flowers...many have given me what they think is advice..."why don't you create floral pieces, they will sell well"....but I just have a hard time duplicating what others "want" me to see.  I guess for me, placing a flower image onto a background is just plain "boring"....it's got to be much more than that!   The design needs to be different, not expected and strange and I'm working my way into that, I hope.  I have four more surface designs worked up that I need to stitch..not floral, more animal related, but blocked backgrounds.

 Once I wrap the finished surface around the stretcher bars and staple it into it's stretched state, I am creating a background piece that I am now sewing onto the back instead of using the staple gun.  I didn't like the finished look of the staples around the entire piece, it looked sloppy and ugly.  The only solution is to hand sew it onto the wrapped piece to give it a clean finished look..a more fine art look.

Doing the stitching is becoming complicated at times because the surface I'm sewing it to is tight against the stretcher bar...takes a bit of time to sew against the wood surface, but it does give a far better affect when complete.  And when handling the piece, there will be staples sticking out to catching your hands/fingers. 

Creating better surface designs and coming up with ideas for fine art finishing is one of the secrets in creating good art.  No matter what you create, how it's displayed and finished off is just as important as the final product.  And I was taught at a very early age..."the backing should be just as fine as the front" and I've remembered that throughout my fiber art career.