Spirit Cloth

Encouraging Formlessness

 

Behind the Door.

I hung the Endless Wishing Cloth there because in this small room, that's the only open space. 

And a few days ago I posted a pic on Instagram. As I  used it to pin up an unfinished Solstice Cloth. 

Blurry here while in motion. The wishing star center no longer visible. 

This action is most significant as a core compositional intention in my work. The kind of action/alignment that encourages the notion that Form is Temporary. I don't talk about it a lot, but it gives birth to new eyes.

To Encourage. To give courage to. Truth. What if truth is simply what might happen? With or without explanation.

 

A loose page #91119

 

I've tried my best to repair the audio issues with Feel Free. I think it is ok.  I am in the process of proofreading to make sure all content is in order and nothing got lost.  I will reopen the site next Wednesday, and do my best to catch up and complete part 2 of Patchwork in Perspective by the end of October as planned. And then... your guess is as good as mine.  There will be, most likely, a big space. But space can be like a thread. If you hold a longer view.

 

Inner Peace

 

Fire raging in California.

I had been working with some loose dyed patches I pulled back from the shop. The group called Birth and Destruction.

Was stitching them. They came with words. My brother wrote those words. I like them so much.

Things come together
fall apart
come together
fall apart
come together again
fall apart again.

I replaced the center patch with another loose stitched patch that was a leftover from something else. Saved. After reading GRACE'S POST from last night.  I added Inner Peace.

I take the liberty to say WE all hope things are OK.

It's November. Going.

Greener than ever before.

But turning.

A little Magic Eye stitching.  Been a while.  Such an easy way to gather new eyes when you need them.

November brings the sewing chair takeover.

.........

There were no knocks on the door yesterday. It seems safe here.  Maybe folks don't feel comfortable with their children out on the dark streets any more.  Last night I was frantic for a moment as I tried to make sure my son was not out on his bike in Downtown NYC like he often is. What a way to live.  In fear of who knows what. But it's always been that way really I say to myself. Just different fears for different times. Like the man always says. Life is deadly. Oddly, that's what brings the joy to every new day.

Combining Moments

Dark rain.

I'm going to sit with this one for a few days. I am adding many tiny black running raining stitches, to darken the outer space. A field of tiny stitches can be a like a color wash. This one, which started out as No Eye-dea, became Everything will Change and evolved into Moving Through..., might be all those things. Perhaps rearranged:

Moving Through No Eye-Dea to Know Everything as Change

I need to finish this one quietly before I continue with anything else. I feel confused. A little needle chanting without words usually clears that up.

As winter moves in, my thoughts brew differently. More indoor time and I am really in IT, that thing that holds my focus, I keep going all day and even all night , in my head. So it is easier for me to post in Diary Format, that is, create a daily post and add to it during the day.  These changes are not delivered by the email subscription service for this blog. Because they are edits to the original post which is delivered only once. That being said, I still need to do it that way. Creating more than one post a day is ridiculous.  So when I get into this continuous mode, I will make a note at the end of the post. So you know to check back for the whole story. If you care about that.

 

Blur and Not Blur

A bit of time out today.

Post office. Preparing the house and yard for winter.

Many blurry pictures lately. Maybe from all the going.

I looked at this and many thoughts surfaced. Questions maybe. About the blur, the softened,ragged edge of image. And clarity.

Isn't blur a just another kind of vision really? Depending on what we focus on? How we choose to look at it?  I somehow got caught up in that. The blur of moving through when we are not in the flow itself. The blur of what moves through us if we aren't in that either.

Anyway. I finished autumn eyes. I think I was influenced by thinking about space as something that might invite a kind of turbulence. Wind. Something indeed began to blow through. The points and protrusions are like pointers for that. Vision is growing and going in sympathy with that motion. No blur or confusion here.  Just change.

I like how the center piece became like a small flying carpet. A place to ride it out. The storm of change. And the eyes are like stars. And the magic ring, is like a circle game.

Considering SunMoonStars and all that might include will help me finish many things. Clear some space for more going.

 

Continuing Then...

Just Going.

After almost every day. For almost 10 years... there has been going here.

That's amazing I think, but then really, not really. It's what I do and like to do.

We are all going in one way or another. And this going might be easier than some other kind of going. Like the not Just Going, but going all the same.

So today I am grateful for all this easygoing going.

(9 times I just said going, and I didn't plan that, I counted . And ha.)

They are evacuating the shore here. It's the surge they worry about. I'm not sure the wind will be as bad as expected. And we are on high ground,keeping watch on the situation that will unfold as time passes.

An early September Stray, not just started (trying not to do that) but continued from way back. A Seasoned Stray then.

This Seasoned Stray has no fear of time. She is Time.

I want to tattoo this one on my chest.

For all you kind folks that made purchases from the shop this past week...I should be at the post office on Wednesday as planned. Unless we unexpectedly blow away.

As I suggested a few days back, I will be doing a rerun of Sun Moon Stars here on the blog starting on the Fall Equinox. A slow go, I think, that might takes us through the rest of the year.

I am aware of commenting issues here. I can't fix that. We'll wait for the Typepad Gods.

Nine for Tendency

Tendency is on my mind.

A predisposition to think, act, or proceed in a particular way.

How Sanity (as I am trying to define it, in small deliberate steps) might in some way be a modification on that.

Anyway, yesterday I got to thinking. While out hacking away at some old root-ball I was trying to remove from the garden. It was such a dense mass beneath the surface. Nothing would grow there. It seemed small initially but as I dug... well it took hours and I ended up with some unidentifiable tangle of plant threads and a Big Hole.

I had a green liquid lunch. Then stitched this.

Another nine. With a black center. A black hole block (component). (What if a black hole could be square?)

This might be Nine for the Tendency to be Sucked In. Ha! Yes. (I could make a political comment here. About Her. But I will keep it to myself.)

Now my thoughts turn to concentration. Concentrating thought. Art might be, in some way, related to that that. Simply that. I think.

I used a focal zoom effect on one section (about 30" square) of the perpetual grid cloth (I am working in sections, but more about that later) after adding the black hole block. I like how the black hole became the center and everything else is radiating outward. Here a black hole is something positively negative. And an eye of a storm.

 

Here Soul-O. And the Art of Looking.

 

That Sense of Order

An unexpected storm of storms last night. Power went down but returned before we could enjoy it. We are so prepared for that situation now, we wait with glee.

I love this picture. It is taken through the screen which stays up all year long now.  From the sleep loft as the sun came up and the big wind subsided. And I like it because of the gridded layer. And perspective in that. How it divides space. Many of my old unpublished (so far) illustrations from a simpler time have this grid layer in them. I think about it more now. In some more meaningful way.  Just starting to merge the young and old of me. As the grid perpetuates.

And there was a question about how we pull out of us what is in us. Yesterday.  And I drew this. 

And then did this. To this.

I think the next eye should be in there. I like this for the seam is a vulnerable place. I like that the stray self is itself as cloth. I love that a seam might run through me. That I might be mended. Later but also from long ago. I liked that coming apart at the seams could be interpreted as a learning process. That the question and knowing could be the same. That the space opened is in the shape of an eye. That I might pull the ragged seam allowance outward in this section, That this part will be "inside out".  That seam allowance might, could, acquire a very beautiful meaning here.

The sun is out. Sometimes a storm can simply wash away uncertainty. And leave you with a lot of kindling.

I could just stitch it back up, insides hanging out as evidence of a normally hidden layer. Of going. Without batting.

No EyeDea

It was once Something.

Then Everything Will Change.

Now renamed No Idea.  No EyeDea.

Hanging around here for I don't remember how long.  Not even rolled. Staring. An eye. Of a storm. Mirroring some sort of confusion. That never seems to settle down. In some ways reassuring.

I dropped my camera yesterday. And it broke. Well it is still intact but when I turn it on it just continually zooms in and out.  Funny in a way. But not very useful to my current needs.

I have no idea what I will do about that.  But I guess I will figure it out by tomorrow. 

So this, an older image must do for today.