Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Tapestry Diary Links

DiaryCutOff2 Since so many people have been asking me  about the Tapestry Diary, here are some links from previous blog posts.

There are some other short mentions of the diary in other blog posts from 2010, but these are the ones with the most information.

Basic Plan: 14 inches wide, the finished piece is more than close to 5 feet long. I wove a small parallelogram every day, about 1 inch tall and 1.5-2inches wide. They started out abstract but soon I began including text and sometimes small images for special days. I used the diary to experiment with techniques, textures, colors and shapes. Every month had a color scheme.

If I was away made up the days when I got home, sometimes weaving an entire week as one entry.

I kept it spontaneous, and rarely thought about what I would do until I was sitting at the loom. I kept a small sketchbook next to the loom and occasionally I did a small sketch first.

January 2010 – Starting to weave the days

February 2010 – 7 weeks in

November 2010 – Nice photos of the fall months

January 2011 – The finished 2010 tapestry diary

Sept-OctoberSeptember, October, November 2010

Friday, December 23, 2011

2012 Tapestry Diary Coming Soon

I have decided to keep a tapestry diary again, starting January 1, 2012. Some of you may remember that I did this in 2010; you can read about it here. I was inspired by Tommye Scanlin’s tapestry diaries, which you can read about on her blog.

The basic idea is to weave a small section of tapestry every day. It can be a way to mark the passing of time, an opportunity to weave without the pressure or expectation of creating a masterpiece, a chance to play and experiment.

I wanted to try something different for 2011, and chose to do a sketch diary. page2detail

I posted on this blog about the first part, which was Moon Snails.

After that I worked from some photos of trees, mostly dark tree trunks against the snow….we had a LOT of snow last winter.

The sketch diary lasted about 6 months, and then all of my traveling got in the way. I know, you would think I could just  do a sketch wherever I found myself, but it didn’t work out that way. Page6TreesWebThe sketch diary had morphed into a serious study of certain objects and forms, with each sketch fitting into the ones around it. For example the page shown above contains 15 sketches.

Even though I did not continue for a full year, I feel like I got so much out of the experience.

DiarySoumakThis tapestry diary will be a bit different from the last one.

I keep looking at the last part of the 2010 tapestry diary, where I played with black and white. 

Most of my current tapestries are black and white, and I have been dreaming of adding little bits of color to them, so that will be the subject of my explorations in the 2012 tapestry diary. 

2012warp I decided to get a head start, so I have warped up the loom, and woven the heading with the year on it. I have always loved the look of a fresh warp, perhaps because it’s all possibility, like a blank canvas.

This warp looks cool because I put black poster board behind it. Otherwise, because it’s a circular warp, I would be seeing 2 sets of warp threads one behind the other, and it makes my eyes go blurry.

(This photo looks a bit crooked, so either I took it from a strange angle, or I need to adjust the spacing at the top of the loom! TIP: take a photo to see imperfections that you may not notice otherwise!)

Nevertheless I was a little peeved when my husband told me he liked the blank warp so much, perhaps I should just leave it that way….hmmmph.