The body is feeling the effects of sitting so tensely for so many hours, too. I have leg pain and tingling radiating down both legs. Not bad pain, but I know the lower back nerves are not happy campers. Have to alternate rest and movement today. I will have to include copious amounts of coffee so that the movement part is possible. Right now, all I want to do is rest! All the lugging of stuff to and from Mass Art, as well as running around between the lab, studio, and printing center balanced well against the requirements for sitting to do artwork for the past three weeks. The overall impact, though, has left me more tired than usual and the tingling is a sign that my back is not happy. Boo.
Going to school today to set up the paperwork for the upcoming machine embroidery coursework I want to start on this fall. Looks like it will take a couple years to complete -- yes, years -- but in the end I will hold a certificate from a UK institution, Woot! That doesn’t matter as much as the potential for learning and really giving my machines, which are capable of amazing things, good workouts. I feel like I’ve only scratched the surface with both digital embroidery and machine quilting. Yup, even after 20 years, I machine quilt by necessity, not by careful, expressive thought. This class will help me examine this part of my process more carefully. More growth and learning ahead. This is the key to happiness. At least for me. Art, baby, art!
For an art link today, here is a seriously tempting pattern I might just have to get that shows how Victoria Gertenbach makes her quilted fabric beads. While I could probably figure out a facsimile,I’d love to see the way she does it! The colors and threads are beautiful. As I think about the new pieces, I am seeing fringy textural extensions -- beads like this have the visual weight and integrity to balance a heavily textured piece. Yummy! So many possibilities in this art world, aren’t there? Cheers.