http://raggedclothcafe.com/2007/12/30/the-archie-bray-foundation/ Discussions and ideas about art and textile art Thu, 09 Feb 2012 09:36:53 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.com/ http://raggedclothcafe.com/2007/12/30/the-archie-bray-foundation/#comment-1554 Tue, 01 Jan 2008 20:08:44 +0000 http://junomain.wordpress.com/2007/12/30/the-archie-bray-foundation/#comment-1554 June
When I am able to sit beside a garden filled with shards of the not so perfect works or creations which broke in the kiln and see the flowers growing up and around these bits….after a walk through the studios and galleries at the Bray my spirit is filled for sure, but then comes something of a freedom in sketching that I so often do not accomplish without filling the senses and letting the muse begin to fly free of the ordinary in my life. I have found other places that bring that same “inspiration” to the sketch pad but alas those days at the Bray were some of the most productive for me. It was a time when my work as a costumer was more of a studio occupation than my days now in a library, but finding a place to just be and sit and take in the surrounds and then begin to drae, to paint, to stitch on a piece of cloth…..that is the best time for my muse.
The ceramist Akio Takamori was in residence at the Bray when I moved to Helena and his work pushed my drawing to more emphasis on line…..his fluid, simple shapes with often just black and grey painting hooked into my muse and sent me on a journey of design that I am still exploring today. Whenever I return to my hometown of Seattle I look up exhibits that have his works on display and once again charge the batteries of my creative.
a look at http://www.flintridgefoundation.org/visualarts/recipients20032004_akiotakamori.html
might show you what I am describing.
Always I am “charged” by a visit to the Textile Museum in Washington DC when I view exhibits and permanent collection pieces there. Quilts of history and created today inspire and give energy to my muse. Visits this week to June’s blog where her creations on canvas have been presented and in her posting to Ragged Cloth last week have shown some wonderful new design forms in her work while she is in Basin. Truly an area that is high in the mountains but looks rather flatter than mountains from the Pacific coast. Somehow in that place June has discovered some “magic” and her images dance from the screen as I view them. There is, to me, a definite influence of place shown in this work of hers.
Getting out of my studio, getting close to something of the earth or something created by another seems to unlock closed off channels and sends me back to the studio refreshed and ready for exploration.
I am always challenged by my own work, but sometimes get in a muddle and regular visits to the places I have described does clear out the cobwebs and moves my creative forward.
In my living and creating space I can never have too much stimulation for the things I clip to the walls, curtains..any surface is a bulletin board for the bits that I see, that stir me and I just must have them up for a while to see. When I am able to have “the real thing” I do add that to my environment.
Thanks for stirring the pot of thinking, June.

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