Virginia A. Spiegel

Boundary Waters 60 (RockTime)
Virginia A. Spiegel

I seldom like to detour from the themes I’m currently pursuing in my artwork, but the artwork for Dinner at Eight Artists (Jamie Fingal and Leslie Tucker Jenison) wanted to be created as soon as I read the call for this juried invitational.  Jamie and Leslie invited us to consider “An exchange between friends.  A handshake.  A kiss before bedtime.  The artist at work. A sun salutation. The wave before boarding a school bus. A song, a word, a meditation. A habit, a custom.  The traditional toast at a gathering. A rite of passage.  The sacred moments of the ordinary.  Rituals:  What are yours?”

I even, oddly enough, liked the required size, 60″Hx24″W, as it made me think of approaching the work as though it were a scroll.  As soon as I read the word ritual I knew that I wanted to do something about RockTime which is one of the truest rituals in my life: “My sister and I paddle to a campsite, put up our tent, unload our backpacks, and then it is, at last, RockTime.  We spend hours just sitting and looking.  But what we are really doing is engaging in a ritual of being of the place, in harmony with rock, tree, and water.”

Boundary Waters 60 (RockTime) – Detail
Virginia A. Spiegel

I’ll have more details about this artwork as the premier at the International Quilt Festival – Long Beach in July approaches.  In the meantime, the Dinner at Eight Artists’ blog is now featuring invited artists’ profiles, including mine.

Rituals’ sponsor for IQF-Long Beach is Moore’s Sewing Centers and Havel’s Sewing for Festival in Houston.

Folio 4, Corvid #8

I was inspired to create the Corvid series after reading Mind of the Raven by Bernd Heinrich. Ravens, blackbirds, and jays as well as the other Corvids are among the most intelligent of birds.  I wanted to show their mental complexity through layers of materials (and thought).

Folio 4, Corvid #5

Materials include hand-painted and screen printed fabric, screen printed papers, florists mesh, Lutradur,ink, graphite, and thread.  Techniques include paint, screenprint, collage, stitch, draw, stamp, and ink.

Folio 2  (Black Trees), Page 5
7″h x 5″w matted to 10×8″

Not one, but two new series debut today.

Folio 2 – Black Trees are ten artworks based upon a ten word poem.  There are layers upon layers of fabric and paint — a mysterious story of tree, sky, and branch on each page.

Folio 3 (Woven Words) – Page 5

The second new series up today is Folio 3 – Woven Word.  The poem and artwork focus on doors, windows, and words — so much in our lives concealed and revealed.

The base layer of painted cloth and stitching is almost obscured by the many layers of screen printing.  The final touch is hand stitching with beautiful hand-dyed red embroidery thread from Laura Wasilowski.

In case you missed its debut, here is the Folio 1 – Thread series.

Folio 1, page 1

The best books I read are somewhat ambiguous.  They force readers to add their own interpretation to the story being told. I am currently very interested in exploring the limits of ambiguity in my art. See all the artwork here.  This series is a folio of “pages” based on ten-word poem. Sometimes the word is visible on the page; sometimes layers have obscured it. I’m not divulging the poem as I wanted you to be able to imagine your own story.  But if you want to know the word on a particular “page,” I would, of course, share. And I can tell you that the poem is entitled Threads.

Folio 1, Page 10

Formerly Present 3 under the needle.  Its texture comes from the surface design and the stitching.  This is quite a difference from the last pieces in the Boundary Waters series.

Here is the progression, in reverse,  so far:

Formerly Present 2
With 500 yards of thread used in the stitching to create a natural grid to contrast with the surface design.

Formerly Present 1