up to my ears

in chores I would rather chuck for a good book, potato chip oatmeal raisin cookies, and a nice pot of tea.

As I go through STUFF, I am finding more tjaps and blocks I have to get rid of.  So before I put them on ebay, where they will probably go for more, you might want to take a look at my More Blocks and Tjaps for Sale page.

My lunch break is over - back to the drudgery.  See you later!

R.

wordless Wednesday

soup weather

While we have rain instead of snow and it is relatively warm (was around 50F today), it is still icky enough to make me get out the pressure cooker and get busy.  The ultimate comfort food -- barley mushroom soup! The non-recipe recipe is here, along with one for potato chip cookies I am fighting against making.  By tomorrow, I will probably lose that fight.

Barley soup for lunch but then, as long as I had the pressure cooker out, I made a sort of hot borscht I had never made before.  I chopped a leftover half head of cabbage, 4 or 5 golden beets, threw them into some lackluster chicken stock, added onions, potatoes, dill, garlic,bay leaf, and a beef bone.  Twenty minutes later...golden beet and cabbage soup. 

I tasted it and it's pretty good.  It doesn't taste like my nanny's hot borscht.  Hers was red, of course - and I think she added a pinch of sugar to it - and flanken (soup meat). Truthfully, I was never crazy about it.  And it doesn't taste like her wonderful cabbage soup (which I make sometimes). No beets - just cabbage, onions, canned tomatoes, a beef bone, bay leaf, pinch of brown sugar and lemon or sour salt so it is sweet and sour. Mmmm. I might take half of this soup and make it into that cabbage soup.  But not tonight. 

Yesterday was another cooking day.  Jeremy, Anne Marie, David & Jake came for post-holiday lunch, since I had to give the boys their Chanukah gifts - gift cards to Barnes & Noble.  Leave it to Jake: "you gave me this last year," he said. Snort! No doubt next year, too.  Anne and Jer requested latkes, and I baked an apple cranberry pie because they were not here for Thanksgiving and it is Jeremy's favorite.  He took the leftover latkes and pie home with him.

I have stopped working and will treat myself to a bit of reading time before I go upstairs. Tomorrow, I am hoping to have time to play.

juried vs curated or invitational shows

 Ever since I read Terry Jarrard-Dimond's post on juried shows, I've wanted to share my thoughts about the whole show thing. If you haven't read it, go do so and then come back here to join the conversation.
(I am finally blogging in daylight, so maybe I can actually think as I write - LOL)

I know people who absolutely refuse to enter juried shows because of the entry fees.  This goes for artists in other media, as well. When the non-fiber artists I know submit, it is usually to a well-regarded state or national show that will be showcased at a museum or an outstanding arts organization with good gallery space and a highly respected juror or jurors.  

While I enter juried shows, I have done it less and less - more from time constraints than irritation at the fees...although there is THAT if you are entering umpteen juried exhibitions a year.  Terry's point of being selective about entering is well taken, and I agree wholeheartedly with not just sending stuff off willy-nilly (does anybody use that phrase any more??) to every juried show.  Terry's list of things to consider before you submit is excellent and it's on her blog for reference. I have been a juror and can speak to those experiences (or probably have on some blog posts over the past few years).

Many excellent and established artists I know believe that juried shows are not necessarily any higher quality than curated or invitational shows - and I concur, based on shows I have both seen and been in.
This is a great way to get work out there that has been rejected from juried shows!

How Can You Participate in a Curated or Invitational Exhibition?

****Get your work out there on your website****!!!!!!!

 It's like the lottery - you don't play, you can't win.  Also, if there are what they used to call 'slide registries' (I guess they are jpg registries these days) - submit your work.  Gallery directors and curators look through those, too.  But I think today, websites work as registries in most cases.

***Join Local or Regional Arts Organizations that Sponsor Exhibits for their Members***
Local orgs may have their own gallery space or may use space at a local university or other gallery space.  There is almost always an annual open show for members and often, they will sponsor either curated or juried shows.

**Organize One and Submit Proposals**

If you belong to a small art critique group and have an idea for an exhibit (which needs a broad theme or title)  write a proposal and submit it to several galleries.  If it is accepted at more than one place, it can travel!

Have it curated by a group member or preferably, an outside curator.  My art crit group show is being curated by two of the members who looked at everybody's work and decided what would fit the title of the show.  It will be further curated when we hang the show.

I belong to several artists' groups where we submit proposals and if the proposal is accepted, we have a show. CAVEAT: make sure it is curated or it can be a disaster!!  Ask me how I know.

**Network**

Talk to everybody: friends, relatives, strangers. If you don't have a card that says "artist" with a visual and your e-mail & website, at the very least, you need to get cards printed.You never know who knows who or where your info will go.

What's the difference between a curated show and an invitational show? Sometimes they are the same, and that is good. There are non-curated invitationals and curated invitationals.

A non-curated invitational will most often have a theme or will be for a specific medium.  The organizer has something specific in mind and will invite selected artists to participate and send a piece of his/her own choosing that relates to the theme of the show.  The invited artist may have a piece that fits or may choose to make one because he/she has been INVITED to do so.

Many artists love these invitationals because they love the challenge of making something for a theme -- it stretches them creatively, motivates them to get to work (especially if they've been in a slump) and it provides a focus.  All good things.

Normally I never make anything specifically for a themed show.  One exception was when I was invited some years ago to make a piece to raise money for breast cancer research. The invited artists had all been touched by cancer - either themselves, or had a relative/friend.  This was a mixed media show with a lot of good publicity in a well respected gallery and was going to travel, so I said "yes. While I had not had breast cancer, I could relate to the hair thing and even though this was 4 years later, it helped me process-- and I took a lighthearted approach to this far from lighthearted subject.

Otherwise, unless I have major time on my hands (unlikely)or have a piece that fits (almost as unlikely) I don't participate in themed invitationals ...or submit to themed juried shows.  I also rarely make a piece for a specific size restriction (unless it is 12x12). This leaves me out of a lot of SAQA shows.

Curated Invitationals

I was recently asked by a professional gallery director curating a show for Studio Montclair, a professional artists' organization to which I belong, to be in a printmaking show: Revealing the Layers.
She had found my work on my website and invited me to bring a pile to show her.

She selected the pieces she felt 1) worked with her theme and 2) related to each other.  She also said she would re-curate on site if she needed to for space considerations or work that didn't speak to her on the second round. 

Taking this approach to the five-person show, she created an outstanding exhibition of five artists' work. Because this curator has a wonderful eye,her shows have always been top-notch in both content and presentation.  

Incidentally, all my selected work except two pieces had been rejected from juried fiber shows.

This is the benefit of curated shows - but your work needs to be on your website - "out there."

I belong to a critique group that submitted a proposal for a group show to a gallery. They accepted our proposal and two of the members are curating the show.  They have looked at all of our art and requested specific pieces.  

Finally, I am most surprised to have been invited to participate in a mixed media exhibition at the Alexy von Schlippe Gallery of Art in Groton, CT.  It is a multi media show and the director went to my website because a friend of mine knew she was putting together a show and told her to look at my work.  She loved it and asked whether I was interested in participating (ha!).  She asked for 3 jpgs; I sent five.  She wants them all. 

Three of the pieces have been rejected from major national juried shows: she asked for good jpgs of two of them so she could decide which one to put on the show's invitation.

'Nuff said. What has been YOUR experience and how do you feel about juried vs invitational/curated shows??  let's talk!!

cleaning out the cobwebs

I really accomplished a lot today. "Sure," says my husband, "you spent money." LOL. Well, how else are you going to get anything done?

You know how when you run out of toilet tissue, every bathroom in the house runs out the same day? Well, that's what happened with our scotch tape dispensers.  Every single one became empty within a day of each other.  Staples was my first stop this morning and now I have not only scotch tape but a new supply of little post-it notes.

Next stop: the appliance store where George, the manager from the other branch had gone, leaving in his wake, half-dozen employees who knew nothing. When I walked away from George, I had ordered a G.E. Monogram ice maker, which will be delivered and installed next Wed.  I also bought the extended warranty and since it is not made by Whirlpool, I am keeping my fingers x'd.

Tonight, Gary the Carpet Man was here (recommended by my son) and by the time he had left, I had ordered replacement industrial carpeting for the basement (gray).  Then, there were the four most dangerous words "while you're at it"... replacement carpeting for the sewing room (gray), replacement carpeting for the previously white carpeting on the stairs and upstairs hall and master bedroom.  I mean, who puts down WHITE carpeting on the STAIRS, forgodsakes?  No amount of cleaning it actually helps. Gray again for all of it (surprise!!).  

This means I have to clean out all the extraneous stuff and organize so they can move the furniture. I started with the sewing room and got as far as the top of the trunk, which is now down to the absolute minimum.

One lone basket. I got rid of two, the contents of which included several bottles of nail polish in a shade I would never wear these days. Eight Garden State Parkway tokens, which are useless unless you have a drill and can make a necklace with them. Six rolls of Kodak 200 film and a throwaway camera, all of which have been used. I should probably get them developed if I can find someone who still develops film.  CVS?  In addition...

I think one of these cards in the Inspired! deck is mine, with a quote from me. What do I do with them?
 

 Six or seven pairs of glasses I hope never to wear again.  They need to be donated.

Uh - I have a mouse that does not work with any of these. Shall I be daring and throw them out?

BUT -- I did find two things I had been looking all over for and missing terribly. They were in the upstairs hall closet I don't use. (well, I guess I use it for something). This was a top when I found it somewhere in the early-to-mid '90s.  I put backing and batting on it and hand-quilted the whole thing. It is a vision of loveliness and in great condition.

 This one is my all-time favorite -- a beautiful ugly duckling. Depression era.

When I found this top on the floor in an antique store in Nyack, NY, it was filthy. The backing was an old sheet, the batting was a smelly wool blanket, and it was not quilted but tied. With red and white bakery string.  I rescued it and liberated it from the filthy blanket and back. I put new batting, a small border and binding, and used what looks to me like a 1940's or 50s fabric for the back. I hand-quilted it and it is my favorite.  When I was sick in 2000, I cuddled under it for all the time I was post-surgery and in chemo and decided I wanted to be buried with it. It covers me as I sit in my chair now and write. I love it because the fabric combinations are wonderful and quirky and un-self-conscious.

Finally, a packet of photos from November, 2001.  I looked terrible; my hair was still not back in all the way.  But I was alive.  Here I am with year-old Benjamin, who was literally being born while I was in the doctor's office learning that I had cancer. Ben just had his 10th birthday.

And here I am (my hair came in curly) -- with my favorite uncle Solly at my birthday party in November 2001. Sol was my father's youngest brother and everybody in the family adored him.  He had Parkinson's and one kidney; he died two years ago when he had had enough and decided to stop dialysis.

There is nothing like the hard copy of photos.  I need to take those rolls of film in.

various

First, I sent a scarf off to Australia this morning and contributed 50% (including the postage) to Cycle for Survival. Great way to start the day! I also sent off my quilt to Form Not Function and made a couple of phone calls I have been putting off. That was good.

 Then, off to the doctor with Marty this afternoon for his 6 month checkup.  On the way home, we hit some heavy snow flurries but the further north we went, the sunnier it got.  Very random - but I'm not complaining. Waiting for me at the front door was a carton I've been waiting for.  25 bags of Costa Rican coffee from Cafe Britt.  An indulgence - yes.  A necessity -absolutely!   Five different dark roast coffees, five bags each.  The last time I ordered 20 bags was 6 months ago, so I know this should last me.  Happiness is not worrying about whether you are going to run out of coffee.

Happiness is also about getting rid of STUFF. (de-accessioning, if you are a museum). We won't discuss whether I live in a museum, but I've got a box of wood printing blocks from India and Afghanistan, plus some copper tjaps.  I've put some of the wood blocks up on my page at the top of the sidebar. E-mail me if you want any of them.

Meantime, my left pinky finger aches so I have to stop typing. 'nite.

I was thinking...

as I walked out of Barnes & Noble this morning, that life is good.  I had just bought gift cards for my 4 grandsons for Chanukah (at the rate I'm going, it will be over before two of them get theirs -- maybe I can trade them in for Merry Christmas ones). 

Latkes.  Fortunately, Chanukah lasts for 8 days. We went to Hilary's tonight for a family celebration with her in-laws.  I made the latkes and while I was cooking, managed to eat a few of the broken pieces that escaped.  I do have one more potato at home, but I should probably bake it - LOL.  For Chanukah, the point is the oil -- it doesn't matter what you fry.  Many people (although I don't know any of them) make jelly donuts, which are supposedly traditional for the holiday - but not in MY family.  I'll stick with potato pancakes - or sweet potato/ginger pancakes...or zucchini pancakes.  All delicious and equally unhealthful.  But hey - it's only once a year.

Back to Barnes & Noble...While I was in the bookstore, I saw the "buy two, get one free" table and sauntered over.  "Hmm...," I thought, "that's what is missing from my life -- something good to read." I had no problem picking out the two I had to pay for, but it took me some time to find a third I wanted to read.  I have been reading/editing for months, but haven't read for pure escape. I came home with...(in no particular order)

A Gate at the Stairs by Lorrie Moore ( a NYT best book of the year)

Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann (National Book Award winner)

and The Private Patient by P.D. James (Adam Dalgliesh - how can you go wrong?)

What have I been reading/editing? Jessica and her friend Meryl have written a book (in addition to their full-time jobs.)  Finally, it is at the printer and will be out January 20.   Published by Career Press, it already has good advance notices.  They have their own blog and are also posting career advice on the Forbes magazine website. I'm so excited and proud of her - and think I should take some of their advice when the book comes out and I can read it again. 

  

On another note - tonight I re-measured the quilt I had cut facing strips for and found a one inch difference from one end to the other.

Ick.  I HATE when that happens.  Then I realized I had not finished quilting it at the larger end: maybe that will help.  I guess that is tomorrow's job.  

Finally, my deepest and most heartfelt thanks to those of you who 

generously donated to Cycle for Survival to support Jessica's efforts. Your donations and mine (which is not posted because it went in the mail) have moved her toward the halfway mark of what she has pledged to contribute.  You have NO idea how grateful we are.

I have two scarves I was planning to keep but have decided to put them on my blog page and donate 50% of the proceeds to Cycle for Survival, in addition to what I have already given.  Click on Items for Sale at the top of my sidebar and you'll see them. Thanks and goodnight!

Cycle for Survival

This morning, up at the ungodly hour of 7:am (for a weekend, it's ungodly).  But I have accomplished some important things.

I have mailed out another sold scarf and also mailed my check to Sloan-Kettering to support Jessica Kleiman as she rides in Cycle for Survival to raise money for research on the rare cancer--soft tissue sarcoma -- that her friend Jen Goodman Linn has.   Jen founded Cycle for Survival, which is in its fifth year.  Jessica has pledged to raise $1,000 and is almost halfway there.

Some months ago I asked you to vote for Jen for the Energizer Bunny award and she won!  Unfortunately, she was back in the hospital and missed the awards ceremony.  She has had five or six surgeries and her tumors have come back and she is back on a strong chemo regimen again after having been in remission. Fingers x'd that this will work: so far, the report is good.  If you can find it in your heart to donate even $5 or $10 to support Jessica, who will be cycling for Jen's survival and for the survival of others who have this rare soft tissue sarcoma.  Thanks!

On another subject -- I have now completed this much more cheddar-y block to send off to Victoria for the NY Metro Modern Quilters group quilt. It goes out in Monday's mail.

 

The cheddar fabric is from Handloom Batik.  Usha's shop at 532 Warren St. in Hudson, NY will be open Sunday, Dec. 5 if you need her wonderful fabric, shirts, scarves, or yummy shawls for gifts and are within driving distance of the Hudson Valley - be sure to go.

Finally, I have cut some strips to face a quilt that has been waiting for me to finish it.  And the other night I went back to revisit a quilt I made a year or two ago that I have never been happy with. It has been critiqued by several luminaries, all of whom thought it was just fine.  I am the only one who finds it wanting - so I have to take it to the studio and fix it (if I can figure out how). Perhaps next week.

blocks and birds

NY Metro Modern Quilters is a group I joined earlier this year, when they were new. I got to two meetings and haven't been able to make any of the meetings since then, for various reasons. I am bummed because I love the enthusiasm, the young quilters who are having fun experimenting, and the break in my routine. They have already made a group quilt and this month, everybody was to bring a monochromatic block based on the color saffron or cheddar or whatever you want to call it.

Tonight, I sewed a block together and had a lovely time playing, but forgot about the monochromatic part.  So here is my therapy block that I am not sending because I need to make another one that IS monochromatic.

This is what happens when you are tired and don't pay attention. I think it may be the beginning of a quilt for Miss Emma, instead.

The wild turkeys are out in full force - although not as much force as those horrible black birds. A propos of this subject... I got an e-mail from Lynn Kunz suggesting that my fear of birds might be a good subject for some work.  Uh - no.  Actually, three years ago, when Jane Davila and Elin Waterston were writing a book, they invited me to participate in an exchange of blackbird blocks, some of which would go into the book.  My first instinct was to say NO.  But then I thought I should force myself to do it and express my feelings about birds. It didn't help, but here were the resulting little quilts.

It is after 1:am and I am too tired to write more, but when I am awake I will comment on Terry J-D's post about juried shows.  Interesting post. I should make a list of things I want to post about because by the time I get a round tuit, I've forgotten what I wanted to talk about.  'Nite.

Holiday Scarf Sale!!

I just uploaded some of my hand-printed, one-of-a-kind "graffiti" scarves to my website. I am running home to dye and print some more but in the meantime, this is all that is available now, and at a holiday blog-readers' gift discount.  Last week, they sold at a holiday open studio in my town for much more.

the birds

I couldn't grab my camera fast enough to shoot the black sky at 7:30 yesterday morning.  And I was afraid to go out on the deck, lest I be attacked. So traumatized I couldn't even blog till tonight.  Thousands of huge black birds flapping their wings, blocking out the sun.  They landed and I still couldn't get a picture that begins to show the scope of this horrible event. The black things are not leaves - they are BIRDS.

Finished in the back, they took off again, and flew across the street, darkening the sky once again. These are a fraction of the number.  Starlings. They must be starlings.Big, ugly, noisy, frightening - thousands of them, screaming.

When I say I hate birds, dead or alive, people laugh - but I am serious.  Starlings invaded my town when I was about 11 years old and there were so many of them, the sky was black and so was the ground. The cacaphony was deafening. There were dead birds everywhere you looked - on the sidewalk, in the street - big, black things you had to step over or around as you walked to and from school.

The town couldn't get rid of them and finally put owl recordings in the trees all over town, which eventually worked.  I have hated birds ever since.  And no, I never saw the movie; I didn't have to.