Finish and Exhibit that Piece! My Seminar at Convergence 2022

Back in July I gave a Seminar with the Handweavers Guild of America Convergence Conference called "Finish and Exhibit that Piece!"

Room set up at Knoxville, Convergence 2022

Here was my seminar description with HGA: 

As a fiber artist I tend to work with a concept and do not think about how a piece is going to be presented or issues I may run into in hanging or putting the finished work together. This problem can often be solved by considering this at the beginning of the design process but there are usually plenty of bumps along the way. This seminar focuses on the importance of finishing and hanging decisions, touches on photographing work for entering shows and encourages fiber artists and hobbyists to get their work out there!

Leaf Me Alone prep to hang the piece

Before the conference I had the time to reach out to my seminar attendees to see what level of interest everyone had in the 3 main things I planned on discussing: 

1) Finish work (sewing, hand work, edging solutions)

2) Ways of hanging pieces and tools/materials to create hanging structures

3) Photographing/basic editing, what to look for in photos

All of my attendees were interested primarily in the first 2 so I didn't work on getting into photographing. Lucky me because the finishing process is much more fun to delve into. I try to make each of my talks, lectures, seminars different. I grow and learn so what I have to share grows along with me. I have a base talk that I work off of for the big key points but I always tweak my discussions the week (or day) before. I think I left photographing out besides pointing out why it's important and different ways jury processes can view photos.

Hook and loop with flatstock for hanging There and Back Again

My class was really quiet. To the point I was wondering how my attendees were doing. I did finally realize that they were just listening intently and had really great questions once we were moving along. 

I brought samples of molding, plexiglass, and the tools I use to cut and drill. There were also plenty of pieces of my own artwork with varying ways that I have finished and hung them over the years. The good, bad and the ugly. I think it's really important to be transparent about "here's where I started and didn't know what I was doing"..to "here I am now and it all looks much more professional however I'm open to new ideas and ways of making the finish work even better."

The thing I felt I missed out on was getting to look at some other people's work and discuss the issues they're hung up on. We possibly could have addressed more questions and ideas looking at work other than my own.  I did stay after to talk about some images that an attendee had sent me before the class.  I really love to talk process and help other fiber artists excel. I had also gone through some of the exhibits for the conference the day(s) before my talk and was able to incorporate photos I had taken of works everyone could see in person. I love looking at and discussion creative ways to hang exhibits.

Weavings rolled over paint rollers in plexiglass display pieces 

at an exhibit in Knoxville

I felt like the seminar went well although I could have gone on for much longer. I struggled a bit with getting it dark enough in the room to get the projector images nice and clear but no one complained about that. What I did hear the rest of the conference was how great my talk was. I was stopped in the hall by other attendees telling me they wished they had known about my seminar, a vendor asked what I taught and when I told her she said that she had heard great things about my seminar and that attendees really learned a lot. It reminded me that this really something I needed help with when I started showing my weavings. The best ideas any of us have at the beginning of trying to present textiles of all sorts is to stick it on a dowel rod which isn't the only option (and usually not the best option). 

A bad example: dowel, unfinished edge, loose stitched

Off the loom: Leaf Me Alone (Full Sized) Update

I posted to my social media on Tuesday that I was becoming entranced with the beauty of simple plain weaving with hand-dyed threads as I wove off the last couple feet of the Leaf Me Alone (full size) warp.  Usually plain weave seems boring to me at this point but I think I was jsut happy to be back to my weaving since mask-making has taken over my year.  Even though I had no intention of getting on to the finishing portion of this piece, I still chose to cut it off the loom. Cutting a weaving off the loom to get a good full look at the final product tends to be a big deal.  Tuesday I cut it off, fixed a threading error from the warp so it won't happen if I decide to use it to tie the next warp to it and I threw it over the front beam, walked out the studio and closed the door.  I opened up the draft of the next design I'm working on and spent the remainder of the day working on that between chores. 

It wasn't until the evening that I really realized I hadn't taken a good look at the weaving I had just cut off and left. I had no clue why I was so lack-luster about getting to see the double weave and why I had started dreaming of things to make with the plain weave portion instead of staying focused on Leaf Me Alone.  It's this:  I've already woven this piece, smaller versions, but the same colors, same words.  I'm so bored with the colors! I think I need to leave this one lie for a bit before I can get back to it.  It will have a leaf panel with beaded and stitched pieces, so I'm working on that too, but here I am, completely over a piece before it's even done.  

In the meantime, I'm really really excited about this next piece, I finally have an idea of colors which I may be needing to dye for it (yay!).  It's going to be a similar look or feel to my other work but it's more for the times so I have to get it done before certain things, such as logos, become obsolete. The title of it came to me on an episode of Live From Here with Chris Thile, it's called "Is There A Thing To Which Brings Us Less Joy" More about that to come later. 

Until then, I'm finalizing the next design and the cats are stacking up around here. :)

Lois and Clark, 2 of our 3 kitties

Large Leaf Me Alone Weaving Update

So. Close. To. Done.... with the weaving portion at least. There's still hours of finish work to do once I have this off-loom. I'm weaving the reaminder of the header today.  I always make my warp about a yard longer than my pattern plans for.  I do this for 2 reasons, 1) in case I change my mind after I get a few inches in to the design of the weaving and I have plenty of room to re-start and 2) once the header is finished, I'll weave a mix of plain weave and the two fabrics in green or blue for the remainder of the warp.  The extra fabric I use to stitch leaves for the leaf panel on this piece.

I'm trying a new way of video recording for my YouTube channel, so here's this morning's video of me talking about finishing work, specifically the plans for this double weave pick up.  I hate the way I sound when I'm being recorded, but oh well, I just rattle on a bit here:

Finishing and Hanging "She Was Lost in the Woods and Followed the Sound of Your Waves"

It's finished.  And even a little bit before it's being hung at Grove Gallery & Studios this coming weekend so I can enjoy it at home for a minute.  I was kicking around a lot of titles for this piece.  I don't like how long it is, but it's descriptive and means a lot to me.  

"She Was Lost in the Woods and Followed the Sound of Your Waves"

I've had a lot going on since August 2014...really since before then.  My residency with the Friends of the Porkies was very enlightening for my future.  This is why it was so important for me to put the work into this piece.  I did a lot of hiking while I was there, alone.  Sometimes I would feel lost, and then I'd hear Lake Superior and head that direction so I could take off my hiking boots and socks to dip my toes in her cold waters.

This piece is also very defining for me, I feel a lot less lost these days and I cannot wait to get back up to the U.P. this August to visit Lake Superior and the Porcupine Mountains again (I'm teaching a 3-day Beadweaving workshop August 19-21!!!)

Anyway, on to what I've been doing to finish this piece.  I hemmed the edges.  First machine stitching 3 rows in my header (something I learned in a Mary Sue Fenner Workshop)

I decided a blanket stitch would look nice for the actual stitching of the hem.

I had to fix this weaving error, which involved cutting, pulling two weft passes and re-weaving them with a needle.

Then on to measuring out the webbing..

Sewing the "loop" (fuzzy) side of the Velcro to the webbing. So if you need to roll the weaving it won't catch on it.

Pinning the webbing/Velcro to the weaving.

A "fix" for me, I wanted to extend these light blue waves a little more for aesthetics. 

And during critique it was decided that the above white area stood out too much, so I needed to tone it back. I pulled some of it and stitched dark blue through.

The "hook" side of the Velcro I connected to my strip of wood and I drilled 3 holes in wood panel for hanging purposes.  

Why the Velcro? It's much easier to hang.  The wood panel is either nailed or hung to the wall first. Then you can press the weaving up against it and slowly level it.