Tracy McCabe Stewart - Contemporary Fiber

 

I am currently in beautiful western North Carolina, but was in Door County for a few days last week.  Door County is small, but they have a really high caliber of artwork in the galleries there.  There are enough tourists with an eye to buy to support the area’s galleries.  I visited some of my favorite galleries while I was up there.  Unlike my previous visit, this time, I had my camera! 

My favorite galleries not only have stellar artwork, but the owners have created these beautiful spaces to showcase art; often utilizing old barns or outbuildings and creating beautiful gardens to surround or display the artwork.  The use of space is as impressive as the roster of artists.  For me, they are a haven; a place of peace.  I step out of the car and I feel myself immediately quiet and pay attention.

I hope to create an artist space of my own as imaginative as these galleries in the future.

My gal pal Nina’s husband, Richard Edelman had a beautiful sculpture exhibit going at the Woodwalk Gallery.  It’s a great space and they had a gorgeous setting for his work:

Richard Edelman

 Here are some shots of the gallery space.  Here’s a converted corn crib:

Converted Corn Crib (c) Tracy McCabe Stewart

Here is a shot of the ceiling:

Corn Crib Ceiling (c) Tracy McCabe Stewart

 My favorite gallery of all is the Edgewood Orchard Gallery.  First of all, they are the sweetest people on the planet.  All of them.  The owner, Nell, is an absolute peach.  They have a beautiful space with a series of gallery bulidings connected with patios and a beautiful sculpture garden:

Edgewood Orchard Gallery"s Sculpture Garden

The converted barn serves as the main gallery:

Edgewood Orchard Galleries

here’s another shot:

Patio leading to additional gallery space

and here is some of the incredible artwork:

Sculpture by David Valentine

and a beautiful piece by William Jauquet:

William Jauquet Sculpture

and a lovely piece by James G. Moore:

James G. Moore

Here are some other great galleries I would recommend:

The Blue Dolphin House for great garden art,  K Allen Gallery for glass, and the Fine Line Designs Gallery for both sculpture and indoor art.

I will post NC pictures when I return to Chicago.  I can’t seem to get them off my camera!

 

Cave screen:As you may have noticed, I haven’t gotten a heck of a lot done in the art department over the last few months.  I did revisit a whooping crane piece I’d started before leaving for my trip to Japan, but wasn’t really engaged enough to stick with it when design problems arose.  It is currently in pieces waiting for me to get interested again.

I noticed, over the past few days, that when I thought about starting or working on one of my bird pieces, I’d start drifting away.  Suddenly, any thing else was more interesting:  laundry, walking the dogs, solitaire, you name it.  Interestingly, when I thought about doing some work on my cave series, I began designing and working the logistics of the piece out in my head.  I guess I need a break from the birds for a while.

I began working out fabrics and creating new thermofax screens to use in the piece last night.  I haven’t decided whether this will be a pure fiber piece or a piece that combines fiber and etched copper like my Lascaux pieces:  Horses and Bulls I and II. 

Anyway, here are some of the new screens I made based on the cave paintings in Altimira, Spain and Lascaux and Chauvet, France.

I am going to try to get some screening done over the weekend.  We are getting house stuff done next week (carpeting).  I need to empty out all of our furniture for the job and move it all back again when they are through.  It will be completely chaotic here for most of the week. 

Have a great weekend!

Here are the scarves I started a few days ago.  I will bring them all to Japan and let my daughter choose the one that I give to my daughter’s host mother.  I posted about this yesterday here.

I thought the scarves needed another layer of vat dye, so I screened an indigo and grey mixture over them.  I got better haloes today, too.  I think this one below is my favorite.  There’s a real hot spot from my camera’s flash.  The color is much more even:

Procion MX and vat dyed scarf by Tracy McCabe Stewart

 Here’s the second scarf:

Tree screened scarf by Tracy McCabe Stewart

The final scarf turned out all right, but the new screeend flowers turned out really blurry.  It was all the same vat dye, so I don’t know what happened.  I like the look of it anyway:

Procion and Vat dyed Scarf by Tracy McCabe Stewart

I am headed out for a 10 day trip to Japan this Wednesday.  My daughter has been finishing her last year of university in Kobe and staying with a host family there.  she has a minor in Asian studies. 

Big in Japan is a fun song from the 80′s by Alphaville.  It’s one of the worst music videos ever; complete with Robin Hood sort of outfits that don’t really have much to do with Japan, as far as I can see.  See it here.   We hum it around here because I am 6’2″ and going to the land of 5′ people.  I’m guessing I won’t exactly blend in. 

Right now, I am trying to get gifts together for Ashley’s host  family.  The Japanese have a somewhat complicated ritual of gift giving.  Here’s what I know:  gifts from/related to your geographical location are appreciated.  The presentation is really important, too.  I will wrap my presents in hand dyed fabric to try to make them extra special.  

I am from Chicago, so I am bringing them a book on Frank Lloyd Wright architecture.  I am also making a hand dyed scarf for my daughter’s host mother.   Apparently she wears very plain, dark clothing, so I am trying to do something pretty subdued.  I started by dyeing silk scarves blue grey and screened them with vat dye solution.  Here are the results form the vat dyeing.  They will probably get a layer of fabric paint before they are complete. 

Here’s a picture.  I am having a hard time getting the colors true because the silk is so reflective.  I barely got any haloing on these-too bad.  She wants plain, so I won’t add another design layer, but may screen some paint to make the effect more monochromatic.  

Hand Dyed Scarves by Tracy McCabe Stewart

Progress on Reddish Egret Piece by Tracy McCabe Stewart

The feathers are all hand dyed fabric, the beak commercial cottons.  On to the body next!

I spent Tuesday and Wednesday in a workshop with the incredible Mary Hettmansperger; learning metal techniques to combine with fiber art.  I was an action packed two days.  I learned a ton and we had a fabulous time.  Mary is an incredible teacher:  very, very funny and really informative.  I cannot recommend her highly enough.  If she comes to your town, run to take classes with her.

The course was on making mixed media art quilts, but most of us concentrated on learning the metal techniques, rather than creating a finished product.  I started in the art world making jewelry, so some of the metal working stuff was review for me.  Mary uses basket making techniques in her metal work and that was all new (an great) stuff.  Here are some action shots of the workshop:

We learned a great stitching/looping technique for attaching things like rocks.  We worked with bth 26 guage wire and waxed linen.  It’s really beatiful and sturdy when done well like Mary’s pieces:

Looping technique piece by Mary HettmanspergerAnother beautiful one by Mary:Mary Hettmansperger piece

Rock stitching by Cindy Heineman

Twined piece by Mary Hettmansperger

 Here’s one by Shelley:

Twining by Shelley Brucar

Combined twining and looping by Mary Hettmansperger

Stana Marie Coleman used the loop technique on this pretty piece:

Metal work by Stana Marie Coleman

 We all had fun with the torches and hammers:

Fun with Fire

Joan Bratton did some gogeous weaving on this piece:

Gorgeous stuff by Joan Bratton

 Mixed media quilts by Shelley Brucar:

Graffiti by Shelley Brucar

A mixed media mini quilt by me:

Mini art quilt by Tracy McCabe Stewart

 

 Everyone made peapods.  I can’t remember who did this beauty.  I think it beloged to Sheila Shaffer-Hirsch:

Peapod Mania!

Hi all,

We had a really cool frost a few weeks ago that created lovely formations on the trees, etc.  My pals tell me it’s called a hoarfrost.  Here are some pics of my backyard:

Frosty Willow Tree

 You can’t see it as well here, but my magnolia got some, too:

Frosty Trees

Frosty Chokecherry

I had my Needle Arts guild meeting today and Mary Hettmansperger was our speaker.  She does unbelievable mixed media work:  baskets, jewelry, textiles and a cross over between all media.  Truly gorgeous stuff.  I’m in a class with her for the next few days.  I’m hoping to take tons of pictures.  Check out her work here:  http://www.maryhetts.com/

I drove up to my house today to see a red tailed hawk munching on a squirrel on the sidewalk.  He let me stare from the car, but as soon as I came out with my camera, he flew off.  I sure wish I could have captured him on film, but camera or no, it was definitely an awesome gift for the day.

I am reducing prices on my work for the remainder of 2009-Read more here

I am featuring a piece of my work every day or so through the end of the year.  Here’s today’s piece:

"Crane Series I" 2008 by Tracy McCabe Stewart

“Crane Series I”

2008

By Tracy McCabe Stewart

20″x20″

Hand dyed and commercial cottons, digitally created fabric.  Machine quilted.

2010 price: $600

2009 price: $450

 

Rust Dyeing

 

Last week  my work group, the Free Motions went up to Nina’s to do some rust dyeing.  Participants included Shelley Brucar, Nina Edelman, Leah Rosenthal, Cathy Mendola and myself  They needed to cure for a week to give the rust time to transfer to the fabric.  Here’s the results:

Rust dyed fabric

Nina had some fabulous rusty shapes to play with.  I’ll probably over dye them.  too much white for me.

 

Here’s another:

More rust dyeing on cotton

 

the rust transfer is nudged along by adding salt or vinegar to the fabric and keeping it wet.  I used both on these.  Lots of direct transfer, but not much bleed to the rest of the fabric.

More cotton:

Rust dyed cotton

and finally, some cotton velvet:

Rust dye on cotton velvet

"Bark Series III" (c) 2008 by Tracy McCabe Stewart

 

 

"Bark Series IV" (c) 2008 by Tracy McCabe Stewart

 

Bark Series III and IV

(C) 2008 by Tracy McCabe Stewart

Hand dyed and commercial cottons, seed pods.  Machine quilted.

each 20″x20″

2010 price:  $600 each

2009 price:  $450 each

email me if you have questions or want higher resolution photos

I am reducing prices on my work for the remainder of 2009-Read more here

I am featuring a piece of my work every day or so through the end of the year.  Here’s today’s piece:

"Canyon" (c) 2006 by Tracy McCabe Stewart

“Canyon”

2006

By Tracy McCabe Stewart

12″x12″

 

2010 price: $220

2009 Price: $160

Hand dyed silks and cottons, painted tree bark, ammonite.

Machine quilted and stretched over canvas

Email me with any questions or higher resolution photos