CCFF Bangle in Fall 2022 Color Fade

This bangle design started with the Capital City Film Festival Design for the 2018 year.  The design is on one of my favorite tee shirts from volunteering for CCFF. The dress that I wore to the Opening Night event was a black and white with similar angles and lines so I had created this bangle to go with it in black and white. The first bangle design can be seen HERE.

I don't often revisit designs but I wanted to play with color fades with black and I needed a break from checkers (just a short break) and this was perfect to go back to.

I had pulled a bunch of colors in late summer and these were some of the delicas that I still had set aside. I really love every color blended together in this variation. The individual seed beads are a mix of metallic, matte, cut, color lined...the coolest ones are a clear green glass with a plum color lining the hole of the beads which give them a really unique effect.

Of course I made some earrings to match and the set is ready to go. It made it's debut at Midnight Madness in Ann Arbor last Friday night and got a few Oooos and Ahhhhs. The Pac-Man Bangle was by far the most frequently picked up piece though. 

I'm going to post the earrings and the bangle for sale in my Website Shop soon also. 

 

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).

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

Partial Ginkgo Leaf Earrings

I've been on a Ginkgo and Cherry themed jewelry binge and I forgot to post that I made these earrings to match the most recent Ginkgo Leaf Bangle.  I like the design but at the end of the day you can't really tell that they are ginkgo leaves, so I'm going to have to make a pair of those at some point too.

These earrings are available in my shop right now HERE. 

Or you can come see me and them at My Arts Night Out on May 4th, Old Town General Store.  You can check out the Facebook Event if you need a reminder!

#CCFF Bangle and Earrings

I'm finally in a place where I can start doing a bit of volunteering here and there.  For the past few years the Capital City Film Festival has been one of my favorite local events.  This year I kept seeing the pattern logo for it and I needed to put it into a bangle.

This bangle can be purchased HERE. 

When I started drafting this piece it, it wasn't looking great and I realized I needed to put it on an angle.  The peyote stitch (which I use in much of my work) lends itself better to angles.

And so, I got the bangle and a matching pair of earrings done for the Red Carpet event last night!

Earrings can be purchased HERE.

A few CCFF High lites:

And it's finally spring so the kittens can enjoy the front porch!

Michigan Cherries 1

In preparation for May 4th's My Arts Night Out in Old Town I've been working on some pieces that are Michigan-inspired and came about from a quick chat with Rhea, the owner of Old Town General Store.  She suggested some pieces with cherries on them (a popular product of Michigan) and I jumped at the idea.

This Bangle can be purchased HERE

I usually don't work much in red, but I am LOVING this set I just finished.  I have another wide bangle idea also in the works. Certainly come by Old Town in May and see these pieces (or just say hi and peruse Rhea's awesome General Store!)

These earrings can be purchased HERE.