California as an Island

a map from 1666 by Dutch cartographer, Peter Goos

I have a thing for islands. I like reading about them and studying them. I make work about them and see myself as one. There is one in particular that I long to be on, all the time. I also love maps and, again, I like reading about them and studying them. I've been paying close attention to maps of California and San Francisco and recently found a resource of very old maps of California as an island. I learned after visiting The Glen McLaughlin Map Collection, a collection of maps depicting California as an island, that California was imagined this way and even after the truth was discovered it took years for "the island to attach itself back onto North America on maps." Further, I find this statement fascinating:

"the maps lagged behind reality and became a cartographic phenomenon that defied the science of mapping." 

Lagging behind reality and defining science give me pause... I was intrigued to learn about this version of California and see my new home state in a totally different way. I think I was comforted finding these images, too, because I like islands so much.

Island of 14,264 Days, an embroidered self-portrait

map of Iceland, my favorite island

Thanks for reading.

Textílsetur, Part 2

Since my arrival I've been working on a black version of my white Island of 14,264 Days. I'm using a similar process as before with a few changes and will be sewing my last knots on the new piece in the next few days. The piece is about darkness, the sadness and heaviness of life, the difficulties and challenges, the other half... I wanted to be here in Iceland in the winter in the dark to make this piece and the season and lack of light has proved very inspirational. I'm not ready to go into greater detail or show images right now... I want to keep this one to myself for a little while longer. However, I'm happy to share some of the things I've been listening to, looking at, and reading over the past month including a few podcasts about different kinds of darkness, some articles, a map, and a beautiful poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow:

Seeing in the Dark on Radiolab

Dark Side of the Earth on Radiolab

The Secret History of Thoughts on Invisibilia

Jasper Johns: ‘Regrets belong to everybody, don’t they?’ 

by Julie L Belcove

Jorge Manilla: Oscure Sacrifices by Susan Cummins

a map of "what the world would look like if it were only made of islands." 

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A Psalm of Life by Longfellow

Tell me not, in mournful numbers, 

        Life is but an empty dream! — 

    For the soul is dead that slumbers, 

        And things are not what they seem.

    Life is real !   Life is earnest! 

        And the grave is not its goal; 

    Dust thou art, to dust returnest, 

        Was not spoken of the soul.

    Not enjoyment, and not sorrow, 

        Is our destined end or way; 

    But to act, that each to-morrow 

        Find us farther than to-day.

    Art is long, and Time is fleeting, 

        And our hearts, though stout and brave, 

    Still, like muffled drums, are beating 

        Funeral marches to the grave.

    In the world's broad field of battle, 

        In the bivouac of Life, 

    Be not like dumb, driven cattle! 

        Be a hero in the strife!

    Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant! 

        Let the dead Past bury its dead! 

    Act,— act in the living Present! 

        Heart within, and God o'erhead!

    Lives of great men all remind us 

        We can make our lives sublime, 

    And, departing, leave behind us 

        Footprints on the sands of time;

    Footprints, that perhaps another, 

        Sailing o'er life's solemn main, 

    A forlorn and shipwrecked brother, 

        Seeing, shall take heart again.

    Let us, then, be up and doing, 

        With a heart for any fate; 

    Still achieving, still pursuing, 

        Learn to labor and to wait.

Thanks for reading.

Texílsetur Íslands

Currently, I'm living and working at Texílsetur Íslands, the Icelandic Textile Center, in Blönduós, Northwest Iceland. Texílsetur is housed in Kvennaskólinn, a former women's school, situated at the estuary of the Blanda River and Húnaflói Bay. It occupies the top two floors where there are private rooms and two large shared studios. I have a private room and studio and feel very fortunate to be making my work in such a special place, a transitional place, where the river meets the sea. I have long been fascinated by estuaries and brackish water, and given my most current work, In Between, which is about transition, being here at Texílsetur seems very, very appropriate. I'm also curious about the history of the school and like thinking about the years of women who lived and learned here, too.

I will be here for a month and will be creating a black version of "Island of 14,264 Days," something I've been wanting to do since I first made that piece in May, 2013. I came up with the idea then, to make a companion during the darkness of winter, the opposite of when I made the white version. I began working yesterday and will complete the piece by the end of the month. Other plans include walking and documenting my observations outside, but also studying the interior of this building and taking pictures of what I see inside. I also have a lot of reading to do.

the view from my room on my first day

Thanks for reading.

Iceland on My Mind

Small Teardrop Earrings with Posts in my Iceland Palette, 

sale $55.50/pair

Remember a few weeks ago I mentioned I would be sharing some big news with you in the coming weeks? Well, I have news to share today, and new work that complements it. I'm heading back to Iceland in about three weeks! I will be showing "In Between" for two months at the Wind and Weather Gallery in Reykjavik and it opens January 1. Then I head to Blönduós in Northwest Iceland to a residency at Textílsetur where I will be spending the month stitching a black version of "Island of 14,264 Days," an idea I had when I was at the Nes Artist Residency in 2013. Then for the month of February, I will head back to Reykjavík for another month at SÍM where I will be developing new work for my next exhibition. In total, I will be in Iceland for just over two months and I am counting the days until I climb aboard that Icelandair jet. I'll fill you in on the details soon.

To celebrate my return to Iceland, I'm offering some new pieces in my Iceland Palette: Small Teardrop Earrings and Small Teardrop Pendants in colors of the landscape. The earrings are available with posts or wires and the pendants come with an 18" fine cable chain. All pieces are only $55.50 for the rest of the sale. Enjoy!

Small Teardrop Earrings with Wires in my Iceland Palette, 

sale $55.50/pair

Small Teardrop Pendants in my Iceland Palette, 

sale $55.50 each

Sand

Moss

Lichen

Snow

Glacier

Sky

Thanks for reading.

Big, Part 3

Island of 14,264 Days

My time in Iceland was huge and I am now, four months after leaving, beginning to realize just how huge. Those 70 days serve as a turning point for me composed of many singular moments bearing weight and lightness simultaneously. I started processing my trip in September when I finally had some space to think. Thoughts started coming to me in a sort-of rush and it was difficult to get words out of my mouth because they were in a jumble in my mind. Since then I have told a few people who are dear to me and through these conversations my thoughts have become clearer.

I will begin by saying a big shift for my work is stirring in me, a shift away from jewelry toward something else, possibly sculpture and installation. Iceland and my "Island" showed me I am capable of expressing myself successfully in techniques and materials outside of jewelry. They also showed me I am interested in expressing myself in other ways, too. I see now, first and foremost, that I am an artist, a title I have been uncomfortable with until recently. My "Island" is the best piece I have ever made and it's fascinating to me that it's non-functional and not jewelry. I think this is telling and I am trying to pay attention.  

I also realized in Iceland that my main goal as an artist is to communicate and connect. I wish to make things that reach a wider audience and are perhaps made in collaboration with people I care about and admire. I do not want to be limited by materials, technique, or scale.

 

a dreamlike first view out my bus window as I left for  

Skagaströnd and the Nes Artist Residency

 
I'm not sure of much else right now simply because it's all so fresh and I want to add that I'm not giving up jewelry entirely. I can say I want to take some time off to explore this shift, give it room to develop and make itself apparent to me. I want to go back to Iceland to do this and I am working on ways to get myself there in the spring. I might do another residency or I might just live in Reykjavík, creating a self-structured residency in an apartment. Either way I will take time to read, research, think, and write about my work and allow this shift, whatever it may be, to happen. 

My friend, Rebeca Mendez, took this picture the day I left Nes. 

The lava fields are perhaps my most-treasured place in Iceland.

And Iceland feels like the perfect place to explore this. I have never felt more at home anywhere and it felt like I was coming home when I stepped off the plane. I was incredibly excited but also sensed tremendous calm. I love Iceland and I miss it every single day. The vast landscape gives my mind and spirit space and is so beautiful and so unusual that it's still near impossible for me to describe. It is a work of opposites, too, something that resonates with me intimately, and I find myself increasingly drawn to it with each passing day. I feel kindred with it and I am absolutely compelled to go back.

Ache, an installation made before I went to Iceland

After my show opens in Sweden I will go to Iceland and live there until July.

Thanks for reading.