Judy's Journal

grandes boules by Sheila Hicks

textile fresco 1969 in the background

framed small studies done over 50 years, a rope piece in the background,   evolving tapestry 1987 in foreground, all by Sheila Hicks

study

study Phare Rude 1978

study   whaler Malgorn 1978

study Phare Inverti 1977

Pockets 1982 by Sheila Hicks, she stitched together pockets from a medical center in Jerusalem that had been used by patients who were undergoing treatment,  they could store their belongings in the pockets

Badagara White 1966 Sheila Hicks

Entrance to the Forest 1972  prayer rug series

grand portal 1974

Images and several write-ups about this show can be accessed through this link to the gallery.

It was wonderful to see room after room of her experimental approach to textiles.  These kinds of exhibitions do not come to where I live in Northern Ontario.  I have to make pilgrimages to them.

My next pilgrimage is to see Magdalena Abakanowicz's exhibition of Abakans at the Tate Modern.  I'll post a photo once I'm there.  For now, enjoy the courageous approach of Sheila Hicks, an American living in Paris, who keeps working at age 85, and who is not afraid of colour and fun.  

Between Heaven and Earth, dyed rayon laid on cotton and hand stitched  by Judy Martin

Thank you Loree Ovens for organizing the Evolve exhibition that was installed in the Propeller Gallery from September 14 - October 2, 2022.  

It was nice to spend time with you, Loree, on the closing day of the exhibition, October 2 when we were both there for the entire time, (1 until 5:30).   

in my arms humble, wrapped and stitched silk, the size of a 2 month baby by Judy Martin

New Growth, acrylic, ink on heritage washi paper by Loree Ovens

I liked how right from the beginning  (late January 2022) you told us that we each would be given 8 feet of display space and that although the work didn't have to be new, it should reflect our endurance as artists through the pandemic.

Thanks also to your partner T C, who designed the invitation.  I printed some up and mailed them to my southern Ontario artist friends.   

I was glad to see my piece Turning Forever To The Heart hung near the entrance, next to your paintings on Japanese paper. 

Do you remember how I wrote about your work on this blog in 2015, Loree?  Click here if you'd like to read that post.

Turning Forever To the Heart, stitched taffeta by Judy Martin

Chung-Im and Eva in front of skeleton v2 by Chung-Im

skeleton v2 (detail) screen printed industrial felt, hand stitched by Chung-Im Kim

Shelter series, A Sure Instinct 3, 2, and 1, encaustic and mixed media by Eva Ennist

On Purple Loosestrife, etching on artist made purple loosestrife paper with embroidery and pastel by Liz Menard

Two of Menard's pieces had remarkable French knot embroidery.  Thanks Loree for telling me that the paper itself was made from loosestrife fibres which was then etched and embroidered.  

It was nice to meet Saskia Wassing on Sunday.  We talked about our fine art degrees in Embroidery from UK universities.  Her degree was in Embroidered and Woven Textiles from the Glasgow School of Art and mine was Embroidered Textiles from Middlesex.  Embroidery has as much respect as painting does in the United Kingdom.

Stitched Stories, embroidered and applique silk by Saskia Wassing

I appreciated visiting with many friends and colleagues on October 2.  David Kaye came and that was especially wonderful.  So many of us miss the David Kaye gallery which closed in early 2019.  David continues to keep his website entitled David Kaye Projects live.  Past exhibitions and artists' work are on the site.  You can find Eva, Chung-Im, Loree and Judy (moi) on his site. 

Between Heaven and Earth, rayon laid over cotton and hand stitched by Judy Martin

Loree, there are a lot of links in this post and I hope that is OK.  I will provide two more.  Your personal website,  Loree Ovens and my own,  Judy Martin.

The Evolve exhibition has come down from the walls now, but it continues online until November 13.   Read the artist statements and see close ups of each piece at this link. If you scroll to the bottom there is a video and an online catalogue (downloadable)

Thank you, friends, who came to Propeller on Sunday Oct 2 to see the show and to visit me.  I treasure the selfies of us that I took.  

Two Years Into Covid by Martin Kotyluk  2022 acrylic on canvas  (detail)

It is a thing.  

To not mention it would be lying and I try to tell the truth here. 

Our lives have changed because of that pandemic.  

Our ways of being with other people have changed.  

(my baking got better, my introversion got worse)

Cabin Dream in the Big Muddy by Rob O'Flanagan 2020-2022 acrylic on linen (detail)

My eye doctor had to close her local office.  

Which meant that I had go into Sudbury for my check up.  

I have not been going anywhere other than to the mailbox so this was huge.

Ned came too.  It was his almost birthday and so we had a date.

(My distance vision got better, my myopia got worse.)

Sick and Tired by Andrew McPhail 2021 sequins on bedsheet

We went to two art exhibitions because they were there.  

Both exhibitions had a pandemic slant.

Pandemic Partners by Rita Vanderhooft 2021 photographic print on paper

Art Gallery of Sudbury:   "is this real life?"  

A juried exhibition with a wide variety of media including ceramics, glass, textiles, photography, sculpture and painting.  It was thought provoking.  It was interesting.  I found beauty too.

I recognized many of the names, I am friends with some of the artists.  

In The Shadows no 1 - 7  Trish Stenabaugh  2022  digital print on paper

Gallery 6500: (a new gallery that has popped up in the hallway of the steelworkers union office)

Also thought provoking, this exhibition was self organized by the 'peer mentors group' of artists and poets.  The loss of one of their members over the winter, Ray Laporte, may have been the trigger for this exhibition that was entitled  "Lost and Found".  

I am friends with some of the artists.

Lost Dreams  Elizabeth Holmes and Gunhild Hotte 2021 acrylic on canvas

I wanted you to know that all this is happening in Sudbury.

Art.  Poetry.  Loss.      

I'm changed because of our trip to the city.

I keep thinking about the art.  

Cabin Dream on the Big Muddy by Rob O Flanagan

I'd almost stopped thinking about the pandemic, but it's a thing.  

It's a whirl.  

How Long Does It Take Moonlight to Reach us?  Just over one second.  And Sunlight?  Eight Minutes  by Harja Waheed, 2019, Sunned Paper (detail)

In November 2019, I visited a real (not virtual) art gallery and experienced (in real life, moving through and looking at) the exhibition  Hold Everything Dear by Harja Waheed.  It was at the Power Plant in Toronto and I went with daughter April and now, over a year later, I am reflecting on that experience. 

The artist showed a variety of media: ceramics, textiles, installation, video, and works on paper.  

How Long Does It Take Moonlight to Reach us?  Just over one Second.  And Sunlight?  Eight minutes by Hajra Waheed 2019  sunned paper

A River Runs Through It, Hajra Waheed, 2019  cyanotype on a bolt of linen

We are living in a time where it is becoming difficult  to identify fact from fiction.  

"allowing objects to speak for themselves, allowing histories to infuse one another and viewers to steep in the mystery of interconnected clues, creating just enough tenuousness or uncertainty in order to leave space for viewers to come to the work from their own perspective and histories - these all remain urgent bottom lines for me, allowing for possibility, imagining and reimagining." Hajra Waheed

Studies for a Starry Night by Hajra Waheed  glazed porcelain and stoneware, 2019

detail of Studies for a Starry Night 2019

"I see my practice as a slowly unfurling process, a chronicle or story that reveals itself over the course of a lifetime rather than within the space of one exhibition. Each body of work is borderless, porous, temporally unbound,  not limited with some discernible end-point."  Hajra Waheed

Letters 1-8  by Hajra Waheed, ink on paper, 2019

The artworks in the set of work entitled Letters 1-8 were inspired by John Berger's novel that uses the device of love letters entitled  from A to X .  Waheed's series of letters combine careful drawings of palm leaves and personal notes.  

Letters detail Hajra Waheed ink on paper 2019

I felt Hajra Waheed's poetic sensibility as I moved through the several rooms containing the exhibition.  The title,  Hold Everything Dear, is borrowed from the British art critic and novelist John Berger's 2007 book of essays.  Other key texts that inspire the artist are: Rebecca Solnit's book of essays Hope in the Dark and the non-fiction of Arundhati Roy. 

The exhibition is quite political yet I was able to understand it on a personal and emotional level. 

Forget What They Tell You

There is hope in the room.  Moving slowly along side the many different items we feel an invisible web-like connection.  The guest curator, Nabila Abdel Nabi explains that that the artist considers all her work as if it is in a spiral.  A spiral that is felt, not seen.  

forget what they tell you, this longing for you is deeper than any blue

 

The spiral is more than just a form, it can denote evolution and involution, it expands and contracts, it reveals and it hides, it does not settle or occupy, it does not want you to believe it is invulnerable, it is a study, not an art, it is smoke entering the air, it is our umbilical cord, it is the form found in heart cells, it is the form found in nerve cells, it is never redundant, it is the act o remembering, it is a compass that allows us to stand in the center of a storm, it is the belief that what we do matters, it represents the awareness of the self,  it is about keeping an open heart in the face of a broken one.  

(only some of the text read by the artist at this link. )

Hold Everything Dear  by Hajra Waheed, The Power Plant Toronto 2019

 

There is enough space in the exhibition to allow us to make our own connections.