I found this walnut slab and thought the little ring on the top was cool. Wasn’t sure what it was when I bought it but I thought it looked a little like the eye of a peacock feather.
When I started to look for inspiration around peacock feather eyes, I found this beautiful Indian blue peacock mount from Creel and Gow. I realized that the lines were similar to my slab. This became the inspiration for my piece.
First, I started with the creation of the eyes. I needle felted multiple layers and then hand embroidered a feather-like texture over the top with a combination of blue, dark teal and light teal. To finish the top of the feathers, I used brown silk yarn slightly stiffened and tied to a cotton wrapped wire.
Then I started working on the head. Lots of blending between teal and blue. The most time consuming part was the creation of the plumes – little wool tufts on silver wires.
I struggled for quite a while trying to decide how to handle the middle section. Trying hand dyed doilies and lace, as well as, a simple macrame pattern as options but not liking either. It just took away from the walnut. In the end I created small felted feathers in a U anchored with an additional eye.
The final design of the full peacock also incorporated blue glass pins (some with bead caps) that anchor the feathers for a little sparkle. I am very pleased with how striking this piece is and how a piece of walnut could transform into a full peacock!.
Everyone knows that art is subjective so it goes without saying that there will be times that you submit pieces for a show and are not selected. I decided to create a weaving that symbolizes my handling of rejection. Nobody likes to get the email that says, “Not selected” or “Unfortunately”, over the past couple of months it seemed like I was getting ALOT of those emails. I received some acceptances too but it’s so much easier to wallow in rejection than in validation, isn’t it?
I decided to process the rejections into a new piece and started a branch weaving. The weaving is in blacks and blues and greys and starts with a gaping hole in the middle.
Big gaping hole
Once the yarn weaving was complete, I printed out all of the rejection emails onto mulberry silk paper and made paper ribbons. I then wove those ribbons throughout the weaving. The word “Unfortunately” dangles from the top of the hole.
Close up of rejection letters woven in
I did not capture any images of it but I thought it was poetic that most of the ink ran together during my first attempt at creating the ribbons. It became a giant murky blob of rejection that all ran together. The second attempt I fused a linen paper that was more ink fast with the silk paper. I also created 2 little negativity spirals in the corners.
Negativity Spiral of Text
The final piece includes ragged weaving ends exposed. I also took a razor to the soft blue yarn to make it messy and raw. My weaving was cathartic and hopefully sums up how others and not just I handle rejection.
Final Piece – “Rejection”
I submitted it for a Northwood’s show and can’t decide what would be the more ironic outcome. Having a piece on handling rejection accepted to the show or having it rejected so that I have additional fodder for the next piece!
First, I lengthened the bridge of her nose, darkened her muzzle and increased the size of her eyes. Then I decided that I didn’t like her as taxidermy hanging against the wall. I pulled her off the plaque and lengthened the neck so she could be a sculpture. Sorry – I forgot to take pictures in process!
Around the time that I converted her to a sculpture, I read an article by Daniel Swanick that highlighted the work of Jeffro Uitto. Jeffro creates amazing sculptures from driftwood.
His horse busts inspired me to kick Bisou’s look up a few notches and go punk rock. I created a series of wool ropes that I felted aggressively so they would hold their shape when they dried. Using a Joomchi process similar to felting, I also created paper rods. I flipped Bisou’s mane all to one side and then attached the rods and ropes.
As a final step, I also added some light, random swirls on the nose and cheek. It gives a marbled effect and makes it look like my girl has tattoos to go with the righteous haircut.
Here are some photos of the final product.
This girl is one of my most favorite all time! My punk rock pony was accepted into the GALEX 56 Exhibition at the Galesburg Community Arts Center. The exhibition opens April 1 and was juried by world renowned artist Claire Ashley so I am humbled to be included and excited to see the other pieces in the exhibit.
There has been a lovely piece of locust sitting in my shop staring at me for awhile now and it finally revealed itself as a lion head just before the holidays.
Live edge locust slab
First, had my hubby stretch his bandsaw skills to give me the foundation.
Slab cut out for head
Then I started on building the face and deciding how to tie it into the wood.
Lion face in felt
Next came multiple batches of dreads and dry fitting. I think I created 4 batches in the end, thinking each time that I would most certainly have enough and being wrong.
Dreads on drying rackDry fitting
Once I had enough dreads and was happy with placement, I started gluing and felting them in place. I then hung it for the first time and decided it was too heavy on the bottom left. Also realized I forgot ears!
Lion head first hanging
I moved some of the longer dreads up to thin that section out and added in the ears and this is the final product. He has a lion king kind of vibe to him that I really dig!
Final felt and wood lion head
Never one to waste wood, I took the bark cut off from the original locust slab and created a cute little owl with him. I call him Night Terror. Sorry I don’t have any in progress shots of this one.
Today, I dropped off a hidden owl chick in a piece of locust wood that I titled Newfound Wisdom, Discovered for the MOWA Member Show. Stealing words from the MOWA site… The Members’ Show coincides with the Magic Wilderness: Dreamscapes of the Forest exhibit. This year’s theme Begin Again also contemplates how connection can reconcile the external world with the deeply personal self. Both exhibitions demarcate how Wisconsin artists have been brave enough to grow, especially over the last two years.
I choose this piece because learning to felt brought out the hidden artist in me. My dedication to felting both during the pandemic and as my husband and I transitioned to empty nesters was instrumental in retaining my sanity and passion. The owl is my favorite bird and is commonly associated with Wisdom so this was a no-brainer.
We start, as always, with a gorgeous piece of wood. This is a live edge locust that already had a hole in it that looked like an owl.
Live edge slab of locust
I then finished the wood and started blending wool colors to get my owl feathers to match as closely as possible. Here are some photos as I constructed the owl.
I had what I thought was a finished owl hidden within but when I stood back and took pictures, I felt the owl was too brown and didn’t blend well enough.
I lightened it up overall and added in some more pinks and am very happy with the final product.
I finished this northwoods headboard commission just in time for the recipients to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary. What a fantastic gift to receive in their new (but not totally done) bedroom remodel in a northern Wisconsin lake cabin. We hung the headboard and took pictures and some video to help surprise them. The electricity in the room wasn’t on yet so please excuse the lighting in some photos.
You may recall in my previous post that this started with a large slab of spalted Elm. When I looked at this piece in the mill, I could see images of animals in it from the start. I pointed out some of the lines of the moose so you can see how my mind works.
From there, I started felting up some dimension. I wanted the felt to extend the animals from the wood so I stayed close to the wood coloring in spots and then took license with key distinctive features.
All of the animals included on the headboard are found in the northwoods of Wisconsin. I also added wire in some spots to allow for extension beyond the slab just a little. Keeping in mind that this is a headboard so I didn’t want to get too crazy.
This project was a labor of love that took a couple of months to complete. I froze in an upstairs garage loft to complete much of the work since it was such a large piece but the end result was worth it. We revealed the headboard to the couple last week and they absolutely loved it!
I won’t have any completed projects to show you this week but that does not mean I haven’t been busy – I have multiple projects in flight at the moment. Today I will give you some progress updates. Then in a future blog post we can see how drastically the final products differ from where they started from.
Project 1 – Member Showcase Submission
This one is due mid November and I am probably the least far on it. Oh well. I will discuss in a separate blog post how I decided on this piece based on the theme for the showcase but for now the focus is on the fact that I am making 3 owls. One of the owls is already complete and was highlighted in a previous blog. The second is started from a slab of elm that had cool lichen on the bark.
Owl out of Elm
I am already on the 3rd version of the neck and head and still don’t like it so stay tuned. This one will likely be a great horned owl. The third owl is not started at all yet – other than sweet talking my husband into routing out some of the wood in the middle. I plan to have an owl hiding in the slab. You can even see the outline of an owl in this piece of locust.
Locust slabExample owl
Project 2 – Woodland Headboard Commission
My second project is a large 7 ft spalted elm slab that will become a headboard. I don’t have great pictures of the entire thing but hopefully you can see from this photo how much movement is in this piece of wood.
Spalted Elm Slab
My goal with this piece is to pull the images of animals from Wisconsin that I see hidden in the wood and build up some dimension and artistic license with felt. The first image I found was a moose.
Moose
Nothing is attached yet but the antlers are wired so I will be able to pull them away from the wood for some perspective. The next animal I found is an owl (go figure). You can start to see me laying out some pieces here.
Moose and start of owl
Picture the owl hunting, like in the photo below. I have been working on additional updates since but haven’t photographed them on the wood again.
There are also walleye, snapping turtle, badger and rattlesnake images that I have coaxed out of the wood. I have completed the structure for the rattlesnake but the images are extremely phallic and I don’t want to get flagged as a porn site so I will just wait on those until construction is a bit further along. 🙂 This piece needs to be completed by the end of November so I will be probably be posting final pictures while eating some turkey.
Project 3 – Weimaraner Commission
This final project is a commission to create the bust of a beloved pet Weimaraner. These are beautiful dogs that are grey in color (that can run from silver to more taupe) and have amber colored eyes. The requestor was familiar with my recent work of integrating animals into the wood and gave me permission to do that. I knew I would need the perfect slab so it started consuming my thoughts. In fact, it was 4am and my husband woke up and caught me staring at pictures of wood. My obsession paid off!
Mock up of Weimaraner piece
I found a walnut slab that had movement that looked like the muscled neck of a Weimaraner. I got sign off from the customer and started building the armature for the head. You know, now that I look at that picture again, this one looks really phallic too. Who knew felting would be so erotic? – hee hee
The final two pictures show the armature and one of the ears that I wet felted. I was worried about how I was going to achieve both the color and sheen of the weimaraner. Hearthside fibers had peduncle silk top that was perfect. It felted nicely with some merino wool for the ears. I will likely just needle felt the silk fibers onto his head but I like having options. The grey stain of the wood also exactly matches the silk. This will make the integration of the head and neck look beautiful in the end. Can’t wait for this one to complete. Technically, it has to be ready before Christmas but I am hoping to find time to complete it sooner.
I am a Wisconsin girl married to a Florida boy and together we have raised a family and lived all over the state. When it comes to my art, I generally create my larger wood and wool felt pieces at our home base in Germantown. There, I have access to my favorite mill for live edge slabs and my husband’s wood shop for prep work. And of course, my favorite local farms for wool:
We also have a cabin in Chetek (northwestern WI). This is where I create branch weavings. Here, I am surrounded by trees, water and wildlife. I routinely go for walks and get strange looks from the neighbors when I travel down the road with long branches tucked under each arm.
For today’s post, I thought I would highlight a few of my latest weavings. Back in July, I had ended a post about branch weaving with finding a wonderful birch branch. Once I found this bright chartreuse art yarn at a craft fair in Chetek, I knew that pairing it with a cherry red wool in that birch branch would complete this weaving.
Hummingbird – Branch Weaving
The next two weavings were created with scale in mind. I wanted the weavings to be on the smaller side. So these are both only about 12 inches wide and 14 inches long in the V. I used a silver maple branch and gray wool that matched the branch as the base color with pinks and golds for accent for the top weaving. The bottom weaving is in a birch branch. This branch has an unique ombré effect from cream to brown. For the weaving, I mimicked that shading.
Silver Maple and Birch Branch Weavings
I have found that I enjoy using the circle weave technique for branches. It feels the most organic. Usually, this means I find some pliable pine branches and wrap them to create a circle. However, sometimes I get lucky and find a premade circle that fits the look and feel of my work. The final piece today uses an iron nut that I found at the local hardware store as my circle. This piece was for a Black and White Exhibit. I had another birch branch, so I used black wool yarn, gray tweed roving, white wool yarn and then some tufts of white roving. It is titled Whispers in the Dark. The black part is an ear and the white tufts the whispers hovering around it.
Whispers in the Dark – Branch Weaving
We are at the cabin this week. The leaves are all turning colors. It is absolutely beautiful. I came back from my walk with a lovely branch tucked under my arm – it is going to be a lovely week.
It has been an interesting couple of weeks of highs and lows filled with acceptances to gallery exhibits, new partnerships and awards but also scams. This blog post is going to be a bit different than my usual. I am going to spotlight some of the new places where you will be able to see my work. But my day job is in IT and I think it is important to highlight phishing scams so others can learn how to spot the signs as well.
First, let’s start with some good stuff. I have referenced a new relationship with the Museum of Wisconsin Art in previous posts. Super happy to announce that some of my pieces, including the Python, Cougar and Owl from my previous blog series plus a few others will be available in the MOWA Gift Shop starting in October. The caliber of work of the other artists featured in the gift shop is amazing. This is a fantastic honor!
Also happy to report that my piece the Maple Flounder won first prize in the All Water/Seascape Competition with the Contemporary Art Gallery Online. This was an unexpected win! I think the depth and dimensions of felt is so much better appreciated in person rather than online. This guy was cool enough to jump off the page and prove me wrong.
Maple Flounder
Scams
Now let’s switch to email scams – then I will round it out with more good news to end on a positive note. About a week ago I received an email inquiring about my art. The email indicated that his 10th anniversary was coming up and he was interested in purchasing 1-2 pieces between $500-$5000. Seemed innocent enough but a few alarm bells went off. The first being that this email went to my personal account and not my artist account. So, the first thing I did was ask how he had heard of me. He responded pretty quickly and said it was his wife that was the fan and he had caught her looking at my work on his computer and he was an ocean engineer and leaving for work overseas soon so needed to purchase her gift quickly and without her knowing. Still not making me feel super great. I kept feeding him info just in case this was legitimate, but I was careful to only give information that was already available via my website.
Then he started to lay his cards out on the table. He wanted to pay by check because his wife controlled the credit cards and he wanted to surprise her. AND his personal shipping clerk would contact me to arrange delivery as he was in the middle of moving to Canada. Personal check and no verifiable address – no way. At this point I called his bluff (sorry about all the poker analogies) and said this was clearly a scam. I never heard back from him. Not even 2 hours later, I got the exact same email about art for a 10th anniversary from a completely different address. Please be diligent with your own security practices. If something doesn’t seem right, ask questions and trust your gut.
More Good News
Just found out this morning that my piece “Whispers in the Dark” was selected to be part of the Black and White Group Show at the Connective Gallery in De Pere in October. They have asked that we only provide teasers so if you want to see (and buy) it, you will have to come to the show. The inspiration for this piece comes from the wind cutting through the trees at night and the stories that they tell one another as they sway back and forth and whisper about all that they witnessed that day. The branch has an ear to listen intently and the whispers hover all around her.
Or you could go with my mother’s title contribution of “Fuzz balls on a teepee”. She is no longer allowed naming rights. 🙂
It seems fitting that I finish the Snake, Owl and Maybe a Puma series with the owl, given that my original inspiration was from a photo of one that my daughter sent to me from this article. I intentionally saved this one for last. Owl’s are my favorite bird and I’ve created a few before but never one integrated into the wood. Finding the right piece of wood was key.
Original Slab for Owl
A nice piece of walnut. It had some soft spots at the bottom but I was ok with that. Once I cleared the soft wood out, I had plenty of space to inlay felt feathers. I tried to convince the man at the wood store that this was the perfect owl butt – he couldn’t see it ;(
Brought it home and sent my husband to work with his fancy workshop tools to route out the light wood in the center. This section will be for the owl head. Then it was wood finishing time so that I had the final colors for matching my fibers. I started first on the tail feathers.
I made many needle felted feathers using several shades of brown merino, as well as some lovely black e. friesian wool and suri alpaca blends I received from my friends at Sanctuary Wool. When you look closely at the bark, you can see quite a bit of variation and movement. I wanted the felt feathers to blend in as seamlessly as possible = smooth finish. There are several techniques to get a smooth finish when needle felting. With something as thin as feathers, an electric fabric shaver works wonders. Here is a picture of half of the feathers shaved. You can really see the difference!
Owl tail feathers
The completed tail feathers integrated beautifully with the wood. I am extremely happy with how they turned out. Now that the tail feathers were done, I set my sights on the owl head. Getting a tight stripe to mimic the rings of the wood was going to require wet felting.
Owl completed tail and head opening
I layered brown and tan merino sheets of fibers and created pre-felts. It was important that the sheets were felted enough to be solid but not too felted for the colors to blend together. In this case, I was also not careful with keeping my rolling even. I wanted there to be width variance between colors and bends and curls where the wool shrunk inconsistently. The wool was felted into its final shape once it was placed into the wood.
Creating Stripes for Owl Body
All that was left was to build out the owl face. This project was always taking liberties with any owl actually found in nature but the closest was the Barred Owl whose face I used for inspiration.
Finished Owl in Walnut
I will likely play with the eyes a bit more before I am officially done but it was close enough to share. Please comment, tweet or link back to my post if this series inspires you to mix mediums as well. I will be happy to showcase other’s work in future blog posts.
