Studio Visit

One of my goals for the new year is to spend more time working in my studio.  When I had younger children, it was impossible to get to the studio to work so I sublet it for years and years.  Finally, when it seemed more possible, I took back the space.  But my work had evolved to suit my life with young children.  It had become so collaborative and so well-suited to being worked on while sitting on the living room couch.  Did I even need a studio anymore?  Why was I paying rent on a space that I hardly ever used?

These questions continue to come up, even as more time becomes available to me as Finnian and Lucy gain independence in their daily activities.  Yet, I have kept the studio, now with a studio mate (who I love, btw) to help pay the rent.  There is always something about having a space where I can be alone and shut the door.  Virginia Woolf was right - a room of one's own, even if you share it with another artist sometimes, is essential to an artist.  For me, going back into my studio also is to become reacquainted with older work that was more studio-based i.e. more suited to hanging on a white wall than on a tree on a highway in Korea.  These works are more intimate and personal in nature and recall, for me, very specific times in my history.

For example,

Obviously I didn't have children when I started this one!  But then they must have come along shortly thereafter because it was never finished.

Yes, I was making a beaded pair of lumberjack underwear, why do you ask?

Maybe I do need to finish that one.  

On Friday, however, I was there to prep some things for a visit from a curator putting together a show at a space in Brooklyn.  I managed to get two boxes of squares into the studio with assistance from Finnian, who was delighted to help as you can imagine.

The squares are very, very dirty.  Here is the very first one I made last summer in Newfoundland:

It used to be pink.

The plan for the show is to stack them, like the photo above, around the perimeter of the gallery with an aim to get all 700 in the space.  I think it is possible.  Note to self:  bring some soap.