Ian Wilson writes “A great distance, and that not only physical, separates the heart of Africa from fiber artist Yvonne Morton’s studio in Dorset in southern England. Morton makes the cloth whose inspirational source lies deep in the Congo. Her early medium was armor - her works is shown in Salisbury District Hospital and is based on the medieval surcoat which knights wore over their armor. While she was bedridden and concerned that the imagery that she was using was in danger of becoming “too cozy” she saw a catalogue from a London dealer - she was introduced to Kuba cloth. These are fine pieces of linen-like lengths of cloths. They are embroidered by the women with applique designs after the fabric has been woven by men from raffia which they had harvested from the African Palm tree - Raphia ruffia. Other fabric that are associated with this part of the world are the widely known cut-pile raffia often termed “Shoowa velvet” - this is characterized by dazzling geometric designs and the bark cloth produced by pygmy tribes-people. The Kuba empire is in currently the central Congo area and is the home to a variety of tribes. Continue reading ‘Yvonne Morton - Artist - Sandy Wagner’
While looking for a topic for today I remembered the summer issue of Surface Design and Mary Stieglitz. She works in digital photography and printing. This article is written by Ingrid Lilligren and she states in her opening “Synesthesia is a term used to describe the ability some individuals have to smell sounds, hear colors, or see scents. It could be thought of a a gift of sorts from the cerebral cortex, a kind of unwilled metaphor. Viewing the work of Mary Stieglitz stimulates multiple sensory responses. Silk panels move like air or water, and when the surface imagery is water, the viewer can almost hear the sound it makes. Through digital application of photo-based imagery, Stieglitz produces contemporary images that speak of deep time. Her work is at once new and old”. When looking at her work Cirque in the magazine I felt myself looking into 3-D as felt as if I was floating above looking down. Mary states she is interested in the visible patterns of our natural world and their relationship to the larger myths and metaphors. Continue reading ‘Digital Printing - Sandy Wagner’
I can’t believe that I almost missed the 3rd. Sunday but with the crashing of the computer-concerts-Christmas planning etc –the bell went off about 20 minutes ago (5:00PM).
As I was growing up my family took “The Saturday Evening Post” and I remember looking forward to the drawing by Rockwell. In 1977 our daughter gave us Norman Rockwell’s America which has the span many years of wonderful work. He was born in 1984 in New York City - his father managed a textile business in NYC - George Woods, Sons and Company. Norman came from a religious family and was a choir boy at St; Luke’s and the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. The neighborhood that he grew up in was at that time Anglo-Saxon white and Rockwell admits to having shared the prejudices of the period. He disliked the city and spent his summers in the country - he said that this time of his life was great inspiration for his early work. When he was 9 they moved to the country and by his early teens he has decided that he wanted to be an artist. He dropped out of high school and went full time to art school and finally 1910 he became a student at Art Students League in NYC. In 1912 his family returned to NYC by Norman was earning enough in commissions to become a full time illustrator. His first commission was at age16 doing four Christmas cards followed by his first illustrated book Tell Me Why Stories.
This fall as we were sailing one of ourtable mate was bidding at the art auction and brought a print of the oil painting they had purchased to the table. To my surprise it was of a costume used in a movie and painted by a Russian painter, graphics designer, costume designer and set designer Yuri Annenkov - I had never heard of him but they have been purchasing his painting that he did of the sketches that he did as a costume designer for years. With the help of one of Ragged Cloths members - Natalya from New York (she looked up Yuri and translated the Russian for me) I was able to find some of his other work and be certain this was the same artist.
Yuri worked in the theater early on and movies later designing sets and costumes. He lived in Russia, Germany and finally settled in Paris until his death in 1974 - he was born in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky to a family in exile for collaborating in the assassination of Alexander II. In 1892 the family returned to St. Petersburg. Yuri did not receive a formal art education but studied in the studio of S.M.Zeidenberg and at the Technical Drawing School of Baron Stieglitz.
The top picture is of Helena Annenkov 1917 - Yuri’s wife. Text is in Russian (thank you to Natalya) Continue reading ‘Costume Designs in Oils - Sandy Wagner’
I have spent a lot of time looking for a Russian artists whose medium is oil but using period costumes or stage costumes with samples of the cloth that the garment was designed in. BUT could not find him so will work on it for next month.
But in the meantime my FiberArts magazine came and I was impressed with the display of vessels on page 28 -30. The one that caught my eye first was by Marcie Schwartzman - she combines fabric and clay. She worked each medium separately for years, after seeing Judy Chicago’s The Dinner Party realized what she could do when combining each. There is not a lot of information on her but she can be found at www.vasefinder.com. Her statement is “I have worked with fabric and clay for years and after seeing how my garments could form vessels and the boundaries of my clay vessels could continue further evolving to a softer shape. Combining the two-came easily as I saw how certain fabrics and glazes were natural complements to each other”.
Elizabeth Lundberg Morisette is another artist listed in this article and her work is revolving around her need to collect. She has a piece at http://elmarisette.blogspot.comthat is called “Her Domestic Helmet” it is made from hair curlers and is wonderful. the two that are in the FiberArts magazine are made from zippers and pages from textbooks. She spent many hours sharing her talents with all ages teaching classes using collectibles of all kinds. www.flickr.com/photos/47691962@NOO/set/1235592 Continue reading ‘VESSELS (Sandra Wagner)’
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