October's End

Today is the reveal day for our Twelve by Twelve colorplay challenge.  Terri chose our "rusty" color palette which she defined with rusty oranges, peaches, and the blues and greens of patina'd copper.  This is my response, called "October's End."

My process?  I started with a stunning piece of fabric dyed by Just Imagination's Judy Robertson.  I cut some strips, and spent a lot of time moving them around.  No meaning, no attempt to make them an abstraction of a particular image -- just moving and looking and aiming for something that I liked. Same with the circles.  Moving shapes, playing. Some people work this away all the time.  For me, it feels ... unfocused?  Unsure?  It was enjoyable, but my mind keeps trying to overlay an image or meaning onto what I'm doing.  


Goodness, I'm having a challenge with using a color palette as a starting point.  That's the idea, of course, a challenge.  But it makes me realize how strongly I connect words to images, and how I immediately move toward a specific image to translate into fabric.  I go back and forth, too, with whether that's a good thing (moving toward one's natural inclination) or whether I should push myself in the opposite direction.  For now, I'm trying to get away from the literal, and I'm making myself play with abstraction.  It's a stretch, and sometimes it's uncomfortable, but it feels like a good thing.

All this creative angst, eh?  Maybe I've been watching too much Project Runway.

I actually made two pieces this round, which I've never done before.  This was actually the first piece I started with, inspired by an amazing piece of batiked fabric made by my friend Judy Bianchi. It's called "Make Your Own Way."

To be honest, I'm not crazy about it.  But it was time to stop and move on.  I think this reflects that I WAS trying to say something in this piece in an abstract way (about being different in a field of similar things) and then it moved away from that idea in a way that is visually confusing.  Still, the exercise was fun and I still have a hunk of that lovely fabric for more exploration.

And here's my goal for the fabric work I'm doing now:  Lighten Up!  Stop Analyzing!  Just Play!