Practice

Each day I practice. Sometimes until my skin vibrates. Then I rest and review. Often, the lines I am stitching reveal an inner dialog that is not exactly sunny in its disposition.

How to turn that around? Is the moon more mysterious than the sun in its power? Do my thoughts turn to darkness because of a natural inclination to pessimism? Are my observations tinted by the dismal current of events that churn away on our media channels every day? Bobbing along with the current can often yield surprising results. I avoid the saccharine but couldn't I just maybe find a little joy in the way I look at things?

Maybe it will take a little more practice.

seeking solace

I took this picture a few years ago. It speaks to my yearning for a community that gathers with compassion. Meeting on the town square used to be a way of sharing good news and consoling those with bad news. We would keep tabs on the latest births and nod in agreement at how difficult life can be. Lending a hand if need be. Touching each other with soft embraces.

Umbrella gathering, Paula Kovarik

Today the town square has been replaced by media channels that shout about our differences and post horrific news via 140 character soundbites. Even the weather channel is now called the Severe Weather Center. Our communications have been reduced to photos with captions, videos with click bait and two-thumbed typing with hashtags. Essayists have difficulty getting published because so many publications are being gobbled up and shut down by the mega corps. Our newspaper in Memphis is now going to be produced in Nashville. How can we possibly get a feel for community that way?

Dizzy, Secret Life of Stones, Paula Kovarik

And don't even get me started on the politicians who seem to revel in fear.

Propaganda, Secret Life of Stones, Paula Kovarik

Shelter, Secret Life of Stones, Paula Kovarik

How do we stop it? How do we get back to the slow consideration of each other? Can we remember that differences add texture and depth?

Secret Life of Stones, the back, Paula Kovarik

stone faces

Thirty stone stories. One at a time.

Love the smudge on the eye. I think I'll add more of that.

I'm using a raw canvas on this piece and double batting. The texture is amplified because of it.

Adding details by hand gives more character to the stones. My fingers are sore.

Each panel has its own story. The background texture is a wavy line. I used black thread in the bobbin to reinforce the little black dots that connect the lines.

Each panel has its own story. The background texture is a wavy line. I used black thread in the bobbin to reinforce the little black dots that connect the lines.

I started this piece without a backing fabric. And I am not tying and knotting the threads. The back is pretty dang amazing. Maybe I need to add more of this texture to the front too.

silent witness dialogs

In a crowd I wonder about the people who surround me. Is that laughing couple making fun of someone or have they just heard a good joke? Do those children belong to someone in the crowd or are they lost and looking for a home? Does that woman look angry because of a sagging mouth or is she is disgusted by what she sees? What is their inner dialog? What would it sound like?

Thousands of stories, one little street in Rome

There are strangers among us, Paula Kovarik

In high school a friend and I used to go to O'hare airport (when it was legal to go to the departure gates without a ticket). We would sit and watch the travelers and make up stories about their lives and destinations. This one was a spy going to Poland, that one was a starlet on her way to Hollywood, those two just learned that their uncle had left them a fortune. We always added a sense of drama to the mundane.

People dressed up to get on planes in those days. No one had wheels on their luggage so there was a lot of lugging going on. Grim determination was mixed with anticipatory grins for the adventure before them. It wasn't difficult to imagine legends behind their gait.

These rocks are watching.

Last year I spent a week at the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore. It was an opportunity to refocus my inner dialog. I collected rocks, hiked every day, watched the sun set into water and imagined the stories behind the people on the beaches. The rocks I collected had holes in them. They reminded me of faces. I thought of them as silent witnesses to the human drama that surrounded them.

Now I am assembling my own crowd using these inanimate objects to build an animation. Each square has its own story. Thirty-five of them — because the whole is almost my height and I can reach both sides to hold the edges.

Silent witnesses, work-in-progress, canvas, thread and batting. Paula Kovarik

details details

Every piece I make usually has a spot of blood on it — a record of the poking, prodding and pinning that happens while stitching. I used to clean each mistaken drop, but now I leave the evidence. It hurt when it happened. It reminded me that I am alive and not just subsumed by the warp and weft of the cloth before me. It's a symbol of existence — a forensic artifact that ties me to the art.

Catalysts has a forest of bamboo below the images, each horizontal stitch was an opportunity to poke through my finger.

Sinking into details is part of my process. Each stitch added not only embellishes but also brings focus to what I am feeling. Stitching also renders me mute, so when I poke that needle into my skin the little yelp that escapes my brain reminds me that I am present.

What would this eye be without the spec of gold in the pupil?

What would these lines mean without the distressed cloth beneath?

What would this tangle of threads mean without the swirl of activity within?