Sunday, April 5, 2020

Social Distancing and the Tapestry Weaver

2020 Tapestry Diary, Jan - March
Of course my first reaction, when I was told to stay home, was GREAT! I get to spend hours every day weaving and painting and playing piano and dulcimer and reading books and working in the garden and and and...

Well, I have been weaving my tapestry diary every day. This is it so far, all parallelograms this year, and so far the colors are wintry. That will change soon. For more about my tapestry diaries see here, with links to older posts.

Wintersweet, detail
I finished the small piece for the Unjuried Small Format exhibit that was planned for this summer. Due to uncertainty about the gallery being open, it will now be online, on the American Tapestry Alliance website instead of hanging on a wall. There will still be a printed catalog, and each artist will get a complimentary copy. When the exhibit was here, in 2014, I was the exhibition chair, and we exhibited 219 tapestries from all over the world! Such a fun show! Here is a small detail because I hate to spoil the surprise before the exhibit opens. Title "Wintersweet."

More Chaos in Progress
It took me 2 weeks to get back to my neglected tapestry, the one I THOUGHT would be the last of the Chaos series. It is dawning on me how timely this theme still is, and I suspect there will be more after this one. Here it is in progress, on the loom with bobbins dangling. I have about 8 inches left to go, and I hope to finish it before Memorial Day.

As for the Corvid19 Pandemic, when my governor requested that everyone over 65 should just stay home, 3 1/2 weeks ago, it was kind of a relief since going out had been getting nerve wracking. A few days later the library where I work was closed (as they all are now), the Y where I swim closed, and everything was cancelled. I am lucky to live in an area where I can go for walks without passing more than a handful of people. I am discovering how nice it is not to be driving hither and yon doing errands daily. We are living through a moment in history that will be written about and remembered, and I can only hope that we are doing everything we can to help each other. Stay home, and stay well.