Joy: Renewal

It didn't register that Easter was here already until my mom texted me 2 days before. I realized that it's a holiday that I've always blindly followed-suit with and never gave much thought to it other than which fun hat do I get to wear if I'm expected to go to some sort of gathering or to church.

This sent me on a spiral of digging around my thoughts on how I do or do not feel about the holiday, religion, and my own personal journey.  These have been constant questions over the past 3 years for me. My AA meeting Saturday further helped move my pondering to the direction of renewal, rebirth, spring. With that idea it became very clear to me that the Easter Sunday that has meant the most to me ever was 2019, 3 years ago.

You can read the original post from 2019 here: http://jennyschu.blogspot.com/2019/04/river-terrace-installation-hope.html

I had agreed to do the River Terrace Installation. I was still drinking at the time when I decided I could take on this project but maybe only for about a month before I joined AA and stopped drinking for good. I didn't know it then but this installation would become a representation of my own renewal. I was probably going to 5 meetings a week between work and working on this installation piece at the start. Looking back on it, it was probably really good that I had this large commission to focus on. The first year of sobriety it tough. Also, I would have never gotten it done by the Easter deadline without all those meetings.  Easter wasn't the dedicated deadline in the beginning, but at the rate I had been sewing the panels together we decided that it could be unveiled at Easter service.  I went to that service and my Dad joined me,  I cried the entire time.  Everything had more meaning and nowadays I cry harder with tears of joy than I do in sadness. 

I didn't originally think I would name this piece as it was to be a possession of the church's and not my own, but that first year and working on this piece gave me so much hope, so it is titled Hope Flows. It still does flow through me on a regular basis. The turnaround my life has made taking things in small chucks, one day at a time, I had no idea how bright the future would be. It just keeps getting better.

Renewal and rebirth for me is about learning from your past and adjusting or changing so that you don't keep making the same mistakes that led you to the bad spots in the first place. 

Twice last week the story about how we walk down the same street over and over and there's a hole. We keep falling into the hole. Eventually you recognize that you're coming up on the hole but you still fall in. After a while you eventually remember that the hole is coming and you can avoid it altogether. Then later still, you may eventually decide to take another street.

 I read that in my meditation book and one of Bryan's morning meditations started off with that so I overheard it while I was making us breakfast.  When the universe starts telling me something I'd better listen. So this time of year does have meaning, I'm ready to get outside.  I'm excited by the irises, daffodils and peonies that are starting to pop up.  I even split and moved a few plants on the handful of nice days that we have had. The specific day of Easter I worked and, sure, I'll eat candy, follow suit and if I happen to have the day off in the future I'll probably go to River Terrace Church to visit Hope Flows and have a good joyful cry.

Hope Flows Bangle 1 and Earrings

After spending nearly 6 months of looking at the images of River Terrace Church's stained glass windows and the drafts, fabrics and working on the Hope Flows installation, I needed to do something in beads. I took my original tiny drafts of one of the panels and dropped it into peyote stitch graph paper.  

I didn't have the bangle done by the reception for Hope Flows, but I did stay up late the night before making a pair of of earrings to match.  I'm really happy to get it done (I thought I could finish it for the MLH Conference but I just can't bead as fast as I'd like), and am extra pleased to have made a large statement bangle.  

This pattern doesn't repeat (hence one of the reasons it takes so long to make), so I ended up taking a ton of photos this morning from all sides of it. 

This bangle ended up being 2 1/2 inches in length.  I hope you enjoy all the photos!

River Terrace Installation Reception with Jenny Schu

This is the finale for me.  When I finished this installation, it felt great, but there was a sense of something missing.  Usually when an artist finishes a body of work, we had an exhibit, showing or reception for the public.  So this is mine, it's coming up in a few days, but then I'll feel done!

Come ask me questions, see the work in person, check out this really beautiful church (and the stained glass this was inspired from).

Thursday, May 23, 2019

5:00pm to 8:00pm

River Terrace Church

1509 River Terrace Drive

East Lansing, MI 48823

The public Facebook Event can be viewed here: https://www.facebook.com/events/2808992972475158/

River Terrace Church Installation

Here it is.  The final hanging day of my River Terrace Church installation.  It felt like being in art school all over again, up until 3am sewing for a 9am critique.  It has to be done.  My energy and spirit was deep into this project.  I have been through a lot in the past 6 months and this piece lived with me along the way.  Somewhere between exhaustion, joy and beauty I teared up when I finally saw it complete and hung in place.  

I am so honored to have been chosen to create this piece for River Terrace.  I told Laura as I was hanging and hemming the dowels into the bottom of the panels that, as an artist, I usually hope that I am pleased with the work I create (it doesn't always happen), I hope some other people like or appreciate it, but this is different.  This piece I hope, pray, that a congregation of 400+ people like this piece.  I created something that would change the entire background of their sermons as long as it is up.  Laura, Mark, Melissa and Carol all encouraged me to come to the Easter service.  I wasn't really planning on it since that week I had to finish this piece, I was late at work for floorset and I was volunteering for the Capital City Film Festival.  I wasn't just tired, I was exhausted.  I decided I would make my best effort and the fact my Dad wanted to drive in an hour to come to the service with me that  morning solidified my decision.  

Approximately 38 hours + of designing and meetings.
More than 130 hours of pinning, sewing, hand stitching and cutting.
315 some odd feet of black satin ribbon.

I felt like I was running back to Jo-Ann's for more ribbon every week.  I could do a two hour lecture on the design technique and my process creating this work.  I'm lucky that I had such a great group to work with while putting this piece together.

I've been to a lot of Easters, but this one meant much more to me than any other Easter. I was pretty much in tears the entire service.  Every word that the Pastor spoke, the hymns, the congregation spoke to me.  It kept circling me back to my past 5 months when I had decided it was time to join AA, and without that fellowship, support and weekly meetings, I wouldn't have gotten this installation finished by Easter.  The constant state of overwhelm I was living in has washed away and from it came this piece and a new beginning of my artistic drive.

This piece was commissioned to highlight the beautiful stained glass windows at River Terrace.  I have always been inspired by stained glass but I've never pursued any work based on it.  From the first meetings around doing this piece I've been excited to play with this inspiration and now I want to do more.  Please excuse the above weird panorama, but the color was better split between two different photos so I just plopped the one over the other so you get the idea. 

Thank you Dad for coming out and supporting this piece, thank you to the group and River Terrace that made this possible, a huge thanks to my boyfriend for tolerating piles of paper, ribbon, needles, pins, thread and fabric taking up the living room, dining room and studio, and thank you to my AA groups (you know who you are, you've heard all about this piece).

River Terrace Church Installation Teaser

I'll start by saying that I am not posting images of the final installation here.  I'll post it on Sunday.  I really want the church to enjoy this piece before it hits social media.  The above and below photos are from the pre-hang we did 1 week ago today.  It feels like it was a month ago right now!  So much has happened in a week and I barely slept last week with the looming Easter deadline.

There was a lot of discussion and research going into the decision of ho to hang this piece.  This is an issue I always run into.  Many of my pieces are meant to be hung away from the wall rather than on on it.  Luckily I had a great team that I was working with through this process and there had already been a cable system hung elsewhere in the church.  We went with the "classic" dowel rod, with 2 tiny hooks on either end.  The pieces are put on the dowel then Wayne and Cory (their assigned job now) take poles with hooks on the end and lift it with the poles on to the cable above.

I will go into a lot more detail on the final post about the Easter Sunday "unveiling" but I cannot say enough how honored I am to have been hired for this installation.  I have always been inspired by stained glass windows and this piece gave me the opportunity to apply that inspiration to my own work.  I had a great team to work with from the church throughout this process, it was all in all an amazing experience. When the piece was in place and finished on Friday, I cried.  I was moved, joyous and exhausted.  I have to admit, I'm still riding this wave of excitement and I hope it wears off soon so I can get more than 6 hours of sleep to play catch up!

Along the way this piece has taken over our dining room.  My studio space with the loom, sewing table, general disaster, was not spacious enough to house these pieces.  Each panel is about 3'4" by 12' long.  I was working on the table for most of this process, but when it came down to hemming the sides, I couldn't measure it rolled up, I had to keep re-stitching areas into place, so the second 2 panels I moved to working on the floor.

Other issues I ran into...for a week I could not get hold of the dark green crinkle satin from Joann's.  I ordered it online from my local stores, 3 hours or so later I got an email that the order had been cancelled.  I ordered it online from the company (they had to have 2 yards somewhere) and about 4 days later I got an email cancelling the order.  I pleaded in an email to customer service with no response.  The following week I found a bolt sitting in my store.  I bought all 4 yards.  I usually purchase too much in yarn or fabric when I'm working on a piece, but since the terms of the commission was that they were paying for materials, I was using coupons and buying what I needed as I needed it (hence using Joann's).  I also purchased fabric from Field's fabric in Grand Rapids.  I really had to reel myself in on that shopping trip.

My sewing machine jammed to the point that whatever I did, it did not want to go.  I am so thankful to have 2 sewing machines.  This seems to happen every time.  The week the piece is due, the week of Halloween, you name it.

Moving to the floor.  I had to be careful in my ironing to not melt this piece to the carpet.  Also, you cannot directly iron the silver fabric, it's content is all sorts of strange, including some metal because my touchscreen on my phone would react to it if the silver happened to graze it.

I love the ironing/sewing novelties section of Joann's.  Above is a normal press cloth on the left, the more expensive but sheer silk press cloth in the middle and on the right, an ironing pad that's meant to lay over the top of your dryer to iron, but works great as a portable ironing section (for the floor).

It was a bit too late in the process when I realized that I should have gotten knee pads too.  Even my dining room space wasn't that big to work on this piece, but I got it together and it is done!  Such a relief.  And I only dropped 3 pins in my coffee through the process.

2019 Church Commission Progress

If you follow me on Instagram, Twitter or my personal Facebook profile you have been seeing snippets of a piece that I'm referring to as "the big project" or "the big commission."  I have been commissioned by a local church to create a hanging triptych to be hung at the very front of the church's sanctuary. Three panels approximately 3.5 feet wide by 12 feet long each.  It's very exciting to be working so large and getting to play with all the silky, shiny and sheer fabrics I can get my hands on to create this large piece of fiber art.

I usually am pretty wary of taking on commission pieces but after meeting with Melissa and Laura one afternoon in October, I came home excited and inspired.  There were already bits of an idea in place, but they needed someone who knew how to put it together.  This fiber piece is being created to compliment the stained glass windows that accent one side of the sanctuary.  I pulled imagery from these windows and started pulling fabrics and colors. Stained glass has always spoken to me, these particular stained glass windows are a bit more modern looking than one would imagine when you think "church" and the lines and color are very much along the lines of my style of artwork.  I have already been thinking about how these window designs would play into my beaded jewelry and other various works of mine.

This process has been interesting due to it's size, I have the first cartoon for the first panel and it's taken over my dining room table.  There's lots of rolling, unrolling, moving cats, and placing fabric going on in my dining room.  I pin together sections and stitch, pin, cut, stitch, press, roll, unroll....  

I wanted to go skiing yesterday, but I couldn't ski with a free conscience knowing that the Easter deadline is looming over me.  I thought I'd finish this panel yesterday but I only got to the point of sewing the rest of the pieces at the top together and starting to measure and press the edges.  As usual, this is a long tedious process. Just the way I like to do all of my artwork.  I did solve my slippage and too-small-ironing-board issue though. I've been pressing and moving fabric between my ironing board and my dining room table. My ironing board was taking up more space than was comfortable to work in and moving the fabric back and forth just wasn't working for me or my surfaces.

I have had a padded table cover sitting in my Amazon wish list for forever.  Ever since someone (Cheryl maybe?) suggested it at a learn-to-use-your-sewing-machine workshop day at my place a few years back.  The top of a table pad is vinyl but the other side is soft and thick.  Thick enough that I can do light ironing on top of.  I can also pin into it!  Why I waited so long to order this table cover, I'll never know, but it's going to be a huge help with this project and future projects.

I cannot wait to have this finished and be able to show the finished hanging in all of its glory, but for now, bits and pieces and fun pops of color.  A huge thanks to Melissa for suggesting hiring me to make this piece and to Bryan for being totally cool with me turning our dining room into an extension of my studio and being a cat-wrangler when I cannot have them messing with this.

I have a few other things coming up too:

I'm the March Presenter at the Weavers Guild of Kalamazoo!  Monday, March 11th, 2019

I will (as usual) be at Fiber Feast with the Ann Arbor Fiberarts Guild modeling and selling my jewelry for their annual fashion show and luncheon. Saturday, April 13th, 2019