Notes on the Experience of Making Art, 2008
- February 16, 2008
- Notes on the experience of making stuff, perhaps
- It hasn't been art so much as conservation, and as much engineering and common sense as creativity, per se. Two drivers: The drought, and the energy audit. Latter first.
- March 2, 2008
- Stash
- In between discussions of their Teeny Project Runway contest, Ann Shayne at Mason Dixon Knitting mentioned rag balls in her February 25, 2008 entry. At the same time, Stephanie Pearl McGhee posted a rumination about stash and how much was too much in her February 26, 2008 post at Yarn Harlot.
- March 29, 2008
- Music
- Three years ago before I met John, my Match profile ending with a PS:
- April 4, 2008
- Practice
- Read Stephanie Pearl-McPhee's latest book, Things I Learned from Knitting, last night. One of the chapterettes talked about getting better if you just knit enough. That we all make crummy projects in the beginning, and if we just keep showing up to the needles and fiber, our output gets better.
- April 19, 2008
- Book Reviews
- What is it about writing book reviews for Amazon, and why do I care that I'm ranked at #29000-someodd (and wow, I'm so excited because the last time I checked, I was in the 35,000s!!)?
- April 26, 2008
- Bruce Baker's Seminars
- The Arts Incubator in Siler City received a grant to cover the cost of bringing Bruce Baker to town to deliver four of his seminars about selling art. The price to Guild members was about the same as buying the CDs, so I took a deep breath and arranged my schedule to attend all of them. It's not easy to add 12 hours of classes and 180 miles of extra driving into an already-full week, but am I glad I did!
- Booth Design: Lots and lots and lots to think about, and even more to change. He didn't make the point overtly: the booth is not the tent frame. I've been relying too much on the frame of my tent as the booth structure, and it needs to be different. Cover the gridwall with cloth. Hang gridwall horizonally and use that as a hanging surface. Find a carpet, and build / construct / obtain somehow better display hardware. Keep it all up at waist height because people will not bend over. After the Jury Slides session, I'm also thinking about displaying the rugs by colorway, but that may be tricky. I haven't done two rugs from the same palette yet. Pondering a wall of cubbies with rugs folded inside, displayed as people show interest. Maybe. Wonder how other 10x10 vendors sell rugs, and where to go to see examples.
- Product Development: Pay attention to trends, and run like crazy when one happens to match up to whatever you're doing. While this was a bit interesting, I'm inclined to think there's a bit of after-the-fact explanation happening. "This sold well, and therefore it must be because we aligned with that trend." I don't know to what extent it is possible to consciously align to trends. And we didn't think to raise the question of, "isn't it the artists' business to be setting the trends?" (Leonard Shlain, Art & Physics.) I feel similarly when I take color palettes from magazines. What then if the magazine designers are studying artists to find new palettes? This can become insanely circular very quickly. (which is a spiral, and my attraction for spirals is a known factor.)
- Sales Skills: The highlight of the set, and the CD everyone bought. (Slides & Booth don't have pictures, and for those classes, it's the bad examples that provide the most value.) What to say, how to say it, how to think about the selling interchange. I'd heard his casette tape on the same subject and I think I had made some changes in my presentation. Not enough. Bruce is, by birth and innate nature, a salesman, and he admits he started making jewelry in order to have something to sell. It's easy to dismiss him in memory with, "but I'm just not that way." However, even if I'm not and never will be that way, I can make adjustments and (try to) see this as a series of on-going opportunities to study what is happening and what needs to happen in order to get money for my rugs. Even one sale a month will make a difference to the studio's financial status. If I can learn to do that, rather than trusting to the universe (which has not served me very well as far as rug sales go), life could be very different and I could realistically consider applying to "big" shows next year. After I get the booth design worked out.
- Jury Slides surprised me the most. I've been accepted to the local shows with no problems, and I thought I understood "good slides." I've read Bruce's articles in the Crafts Report about improving slides. What I hadn't seen was jury's view of the selection process, with set after set after set of slides flashing past in rapid succession. I suddenly understood what "body of work" means from the point of view of a jury slide set: five slides that relate to each other, that show some depth of skill and focus. I do not have this yet. Not in slides, that is. I don't have five rug pictures that really sing when viewed together, when competing against tens or hundreds of other textile artists for a very limited number of spots in a show.
- May 18, 2008
- A&B Store Fixtures
- Finding a way to keep hoops orderly and at the same time accessible during street fairs and other events has been a bit of a challenge. I noticed the hoop rack Julia Hartsell was using at Shakori last year, and when an old bunk bed showed up at the swap shed, I made use of some of the parts to create something similar. The notion of "Rack" was successful because the children at the YMCA Family Fun day reliably brought their hoops back to the rack so I didn't have to chase them down as much during the day. Unfortunately, the design was weak and when we tossed the rack into the truck, hurrying to get out of the way of the approaching thunderstorm, the pegs snapped and the rack broke. I repaired the joint but next time out, a burst of wind carried the umbrella out of its stand, over a table, spearing the hoop rack like an overlarge lawn dart. The hoop rack broke again.
I had an energy audit in the middle of November, 2007, courtesy of the kind folks at Progress Energy who paid most of the fee. I can't say I was surprised by the answer. On a scale of 0-50, where 0 = good and 3 or less is an EnergyStar rating, my house scored a 25. That compares favorably with a tent. 50 = wide open to the outside. I've spent a considerable amount of time remediating the problems that the audit identified, and then also applying the knowledge to my rental property, which happened to come vacant at the turn of the year. Useful work--I'm not done yet, and my energy use has already fallen by 30%. But a bit difficult to accept I've been living under these conditions for 11 years and never identified the (many) sources of the problem. Lesson: buy caulk in bulk. I have used at least a case, purchased in 4 and 5 and 6 tube trips to the hardware store.
This area suffered a serious drought last year, and unless we get a hurricane early in the season, it's probably not going to get any better this year. Time to harvest rainwater. I have six 55-gallon barrels lined up, waiting to be connected to the downspouts, and then we have to figure out how much additional storage to set up and connect to each other. At the reported rate for roof run off, this house should be able to generate more than 700 gallons per inch of rain, but 700 gallons won't water trees for too awfully long when it's 95 degrees for two months straight. First things first: figure out how to connect one barrel to one downspout. Also hauled four truckloads of bagged leaves home and spread them around at-risk plants; shaded ground doesn't dry out as fast. I lost a few trees last year and expect to discover that a few more died if/when they don't leaf out this year. On one hand, I don't want a landscape that needs pampering, but on the other, a lot of plants can make it if they get big enough so I'm hoping this extra care is only a temporary thing (and hoping the same for the drought!).
It's fun, and interesting, and useful, but it's not art. Too bad.
It just may be time to come out of the closet.
This is stash.
Four drawers in a lateral filing cabinet, filled with rag rug balls of fiber sorted by color. Photos weren't color-adjusted; the red isn't really that orange and there's more actual difference between the blue and green drawer. The black drawer is divided into raw fiber and tied-up balls ready to be used in any rug that needs black. I started using black much more consciously in rugs #21 and 29, and now it's just easier to keep several hundred yards tied up all the time so I don't have to think about it when I'm ready to start a new rug. Thanks to Jinny Beyer for pointing out how much more lively colorways can be when black is a design element.
The filing cabinet and another shelf unit loaded with bins of more rug stash, sorted by color (yellow, grey, orange, purple, blue, other misc. fiber stash). Two bins of brown live on top of the lateral filing cabinet and just barely fit under the ceiling.
Clothing washed and waiting to be sliced or rolled. Moving from plastic bags to pillowcases as I find more linens in my stash aquisition efforts. Pillowcases breathe, while plastic traps air and fabric gets musty.
I think it's temporary, but the truth is, the in-process bins have moved out to the living room because there's no more room in my fiber studio.
My voice is somewhere between Marian Anderson and Marni Nixon. Haven't sung in public in a while but could be persuaded to get back in vocal shape.
I tried, a little; I took Claude Stein's Natural Singer workshop one October when he was in town and demonstrated to myself that indeed I could sing, but that weekend was nonetheless emotionally painful. The class left me even more bereft--ability, but no hook. No interest in roughing-up my voice to sing the Blues; not operatic, choral music required a time and travel commitment I couldn't make; no way in. I could play the piano a little but no so well as to accompany myself and there I was, all warmed up and no-where to go. So I could sing while I hooped, but THAT'S a skinny market...
And there I left it, pretty much, for the next two and a half years. John and I were in Tony Sullivan's store the other Saturday, picking up the Kay Archtop he'd had repaired, and I was touching the instruments (and checking out price tags) and thinking it would be kinda neat if I could play but not $250-for-a-cheap-instrument and more for lessions and all that time-to-learn worth of neat, and maybe a mandolin? But they have 8 steel strings and that's going to hurt. Shake it off and focus on my own art and just let it be.
That decision lasted maybe two weeks.
The other weekend, John asked if I wanted to learn to play the guitar. Did he notice my thinking at Tony's? Don't know. I do know it was an opportunity that couldn't be missed; John owns a pile of guitars and plays easily; plays all the time, actually, and sometimes performs. Too soon to tell if we'd ever perform together but it was a step to take. So he showed me some chords and off I went.
It took a little web research to figure out those chords once I'd forgotten what he showed me, and then more to get to some lessons, and when it was clear free web lessons weren't going to cut it for me, a little more searching took me to Bruce Emery's Skeptical Guitarist series, and I was home.
Started playing around with the beginning chords. It didn't take too long to realize that chords alone are no fun. Moreover, I don't like the songs in the beginning books. Off to find songs that use the chords I know / am learning how to play, but that's not the way songs are identified on the web, apparently. Too easy to transpose. Songs don't appear to be sorted much by the number of chords used, either, which would be a useful list for me at this point. One website pointed out that many hymns use only three chords, but not a one of my collection of hymn books, including the Unitarian, identifies guitar chords. Need something a bit newer age, I guess.
For now, I have a few. Amazing Grace is the starter song; it feels good on my voice, I know the tune, and it can't hurt to sing it through all the way three or four times. Swing Low, Sweet Chariot just entered the list this morning. I have a longer list of songs I want to learn over time, and in the back of my mind, I'm thinking, "I need 100 songs I can sing and play, and then I'll see what happens." This is parallel to my 100 Rugs plan, which in turn derived from the "paint 500 hearts" plan which ended at 150 with enough understanding to get me to a new place in my own art.
So here I am, three plus years after the original offer, getting my voice in shape. Never realized I needed to have my own instrument, too. That wasn't anything my voice teacher or choir director pointed out. It just doesn't make any sense to practice the guitar without singing along.
Two weeks into the guitar, and I'm thinking the same thing, only the back of my mind is nagging. I don't nag myself about the knitting. Wonder why? For today, this week, my guitar practice consists of playing and singing a small set of songs that use a small set of chords I know, and hoping I will get better (and I am).
The nagging part says I should be doing something that looks more like WORK. Scales, or transition practice, or something. And then another part of my mind says, "Lighten up, just play. When you're ready to get more accurate, or more smooth, or more whatever, it will come." Until then, you are learning. You've never held a guitar before. The idea that moving your left hand up and down the strings in a controlled manner will produce reliable sounds is a new concept. (I can't hear chord changes in recorded music.) (Yet, at least.) You're still learning how to send these particular signals to your fingers. It will come.
With a nod to my newly activated interest in music, I re-read Noah Adams' Piano Lessons. It's a small story about a man deciding to take up the piano again, buying an upright Steinway, and then struggling through a year of teaching himself with the aid of a computer program. He makes progress in spite of himself.What was the most amazing aspect of the story was the reviews it drew on Amazon! I'll add reviews to books if the total count is < 12 and I have something worth saying; Piano Lessons' review count was at 45 so I didn't write one (which would have been a 4-star). But I did look at the 1- and 2-star reviews. Whew! Talk about resentment! A small portion of the reviewing community has trouble with the fact of a man able to afford an $11,000 piano who then does not play it much.
Back to George Jones and Amazing Grace and being out of time for today and trusting that it will come when it's ready to.
There's just no way for me to know at this point what data needs to get into the database of "guitar playing." Building calluses (every chord in Amazing Grace uses the same finger, and the first time I tried it, my hand hurt almost too much to finish). Learning to hear the different sounds. Watching my wrist adjust.
Knitting's not very different at all; just that today, I'm learning different things in the rugs, like borders and more sophisticated coloration, than basic stitch control.
Enough noticing. Time to notice that the kitchen needs cleaning before the weekend.
It's certainly part of the blog world, and on-line community, and I went around the office telling people to see Lars & the Real Girl, and writing reviews comes from much the same impulse. Only there aren't many people in my own circle of friends to whom I can recommend Knit Knit. Unexpected Knitting was a hard enough sell!
There's something to be said for the body of reviews. I like clicking on "see all my reviews" and looking at the list--we are so revealed in our reading. I am puzzled by people who write one review only, usually bad, and never post anything else. What's that about? It's almost as puzzling, although I can understand why it happens, when people say nothing more than "Great book! I loved it! These people tend to write lots of reviews that could be pasted from one book to the next (maybe they are...).
As a rule, I will rarely post a review if there are already 10 or more on a book, unless the star-spread is large and I have something to add that hasn't been covered. Amazon keeps asking me to review the LOTR DVD set. Huh? I have something to add that 400 other people haven't said? That you'll make a buying decision based on my comments? (Personally, I wanted more commentary from Ngela Lawson. Please pass that on to Peter next time you talk to him, OK?)
I want a review to tell me why I should buy the book, or instead, invest the wait time to get it from the interlibrary loan. I would like to think my own reviews provide some guidance along those lines to other readers.
There's a bit of "here I am, reading public, and this is what I think," and also a bit of a thank you to the authors, by providing proving I've read or owned the book and maybe how I used their information in my own life. I don't write reviews of fiction; "stories" just flow through my life. I don't write actively negative reviews, but I will provide a counterbalance if most of the reviews are along the lines of "this is so wonderful" and I found the book simplistic or useless.
John doesn't understand that I give away any time to reviewing, and I can see that I would probably be better served by investing that amount of writing energy into my own next book. In time. In a world with more time to write, the two would not be mutually exclusive. Maybe Amazon reviews are simply a way to get published. I tried writing a gardening column for a newspaper once, and couldn't do it, but there were a lot of mitigating factors. And the truth is, I was moving away from being a gardener even as that opportunity presented itself.
So I write reviews, and blog, and there are a lot of books in the world that started as blogs and collections of essays, and maybe I'm just letting Amazon's servers collect my material. Stay tuned.
You can contact Bruce or order CDs through his website at bbakerinc.com.
Booth Design, Product Development, Sales Skills, and Jury Slides. My expectations were that Product Development would be the one with the most benefit. I may be wrong about that, and it may be too soon to tell.
I quietly chuckled to myself when Bruce told us we needed to be writing business plans for what we wanted to do in a year. Not possible. I don't know where the art will go. It goes where it will. But within 24 hours, I had the outline of a plan in my mind. Spend the rest of 2008 with my small shows, the First Sundays and local street fairs, practicing sales skills and improving presentation and merchadising. Pay attention to knitting a body of work that could serve as a slide set. I don't know how I will do this yet. I pick colors in part according to which storage unit is the most full at the time and needs to be drawn down. This does not make for a consistent palette.
I am not yet sure that the possible similarity in design is enough to make any five of my rugs, apart from the spirals, look like they belong together. People see color, not underlying structure. Need to think on this a good bit longer. (Actually, I've done all the thinking that needs to be done. What I need to do is find a way to knit five rugs in compatable colorways. Given that my basic color selection process involves determining which bins or drawers are most full, and using those colors on the next rug, this is going to take some adjustment. Stay tuned.)
In its defense, we had used the headboard of the bunk bed sideways, putting stress on joints that were never designed to take real weight. Regardless, it was time to try something new.
I sketched out some designs using 2x4 lumber, ideally ones that would fit in a red wagon so that we could load the rack into a wagon and haul a truckload of hoops from a parking lot into a show if we had to. I sometimes bring 50-60 hoops to an event, and that's a lot to carry over your shoulder. However, red wagons are fairly small and I couldn't quite get the length I wanted.
Before investing much more effort in design, I thought to google "hoop racks," and hit pay dirt. The second link led me to something that looked remarkably like the clothing rack I had disassembled in the closet. Unfortunately, my clothing rack had only one bar across the bottom, which wouldn't support hoops, but I could make it work. A bit of work with bungees and two spare pieces of 1" PVC pipe that happened to by hanging around (score one for hoarding) and I had an equivalent rack.
We worked Siler City Alive last weekend, and I took my new hoop rack as a test. It worked wonderfully, given the investment and materials. The hoops stayed reasonably organized and the children knew where to bring them back to; within reason, hoops were accessible individually. Unfortunately, the bungee-supported PVC pipe slipped sideways several times, tipping the hoops out on the ground. Similarly, with only one support pole at each end of the rack, the extra-large hoops on the outside tended to flop a bit more than I really like.
John found Manhattan Wardrobe Supply, a supplier to the New York theater and fashion trades, on-line and pointed out their clothing racks. The racks were probably discounted from local list, but shipping would bump the total price back up. I realized it was time for a trip to A&B Store Fixtures.
In the earlier years of my life as an art retailer, I had spent a lot of time at A&B. They operate warehouses full of new and used display hardware--cases, shelving, decorations, you name it. Wandering through even the Raleigh A&B warehouse is an amazing trip through a world most of us never notice. (The Greensboro store runs to four warehouses and holds even more, and more varied, merchandise.) It had never crossed my mind to wonder where those shelving units that hold jeans or blouses, or the racks that hold clothing on hangers, or the wall unit that dispenses M&Ms by individual color come from. Sunglass and watch cases. Wallet turntables. Shoe racks. Shelving to display expensive handbags, or teddy bears. Some of the units are branded and others anonymous. Mannikens of every description, posed and stylized or somewhat naturalisting and reusable. Partial bodies used to sell "parts," such as underwear or gloves. Clothes hangers and racks to store clothes hangers. I hadn't been there in a while, but I knew they sold clothing racks. And I needed something for rugs, too.
The clothing-rack-for-hoops turned out to be fairly easy. They had two models with two bars across the bottom and wheels, one with single-pole risers and one with double. Both clothing bars had extensions that could be used to support oversized hoops. The double-bar rack will hold the hoops more securely; check. Problem solved, no shipping.
On the way out of the store, I asked if they had anything for rug display, and Jim said, "Yes, one 3'x5' for $175 in the other warehouse, and one 8'x10' that's not assembled right now." Unfortunately, it was too late in the day to go to the storage warehouse and look at the rack, but I made a note to come back in the middle of the day next week and take a look.
Saturday, John and I went to look at the rack. Bingo! Built like "plan racks" that some architects and engineers use to hold working drawings, or a poster rack in a museum store, it has 10 arms to hold rugs and swing to display the next. It's battleship gray and needs a new coat of paint to be retail-ready, but I think it will work just fine in the booth. Now I'm pondering whether I need their 8x10 model... (And looking for manufacturers' information on the display racks in the big hardware store rug departments!)