Artists' Date

In lieu of being on vacation this week (stuff happens), Bill and I took Tuesday off to go to Green Bay for an artists' date (and to buy two gallons of wood glue).

The Neville Public Museum is showing Through the Needle's Eye, the 19th national juried competition and exhibit from the Embroiderers' Guild of America. As much as I enjoy my fibery friends, there's still no one I'd rather see an exhibition with than Bill. It always surprises and delights me to hear his impressions of a show and the pieces in it.

He, of course, loved the 5-panel America The Beautiful tapestry. His other favorites were and The Last Fall by Carol Lynn Stratton and Out of the Flames by Kay F. Haley.

Out Of The Flames by Kay F. Haley

The show presented the gamut of embroidery technique -- skills I greatly admire and do not possess. But what inspired me most were pieces worked predominantly in simple running stitches.

Deanna Funk of Springfield, Illinois used running stitch on stitched-resist shibori dyed background fabrics to create Paths and Circles and Rocks and Rills.

Karen Schueler of Newark, Deleware had two pieces in this traveling show -- Park By The Arroyo and Neighborhood.

Neighborhood by Karen Schueler

Her description of  Neighborhood focuses on the technique:

I ‘paint’ scenes of my neighborhood by stitching scraps of dyed fabric onto painted linen in the tradition of ‘rag pictures’. This is user friendly stitching. Need a color change – stitch another color over the top. Don’t like what you’ve done – snip it out. Need some definition of the shape – change your stitch direction. What were separate bits of fabric gradually meld together, stitch by stitch.

And while I admire the technique, what I loved about the piece was the emotion it evoked. Nothing is quite as straightforward in any neighborhood as it might seem when viewed through rose-tinted glasses (what is hidden by that tall fence?). And yet we love what we love, including the flaws.

Plan A for the week didn't work out. We snipped something out, changed direction, and stitched together a Plan B that worked. And we're good on wood glue for a while now.