Patience and perseverence.

    Today the last towel and journal from the Linen Team arrived back here in York. It was worth the wait.

Towel #V hard at work.

      Towel #V spent 8 months being well used and loved in a Navajo Nation school in Arizona. Journal #V is busting at the binding with life, text, images, beads, drawings, art, memories and stories.
    As I flip through the pages of this journal my heart feels so full with gratitude. THANK YOU Mrs. Wilson's art students!!

Towel #V has arrived back in York.

Worth the wait.

    Now that all the journals and towels have been returned, I am still hopeful that a few more of you Paper Team folks will send me your papers. I will happily spin whatever you have to offer me.
    During these dark months ahead I will design and create a piece that incorporates these spun papers.
    Now more than ever I believe in the metaphor of weaving as an illustration of community - and specifically of a balanced plain weave as an illustration of democracy. We are all part of the same cloth.
   I am still seeking a location to install the completed project.
With much gratitude ~ Sarah

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.

From text to thread

SHIFU is the process of spinning Japanese paper into threads. This ancient technique of making thread allowed Well Used, Well Loved participants a way to safely and secretly share their responses to the project prompts.

beautifully decorated kozo paper

Fold and Cut

The process begins with the writing and drawing on kozo paper.

The paper is folded and cut into thin strips. Then it is torn at alternating ends to create one long, continuous strip of paper.

Kozo paper is all cut

Each place where this continuous strip makes a turn needs to be pre-spun. Using a little moistness on my fingers, I give this corner a little twist to make the spinning process more smooth. This turning juncture in the paper strip makes a small "seed" and gives Shifu threads their unique character.

Tearing the edges to make a long continuous strip

Once all the seeds have been pre-twisted I begin to spin the paper into thread - either with a drop spindle or on the spinning wheel.

I will upload a video of spinning in the next blog posting! Happy Shifu!!

From paper to thread

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?

Beginning from this end

handspun kozo paper from the mountains of CO

 "What we call the beginning is often the end.

And to make an end is to make a beginning.

The end is where we start from"

       T.S. Eliot from The Four Quartets

And here we are - the end of the first phase of "Well Used, Well Loved" our community art project where we have explored age, beauty, loss and love. It is, however, just the beginning of unraveling, examining and reflection on what transpired over the past nine months.

Towels, journals and papers return to the studio

Our well used and loved towels are arriving back here in the studio.

Our creatively expressed papers have come back as well. Some kozo papers arrived in spun paper form and others await my hands to turn them into thread.

My own summer was rather eventful - as you might note from my last blog posting. Add to the loss of my own well loved Mother - the addition of a new daughter-in-law in a big family wedding in our back yard.

Kozo spinning lesson

I am blessed to live a creative and busy life - filled with loving family. And now it is time to pour this love back into "Well Used, Well Loved."

Beginnings and celebrations

Well Used, With Love

Her well used, with love hands.

If there is one object that we can observe that is well loved and well used - it would be our hands. I mentioned this in the last post and the last project prompt.

My mother with her beautiful hands slipped away on the silvery trail of the full moon on June 20th at 9:10 PM.  Flying across Casco Bay, right out the Hussey Sound, she sailed towards a new horizon.

I photographed and drew her hands her last few days. It has been a distinct privilege and true joy to be her daughter - she was a true gift. I feel like I am just beginning to know her.

Me and Mom Summer 2012

Soft Matter

Soft matter: vulnerability and love

Prompt #9

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, vulnerable to abrasion, cuts and also open to compassion and a tender caress.

Examine your hands - what signs of use and love do they illustrate?

What connections to your perceive between soft materials, vulnerability and love?

Hands and feet have stories to tell as us.

One participants response:"When we think of soft we often think of vulnerable but we don't as readily think of hard as brittle.
As a child I was obsessed with my hands and how smooth and "unused" they looked. I admired (OK, I was a weird child) old people's hands. The ropier the better.
And to think I have a pair of my own now!
I'm not sure if I thought things that had been used over a long period of time were more interesting but I think I did, were such hands more loved or more useful? I can't say. Perhaps even more appreciated.
The kobo paper is a perfect example of soft and strong at the same time. People can be like that as well. Love always makes you vulnerable but who would choose to live without it?"