News bits and updates

Towel and journal VI back home.

I began this journey in early 2016 with around 50 households participating in the project where we explored thoughts, feelings and reflections on age, beauty, attachment and impermanence.

Three years have passed since I reached out for companions on this journey - and I am eternally grateful for the enthusiastic and willing folks who contributed this project.

Well Used, Well Loved continues to garner attention and awards. Here are some news bits and project updates.

Last week I brought the 4 WUWL panels home from a solo exhibit in Brunswick ME at Maine FiberArts.

I have also been returning the Well Used and Loved towels and journals to the 8 Linen Team households. Only one towel/journal set is waiting to go back home.

Well Used, Well Loved has been accepted in a national  juried exhibit titled "Excellence in Fibers IV."    The exhibit will be in Los Angeles at The Craft in America Center from May 11 - July 6, 2019.

I am so pleased that this work is getting the recognition it deserves and that all the voices that contributed to this project are being seen.

Again - thank you to all who supported and championed this project. I am incredibly grateful.

WUWL panels with Shifu threads 

Central panels installed at ME FiberArts Gallery

WUWL in FiberArts Now magazine

Full Circle

 Come see the project on display! Read the journals, handle the towels and soak up the 12' weaving. George Marshall Gallery, Lindsay Road, York ME. 

   

Well Used, Well Loved at George Marshall Gallery, York, ME until July8, 2018.

The Eight Journals on display and available to be read.

The 8 towels and journals.

Towel III caretakers Andrew and Bethie.

"Well Used, Well Loved" in the spotlight!!

After two years of designing, organizing, guiding and working on "Well Used, Well Loved, " -- I have the opportunity to exhibit the entire project at a lovely gallery right here in town.

Here are the details:
Where: George Marshall Gallery 
104 Lindsay Road, York ME 03909
When: May 26 - July 8, 2018
Opening: May 26th, 5-7
Artist talk: Sunday June 24th 3 PM

On exhibit ~ the four panel piece woven from the hand-spun papers with participants text, the well used and loved handwoven dishtowels and the participants journals.

Detail of center panels

I hope many of you will be able to come witness the power of community art.

Heartfelt gratitude for all the households who participated in this project ~

Sarah

Progress Report

Shifu thread is so easy to weave 

The Shifu paper thread is brocaded on to the surface

 I have begun weaving with the Shifu spun paper thread from the participants in Well Used, Well Loved. Now that the loom is all threaded and ready to weave -- it is a breeze. This thread is so gorgeous that all I have to do is stitch it down with the supplementary warp -- and it looks amazing.

Slight color changes from each paper thread

"I'm my cat's dishtowel"

I am digging in to each of the 8 Journals - reading each one - selecting favorite passages to copy on to Kozo paper for spinning as well as transcribing these passages to my lap top for future reference.

Here are some beautiful words from journal #III.

"I feel no moment slows down enough to become well-loved. My things grow well-used without my noticing them. Is that a form of love? Trusting a thing to be there for you without acknowledging or thanks? That trust, that faith, is a way to love?”“Maybe it’s a way we allow children or pets to love us. I’m sure that’s how my cat feel about me. She loves me by allowing me to work thanklessly for her. I’m my cat’s dishtowel.”

Honestly - if I had the time and energy -- I'd copy every word and illustration in each journal. I feel so honored to be able to step inside your head and hearts as I sit with your responses to the prompts. 

Gathering, Reflecting

    For those people who make art -- you know this time period.
If I were a hen -- I'd be sitting on my eggs.
Contemplating, keeping them warm, inspecting them every new and then.

Well Used, Well Loved - Journals and towels

    Well -- here I am -- exhibiting hen-like behavior. Not actually sitting on this stuff I gathered from "Well Used, Well Loved" - but contemplating it.
     Examining it, reviewing it. I am inspired by the stack of journals that were so lovingly created by the linen team households.
     I am awestruck by the depth of thoughtful writing and drawing that the paper team created. The Shifu spun threads from these kozo papers are seeped with spirit.

A response to Prompt #9 "Soft Matter"

     Entering into these dark winter months ahead, I feel the poignant potential of these materials.
    This time of waiting, sitting, listening and reflecting is a critical step in the art making process.
So like a hen,  I'll just sit here for now.


    Thanks for waiting with me.


Shifu spun threads waiting to be woven.

The list of prompts

WELL USED, WELL LOVED

A Community art project that explores age and beauty

Through the vehicle of a physical object (a hand-woven towel, a journal and kozo paper) over 30 households explored questions of age, beauty, value and attachment.

From later January to late September 2016, we explored together and alone the following questions. Some of us wrote in journals while others wrote on kozo paper.

HERE IS OUR ENTIRE LIST OF PROMPTS

 

Prompt #1 on kozo paper

Prompt #1 - Hello

Introduce yourself and your household.

 

Prompt #2 - Old and beautiful

As you look around your life and home -

What or who do you perceive of as "old"?

What/who do you perceive as "beautiful"?

Do you have possessions that feel too precious or special to use?

 

Prompt #3 - Will I be loved?

What connections do you see between being attractive/beautiful and being loved?

If I feel beautiful/attractive/appealing to others - will this mean I will be loved?

 

Prompt #4 -  Demonstrating Love

What actions, words, or attitudes demonstrate love?

 

Prompt #5 - Sorting

Prompt #5 on kozo paper

Spring cleaning: Attachment to objects, people, attitudes.

How do you sort, let go of these thing/ people that are no longer serving you?

How do you evaluate the need/desire to keep stuff?

 

Response to prompt #6

Prompt #6   Absorption

The materials for this project are handwoven linen and Kozo paper. Both of these are created from a plant material, a bast fiber - both known for its absorption qualities. 

Your towel, your paper has absorbed much in the last two months you've been together. Absorption can also been seen as dissolving boundaries, union.

In that light I wonder what parallels or connection you observe between your own ability to absorb, to soak up, to feel to empathize? What reflections do you perceive  between your materials (linen, paper) and the action of union, of dissolving boundaries of connection? What value do these actions have today?

 

Prompt #7     The Dark Side

For two months we have examined and reflected on different aspects of using and loving.

This week I would like to explore what might be considered the dark side of this topic. It’s a place that some might shy away from – with all good reason.  And yet, to know and understand something – we must be aware of its opposite.  In this case, what might be the opposite of “Well Used, Well Loved”?

In yoga class, sometimes my teacher will have us exaggerate the opposite of a pose – for example if she wants us to relax and drop our shoulders – she asks us to shrug them up, way up to our ears.  And then we dip our shoulders back down with new awareness of both positions. As many philosophers query – how can we know sunshine without knowing shadow?

These opposites are an integral part of Yin/Yang philosophy, Bali Hinduism and many other spiritual traditions.  Perhaps the deeper we explore both sides, the less obvious is the line between “black and white".

Prompt #7 in a journal

 

PROMPT #7

Do you see an opposite to Well Used, Well Loved?

Do you want to explore this opposite side?

If so, what do you see is the opposite of Well Used, Well Loved?

 As always – there are NO right answers to these prompts. And they are very personal.

To share them is your choice – not a requirement.



Prompt #3 response in journal

 

Prompt #8  Beauty, Economics, Well Being

Beauty is temporary - right??

You pick a beautiful flower and know it will fade, wither and die.

 

How is it then that I struggle to accept this?

How is it that I resist the inevitable aging process of my own body?

This is a normal, natural process.

 

For over 15 years I have colored my hair (in reaction to school children commenting that I reminded them of grandma.) I did not want to be like grandma while in my late 40s. So I took to coloring my hair.

 

Just this month I made the decision to "go gray".  In sharing this decision with a friend who is still active in her career  ~ she remarked  she could not choose this option. She feels obligated to keep coloring her hair while she is actively employed. "It's just a fact" she said  "To be valued in the work place you must appear vital and youthful. Gray hair does not fit."

 

My mind quickly queried about the connection between economic survival and our cultural attachment to beauty. Thus Prompt #8 is ~

 

• What connection do you see in your own life between your economic survival/well being and your age/beauty?? Are you in a profession that requires a certain maintenance of image/beauty?
• What connections do you see in our culture between economic survival/well being and age//beauty?

 

Prompt #9

Soft matter: vulnerability and love

Both our towel and our Kozo paper are soft materials - allowing them to show evidence of wear and tear - or use and love. Our physical bodies are similar.

• Examine your hands - what signs of use and love do they illustrate?
• What connections to your perceive between soft materials, vulnerability and love?
  

  
  

  
  

  

  Playing with color and language on kozo paper

  
  

 

Prompt #10 "Saying Goodbye"

 

My most successful public workshop is the Mandala Community Weaving. To introduce this project I sit and talk with students about Mandalas - especially ones of sand  made by the Tibetan Buddhist Monks. I guide them thru the story of how the Monks take a long time (a  week or so) to make these Mandalas, using colored grains of sand that just lie on top of an outline.

I talk to the students about how the monks make the Mandalas over and over again -  as a practice and a lesson. I show them photos to show how after spending days working on the Mandala, the Monks sweep it up into a brass bowl and then with great ceremony they pour the sand into the closest body of natural water.

 

After sharing this story I ask them: "Why do you think the Monks spend a long time making something beautiful and then pouring it into the water? What lesson do you think the Monks are trying to learn?"

 

I have asked this question to hundreds of young people - and invariably I get an array of beautiful answers. The most memorable response was from an 8 year old in Maryland last spring.  He said "I think that they are trying to learn how to say good bye to something that they love."

 

Yes, exactly.

Isn't this the most difficult lesson we as human beings must learn. Whether it is a beloved flannel shirt that is just too tattered to wear anymore or your elderly mother who is frail and failing - it is very hard to say good bye.

Letting go and saying good bye is hard.

This will be my last official prompt for the project - we will be saying good bye to this effort in a month.

 

Prompt #10 - How do you say good bye to something or someone that you love?  Do you have a ritual for saying good bye? Can you share a story?

Behind the couch

Towel III. Lurking behind the couch.

What lurks behind your couch? Between the cushions, hidden away? Is it something that you intentionally hid there to avoid confrontation? Or is it something neglected?  Or simply something forgotten in the busyness of life?  

In our Well Used, Well Loved project we are on prompt #8: which examines the connections between beauty, economics and impermanence.

• What connection do you see in your own life between your economic survival/well being and your age/beauty?? Are you in a profession that requires a certain maintenance of image/beauty?
• What connections do you see in our culture between economic survival/well being and age//beauty?

 In a manner - this is something that gets stuffed behind the couch - not talked about - but when the topic is brought out to the light - I am not surprised at the energy that it consumes. Just ask any woman of a certain age about her choice to color or not color her hair.

In reality though, I think hair coloring is just the surface of this topic.

I am curious about the conversation that lurks behind the cushions.

What do men have to say about this prompt? 

What lurks behind this topic?

Our connective tissue

Towel II cools with the bread.

As a weaver and thread enthusiast, I am well aware of all the metaphors that underlie my work.  One of my current passions is thread as connective tissue between living organisms - the element that binds you to me, binds cultures throughout history, binds seemingly disparate tribes. Sort of gluten perhaps?

And yet sometimes our threads do not connect - we have different points of view on the same issue. This is where conflict could arise. But what if rather than conflict we simply nodded our head - and agreed to disagree? Then the connective tissue that binds us together is unbroken.

"Well Used, Well Loved" has a closed Face Book group - where we share our thoughts, response to the prompts and the photos. This is a safe place for our participants to be vulnerable and share ideas, opinions - each one unique. I, for one, have had my eyes opened to feelings that are quite different than my own. 

We are on Prompt #7 "The Dark Side"

For two months we have examined and reflected on different aspects of using and loving.

This week I would like to explore what might be considered the dark side of this topic. It’s a place that some might shy away from – with all good reason.  And yet, to know and understand something – we must be aware of its opposite.  In this case, what might be the opposite of “Well Used, Well Loved”?

Towel VII helps with Easter eggs

In yoga class, sometimes my teacher will have us exaggerate the opposite of a pose – for example if she wants us to relax and drop our shoulders – she asks us to shrug them up, way up to our ears.  And then we dip our shoulders back down with new awareness of both positions. As many philosophers query – how can we know sunshine without knowing shadow?

These opposites are an integral part of Yin/Yang philosophy, Bali Hinduism and many other spiritual traditions.  Perhaps the deeper we explore both sides, the less obvious is the line between “black and white". 

PROMPT #7

• Do you see an opposite to Well Used, Well Loved?
• Do you want to explore this opposite side? 
• If so, what do you see is the opposite of Well Used, Well Loved? 

 As always – there are NO right answers to these prompts. And they are very personal. 

To share them is your choice – not a requirement.

I am so very grateful for your companionship on this journey of inquiry.

Here are two responses: one visual, one written ~

Visual response to Prompt #7

"I can't seem to shake the last prompt regarding opposites, darkness and light... it follows me through my day and even seems to be stalking me in my sleep. Clearly something, I have not given enough consideration to, is seeking my focus and attention. As I sat staring at VIII on my kitchen counter this morning I wondered... is she a continuation of VII and all the woven and numbered towels before her? Cut from the same cloth, but with her own unique sewn and stitched edges. That's when it hit me.... the idea and nature of EDGES is what has been insistently prodding me. Edges, transitions and the nature and power of something to be itself and at some point (visible/invisible/tangible/intangible) become/express something else. It's time to grab some paints and stay tuned to what is bubbling up from the edges and transitions of the dark woods I am about to wander through."

So many threads

Towel V gets wet and messy with a ceramics class.

    I've been away from home for a spell - and there are so many photos and stories that I want to share about what's gone on in this project!! I will be breaking it up into a few blog posts.
    Our 8 Well used, loved towels are out in the world - living large with individuals and families, a classroom and households from England to Arizona and Oregon.
    Our 38 paper team folks had their spinning workshop

kozo paper before it becomes thread

this week. Soon I will have a tutorial for those who could not join our workshop.
   I am in the thick of writing a grant to fund this project for deeper exploration. All is well - I just need to catch up on some news here!

Towel II helps clean up.

    Many of you are contributing the our closed FB group - and I am delighted to see that the threads of connectivity are weaving a tight web.

   That's it for today - back to grant work!

I'll do my best to keep posting your images and stories.

Peace, Sarah

Towel VII helps with birthday confections!

Uncovering the connections



Periodically I pose a question or some point of reflection. Here are some words that folks have shared:

"Each week as I ponder our prompts, I fall deeply into my head, becoming reluctant to post. This afternoon I walked into my studio and found some threads from a recent project, lying on my work table in the shape of a heart. I taped them to my journal and these words came forth."

"I realized today that I might actually be a bit sad to send VIII back at the end of this project, the connection she symbolizes is to me like a link to an old friend being newly remembered. Ahhhh."

"I would describe my relationship to my body as well used, but until recently not well loved. In truth, I spent the better part of fifty years "thinking" I loved my body. "Thinking" I understood the nature of our relationship, "forcing" my ideas about how I should look, act, and feel, "meeting out" my own sense of timing and rhythm, and "dictating" my ideas about what I should eat, drink and do upon this aspect of my Self. But it wasn't until I journeyed through the dark under...ground of cancer that I came to be open enough, to see, know, listen to and love my body as my most faithful and true consort/companion."

journal writing with a well loved pen

The writings and drawings on the kozo paper will be spun into thread and woven into a community art piece.  The writings and drawings in the journals will be shared in an exhibit this fall, along with the 8 hand-woven well used, well loved dishtowels.





Off they go into the wild blue yonder!

One last look at the towels.

Today I went to the post office and shipped off the eight towels and journals to the linen team. The Kozo paper has arrived for the Paper team - so tomorrow I'll start to prepare the packets for this group.

I continue to be surprised and delighted by the response to this project. I have had over 45 people request to be involved in the project. There will be over 40 people involved on both teams (paper and Linen).


I have asked participants to contribute to this blog - or to email me and I'll share their news. So stay tuned for more news - the exploration into age and beauty has begun!

Towel and journal ready to travel.

Ready to ship.

The projects has legs!

I have received over 40 requests to participate in this project!

Today I emailed the two groups that will be participating. I'll keep the information fresh as this unfolds.

The heart of "Well Used, Well Loved" (WUWL)  is an inquiry into  thoughts, feelings and reflections on age and beauty.

From its inception this community art project has had two legs - The Linen Team: which reflects on age and beauty through the use of a hand-woven linen towel and  The Paper Team: which records personal reflections and conversation around age and beauty on Japanese Kozo paper that will eventually be spun into thread and woven in to a textile art work.


NEWS FLASH!! Well Used, Well Loved has received grant funding from the Artists Resource Trust a fund of the Berkshire Taconic Community Foundation! So now the project can really fly on these two legs! Thank you to the A.R.T and the folks at the Berkshire Taconic Community Foundation!!

In one spirit ~ Sarah

 

Project ready to go! Seeking 8 households or individuals!!!

Towels and journals ready to go!

Well Used, Well Loved

A community art project that explores age and beauty

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Will you consider joining me in this reflection on age and beauty?


     I am seeking 8 individuals or households to "adopt" a hand-woven linen towel to use for six months. You will be asked to record periodic reflections and observations in a small journal that will be provided. Each site will be invited to have a "kitchen table conversation" with me at least once during the time period.
     At the end of the six months, I will collect the used towel, exchanging it for a new towel as a thank you for participating in the project.
     The eight Well Used and Well Loved towels will be the centerpiece for an installation grounded in an exploration of aging and beauty.     The journals (or text from them) will also be a part of the final installation.
     If you are interested I will ask you to sign a participation agreement. You will agree to use the towel, to communicate during the project's 6 months, to write in a journal, to return the towel at the end of six months.


Please visit my website for more info.
http://sarahhaskell.com


Please contact me if you are interested in participating in this project.


Thank you!