Opening at The Bascom last night

The American Craft Today exhibit opening was last night at The Bascom in Highlands.... here we are going in:

There were really more people there than the three of us!  That's my friend, Fran and my husband leading the way; friend, Beth, was taking the photo.

And, here I am standing proudly beside my tapestry that was selected for the show:

Life after Retreat...

... gets hectic again.  I returned from the Lillian Smith Center retreat last Friday and normal life at home began again.  And the first stage of "normal" was getting the car unloaded, suitcase unpacked, laundry done.  The second stage of "normal" was spending the weekend doing the first steps in preparing a tapestry for an upcoming delivery for exhibit.  My husband had a project going on during the weekend, as well, and I helped out with that  a tiny bit.

This week has been spent with getting the tapestry through the next finishing steps, including getting a frame together to mount the piece on--two frames, actually, since the first one I thought would work didn't... it was too short.  As much as I tried to convince myself that the presentation looked fine, it just didn't.

Monday had been spent getting that particular mounting board ready and beginning to stitch on the tapestry.  On Tuesday, I had an acupuncture appointment twenty miles away, and after that I drove another thirty-something miles to an art supply store to buy stretcher strips of the RIGHT size.

I made the second mounting board yesterday afternoon when I got back and spent the early part of last evening stitching the tapestry onto the NEW mounting board.  I felt I just had to get back to where I'd been on Monday... and I did before I left the studio last night.  Once upon a time in the blog I talked about "time spent, not time wasted..." and I've had to call that to mind several times as I've moved through the process of undoing a day's effort.

The tapestry is now 30" x 22" and is stitched onto a mounting board, 32" x 24", that's been covered with a natural color canvas.  I'd considered weaving the mounting fabric but just didn't think I'd have time to do that.  And I'm glad I didn't now because I would have stretched that handwoven over the too short frame, I'm sure!  Then I really would have been in a snit.

Here I am, hard at work on the stitching:

 My fingers really take a beating (or would that be a pricking) when I'm stitching on.  I use leather thimbles on two fingers and that helps quite a bit.  Doesn't help when I accidentally stab a finger of my other hand, though.  I've got several pricks that have only bled a bit and I was able to keep the blood off  both the mounting fabric and the tapestry.  One jab was so violent, though, that I screamed out a few choice words--scared my cat so badly that he spent the next half-hour under the chair he'd been snoozing in.

Here's the almost finished tapestry.

I still have to put D-rings and hanging wire on the back and then it will be complete, ready to take to The Bascom next week for the American Craft Today exhibit.  Opening for that is on the 22nd, by the way.  Maybe I'll see you there!

More about the Lillian E. Smith Center for Creative Arts

"To find... the place where fantasy and earthly things are metamorphosed into a work of art... this is what the journey is about...."  Lillian E. Smith

I was happy to be driving up the gravel road to the Center on the 14th of this month; and now my time here is almost over--at least for this year.  I'm hoping to return in the future--this is such a wonderful place to spend time.  As Lillian Smith said, "Dreaming, talking, acting: this is the way to bring change about."

Here's a short quote from a brochure about the Center:

"The Lillian E. Smith Foundation was established August 1, 2000, to honor the memory of Lillian E. Smith, one of this country's eminent writers, civil rights activists, and humanitarians.  Smith held at the center of her being her function as a creative artist.  She also deeply valued the power of the arts to transform the lives of all human beings.... It was with this vision in mind that the concept of a retreat for artists, writers and scholars was developed on her homesite."

What a wonderful concept... to value the power of the arts to transform lives.  I feel especially blessed to have been here during this particular time when a political party's convention has been taking place, one at which the value of the power of the arts was possibly not a plank of the platform.

I've been involved in the arts for most of my life.  I majored in art in college, then was a full-time art teacher for 31 years.  I continue to be involved in art teaching, although now in short classes and workshops specifically for tapestry weaving.  I can truly say that my immersion in art making and teaching about what I've learned in art has transformed my life.  And I've seen it at work in the lives of others.  I hope that a belief in the value of the power of the arts to transform lives is revived on a national scale.  One can always hope.

OK... off the soapbox now.  Here are some photos from the Center as I prepare to leave.  They're in no particular order, by the way:

So, for now... I'll say good-by to the Lillian E. Smith Center... until next year.  Maybe I'll see you there!

Today and tomorrow here at Lillian Smith Center...

... time goes by so quickly, doesn't it?

Here are a few more of the past days' efforts at the studio: