To Stand in the Center and See All Around - an Introduction

While I hate to be one of those "sorry for not blogging" kind of bloggers...I do apologize for the silence.  Partly, it is because I have not taken photographs for ages so I feel badly about so many picture-less posts.  And partly it is because I have been pretty flat out busy.   Any extra moments have been taken up with smaller projects and being with a sick friend.  It is surprising how much mental space that uses up, but it does.

All that aside, I have been working (somewhat) steadily on my project for bkbx that will be opening on March 6th.  Save the date!  It is called To Stand in the Center and See All Around.

The piece has been morphing in my head and under my hands.  I am still very much in process of spinning and knitting the black Shetland wool.  My plan, and it seems to be working, is to simply begin the process without expectations.  Using the notion that textiles can become saturated with narrative, I began making the piece.  I spin in silence.  I spin while watching episodes of Chopped and Anthony Bourdain's Parts Unknown (a cooking theme seems to have started up).  I spin while listening to dharma talks by the MRO teachers and senior students.

I also knit.  I knit in my living room, on the subway, at the Temple, at the Infusion Center where my friend has her chemo.  I will bring my knitting and my wheel (hey - hope springs eternal!) to Nashville in a couple of week's time.  I even spent some time during Rohatsu working out the details of the  installation, which wasn't exactly what I was supposed to be doing but I did it anyway.

The piece is getting bigger and it also is gathering a kind of energy.  It is developing a presence that comes from everything that is being poured into it - intentional and unintentional.  I want to put my finger on what, exactly, that is but I find that it can not be summed up in words.  I suppose this is why it is a thing, an art object, and not a novel or essay.  It has a certain vibe or buzz or mojo - or maybe prana or chi or ki, if you want to look at it that way.  You can't make it happen but you can't stop it from happening either.

I also have purchased 2500 pieces of 1" mirror.  These will be included in the installation, as well.

That whole Minimalist thing?  Yah, not so much.