Forget the quilts -- Let's go to Napa!

Written last night:

Dear Friends,

Today's plan was to go to an art quilt meeting in Walnut Grove with my friend Mary Kaye. She couldn’t pick me up easily because police cars blocked some streets by the Capitol to free them for a walk — I still have to look up what the walk was for. Anyway, she did finally make it. 

Next we got onto I-80, and it was all mucked up because of construction (something involving a bridge — they’re working nights and weekends.) Cars were barely moving. After many stops and starts and turns and trials of alternate routes we decided, “Forget the quilts — Let’s go to Napa!”

We turned our backs on traffic and took the back roads. Rolling hills turned to curves, sharper curves, "don’t look over the edge" curves. It was gorgeous. Acres of grapes, golden grass, and nut orchards (Yes, they call them orchards, not groves, says Mary Kaye, who grew up on a Southern California almond orchard.)

We ended up in Napa (pop. 76,900) — a bigger town than Yountville or St. Helena, the other wine destinations I’ve visited. We chose a place for lunch because it had a parking spot out front. Inside there was live music, long, patient lines, and tempting baked goods. We stopped there by happenstance, but intense study couldn’t have found a better restaurant: Alexis Baking Company.

I insisted we couldn’t come back from Napa without a bottle of wine — so we stopped at a small wine tasting room at a crossroads in the countryside. There was an antique shop across the street, with rusting tractors out front, and next door was a restaurant with many patrons. 

I didn’t know what to expect — a long bar? little tables with samples in paper cups?  something involving a spittoon so you can swish and enjoy many sips? 

Perhaps they’re all different, but this tasting room (Vezér Family Vineyard) had the dim, cozy feel of a club or game room, with leather chairs and sofas and a small bar where a friendly tender offered tastes. You paid for tasting, but it was credited to the price of a bottle, I think. It all happened so quickly that I’m not sure. I had two tastes. Then I bought a bottle of red wine, which I’ve hidden in the cupboard by the stove. I’ve got a lot to learn.

Today turned out better than planned. We laughed all the way back home.

Love,

k

Walnut trees

Still learning

Written last night:

Dear Friends,

I am beginning to feel at home here. Zing and I have worn paths to the Safeway and the Natural Foods Co-op, and I know when the Farmers markets are open and I’ve made some friends, and I know which gas station is most convenient, and where to get my car washed and which street lanes become right turn only and how to turn a key in a lock without breaking it, and how to use a FOB to open a door (What’s a FOB? you ask? It’s a magic circle that you press against some numbers and it unlocks a door.), and which streets are one-way, and which hours to avoid driving in midtown, and how to say NO to a homeless man, and how to use earbuds, and when to talk to someone in the elevator and when to be silent, and which stores welcome dogs, and what time I-80 clogs up and …. 

… and there’s still so much to learn!

At first I was afraid to drive down the street, and now I’m thinking about driving to San Jose. It happens in steps: First, explore with someone else, and then drive alone. I might explore by bus or train, and then drive myself. Today it was Danville, not too far from Berkeley, for a SAQA (Studio Art Quilt Associates) meeting. Mary Kaye drove. The topic was Writing an Artist Statement, and I could rave on and on about the group, but I’m falling asleep!

Love,

k

A Northern California SAQA member showed us a piece of her pojaki, 

hand-sewn traditional Korean patchwork

Mountains or hills?

Walnut Creek, CA

Written last night:

This morning I followed mountains west. Or maybe they were hills.  How is a flat-lander from Florida to know? I drove 90 minutes to Walnut Creek, CA, outside Oakland, where there was a regional meeting of art quilters. It was a chance to get to know the area and meet some people who share my inclinations.

Unlike the ocean, mountains show themselves way before you get there, so you can enjoy them longer. As I left Sacramento, they were a violet smudge up ahead. I thought it might stay that way, but in five minutes or so the edges began to sharpen up. Oh my! As you drive toward mountains they become real! I got all worried that I might be driving slanted soon. Thank goodness I grew up in hilly Steubenville, Ohio. It all came back to me: turn your wheels when you park on a hillside; that way you’ll tend toward the curb. And what else?? Quick! Where is my emergency brake? I had no idea! In flat Florida an emergency brake is a flourish, not a life-saving device. My heart was popping, and then, just in time, the road (I-80?) turned away from the high points. 

Then back. Is it a hill or a mountain up ahead? Oh, these were hills; Rosa and I were rolling on earth plump like mounds of bread dough, yeasty and golden, spotted with a few trees. 

Oh, no! Now mountains! Those sharp points! 

Thankfully, we veered away again, across a bridge over water deep enough for container ships. I marvel at the large imaginations that designed all I was passing through: fields and silos and tall buildings and apartments and farm stands selling peaches and cucumbers and tomatoes. 

Walnut Creek itself I must learn to love. It seems a manicured place. Several women at the church where the meeting was held said they are a “20-minute BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit)-ride from Berkeley.” So, I gather, it’s where ideas bloom. Glad to be here! 

Then, in the afternoon I returned to a still-messy place that feels like home. Zing was waiting for me and he hadn’t pee'd during all the hours I was gone. So he’s at home here too. We went for a walk and then I talked for a long time with my friend Pam. I fried some bread on my new stove and had a salad. Now I’m listening to opera (don’t ask me what!) and looking out the big window at the night and the scattered lights in the office building across the street. 

Good night!

Love,

K

Speakers discussed the Modern Quilt Movement
(above and below)

More than 50 members of
Studio Art Quilt Associates
 from northern California and Nevada met Saturday

Pati Fried, Cathy Miranker and Tara Faughnan, were speakers

(I think quilt detail above is by Tara Faughnan, but not certain)

Florida in Fabric II

"I can't believe how powerful it is to actually be here and experience the texture and fabric," a visitor told me at the Florida in Fabric II exhibit at the Ruth Funk Center for Textile Arts at the Florida Institute of Technology in Melbourne. She's right.  Photos don't properly convey fiber art. But, until you get to the show itself, here are photos from the opening and also the gallery talk by juror Martha Sielman. When the artist was present, Martha turned the mike over to her to explain her own work. The show runs through August 23. 

Carla Funk, left, Director of University Museums at FIT,  with Martha Sielman, juror of the exhibit
and Executive Director of Studio Art Quilt Associates, Inc. (SAQA)

La Via a la Florida: Las Flores Bellisimas by Marsha Walper of Tallahassee

Regina Dunn of DeLand, with Beach Walk

Susan Rienzo of Vero Beach, with Sunshine State of Mind

Ellen Lindner of Melbourne discusses The Last Few Dates

Martha Sielman with Sometimes This Place Bugs Me by Marlyn Foell of Satellite Beach

Linda Geiger of Cocoa Beach with Homage to Cutoffs and Hawaiian Print Shirts

Martha Sielman with Star Over Tallahassee by Vonda Frenes of Palm Bay

Album of Florida Lights by Mary Jo Kuhn of Jacksonville

Martha Sielman describing the postcard charm of Golden Apples of the Sun  by  Sandra Donabed of Jupiter

Ellen Haines of Jacksonville with Fire

Martha Sielman with Sweet Florida Blue by Lisa-Marie Sanders of Cocoa Beach

Martha Sielman with Orange Topiary by Margo Huckabay Hicks of Palm Bay

Martha Sielman with a piece from Oil Stains,
an accompanying show that is quilter Eleanor McCain 's response
to the BP Gulf oil spill

Bridge: Arc in Air

Bridge
20 1/4" x 16 1/2"

This is Bridge, my piece in the Florida in Fabric II exhibit at the Ruth Funk Center for Textile Arts in Melbourne. If you get to Melbourne you can see it through August 23. It won a Director's Choice mention.

I love to run across bridges, and in this piece I'm trying -- through flying words, shiny fish, and translucent color -- to convey what it feels like to be in the middle of a bridge on a gorgeous day. The arc reminds me of the William Powell Bridge in Miami, and the words are the first stanza of a poem I wrote about the marvelous people I have encountered on that bridge over the years -- including a one-legged woman who ran across on crutches, a man who always ran backward, and the faithful who on some Sundays were baptized in the shallow water on the far side.

 I sewed the introductory first stanza using free-motion stitches:

Arc in air

blue air

blue air shining

shining like bait fish

fish in a silver net

caught in the sky

Notes from Lesley Riley's artist success webinar

This closet looks organized to me. The bulletin board has my work plans.

To-do list for Florida SAQA entry

I could not find my notebook on how to be an organized artist. It has notes I'd taken while watching Quickstart Your Art Business ASAP: An 8-Step Artist Success Action Program, an Interweave webinar featuring Lesley Riley.
When I did find it -- under a pile of other books --  I couldn't find the right pages. Since the notebook was almost full already, I'd just skipped around, writing notes in all the empty spaces. But now I think I've made sense of it: here are highlights:

1. Schedule time. Use every five minutes to move yourself forward.
2. Have visual reminders, with clear goals. Say I want to do ____ by ____.
3. Seek your style. 
4. Define what makes your art special and love that.
5. Create a social media presence; choose at least two outlets:  blog, Facebook, Pinterest, YouTube … 
6. Face your fears; common ones are about (lack of) money and being unsure of one's talent. 
7. Plan your work.
8. Market your work. Don't be shy. 

I'm not going to tackle all eight just now, but Lesley Riley has already led me to itemize steps  I have to take to complete my projects. For instance, I've got to learn how to manipulate the pixels before I can send properly sized photos of my work to SAQA.

As for #8, marketing -- I'm somewhere between Lesley Riley and my favorite artist, Agnes Martin, who said, " I paint with my back to the world." 

Art quilt: emphasis on ART

I just attended Leni Wiener's webinar on entering Studio Art Quilt Associates shows. 

In a few days you'll be able to find the hour-long audio, with its guiding PowerPoint, on the SAQA web site. For now, here are two points that impressed me:

1. SAQA means art. People want to see art. Some of those people are not sure they want to see quilts. So for SAQA shows, they are looking for jurors who are artists or fine are curators -- and not necessarily quilters. I am glad!

2. An artist's portfolio should look like all the pieces are made by the same person. This means it is coherent in palette, technique and style. If you check Wiener's web site, you'll see that she offers guidance in developing a style. (The $100 fee seems reasonable.) 

Studio Art Quilt Associates Florida Met Saturday

Jennifer and I drove to Melbourne Saturday for an afternoon with other Florida members of Studio Art Quilt Associates. Events were at the Ruth Funk Center for Textile Arts at Florida Institute of Technology, where there is a show of selections from Masters: Art Quilts 2. Martha Sielman, curator of the show, gave a one-hour tour, highlighting every other quilt on the wall. (It would have taken two hours to cover all of them, she said.) Some things (trends?) I liked were: silk and fewer layers (two -- or even one), and texture. incorporating twigs. There was lots more. You can see everything in the Masters 2 book from Lark Crafts. I wish I had counted the people and also the quilts -- but I didn't. The show closes Aug. 24. 

• Ruth Funk Center for Textile Arts
  at Florida Institute of Technology
  150 W. University Blvd. , Melbourne , FL , 32901
• :
  321-674-8313 (Phone)

Viewing A Scorching Sun by Reiko Naganuma of Japan
85 1/4" x 65 1/4"

Jennifer Bailey, SAQA Florida Pod 1 representative

Marianne R. Williamson of Miami
showing one of her Impressionistic, intensely-stitched quilts

We wrapped up with dinner
 at Bonefish Willy's