Rollin' rollin' rollin'

96" x 44". That's how big this woodcut print is. And now, nervously and with great anticipation, the big reveal.....

After laying down a protective blanket, Five-in-One Social Club workshop goes to press.

Five-in-One Social club steamroller workshop. First print!

Here's a print we pulled later on in the evening. It is an assemblage of an old bedspread and some cotton napkins. Love the way the color affects the print.

This is the quiltop I created for another print. Look for this one later on this week!

Steamroller_Five_in_One_Social_Club.jpg

Beasty

Purchase your steamroller print here! There are some incredible designs to choose from.

Five-in-One Social Club

deconstruct/reconstruct

I use this mighty tool to deconstruct pieces that don't speak to me anymore. I look for those quiet ones that seem unbalanced, pretentious or unsuccessful. They hide in piles beneath my work table — murmuring. Some are sharing false narratives. Some seem to be trying too hard. Others just plain bore me. So I get out the rotary cutter and start cutting.

rotarycutter.jpg

I'll often end up with a pile that stretches to fill my entire work table. I try not to think about how many hours were spent creating the pieces in the first place. It's about the process not the product right?

I Need a Third Eye, work in progress, Paula Kovarik

The varying stitch, cloth and colors create an animated surface.

I Need a Third Eye, work in progress detail, Paula Kovarik

Then I start stitching again, connecting the diverse pieces to each other by adding another layer of meaning to the story.

I Need a Third Eye, work in progress detail, Paula Kovarik

And then I add some more. Until it seems to be enough.

I Need a Third Eye, final crop, Paula Kovarik

grids and webs

I woke up thinking about the difference between webs and grids. Webs reach, weave and beckon. Grids underpin, stabilize and neutralize. Webs are homes and traps. Grids are fences and containers. Webs spiral, grids measure cadence. Webs connect with tenuous intersections but also can withstand thunderstorms and errant wasps. Grids tie things together with a regular rhythm yet can be broken with a casual erasure of consistency. 

Webs can have enemies in them, grids can keep the lights on. Webs can be world-wide, grids map the lands and seas. Webs tangle, grids untangle. Grids are a human construct. Webs are a natural phenomenon. They are cousins in understanding where we fit.

Cracks, work in progress, Paula Kovarik

The news of Charlottesville and our president has shattered my sense of safety and calm. It may be why I keep cutting up pieces of fabric into shards and stitching them back together. Quilting this piece begins next week. I could stitch a grid onto it to find order. I could stitch a web of threads over it to hold it all together. Or I might cut it up some more and practice sewing it back together over and over again. Not sure where the thread will take me.

It's in our nature.

I've been thinking about dysfunction. Siblings, political parties, major corporations, government, non-profit agencies — they all experience a little wrack and ruin over time. Personality conflicts, power grabs, bullying, and just plain incompetence can splinter the foundation of any assemblage.

It's in our nature.

So how do we face and focus on mending? It's clear we all need the balm of empathy. We need to find common ground to forge compromise and progress.

Haywire, Paula Kovarik, 2017

We need to clear the air and listen. Speak truth to power and allow for differences.

Ladder to Elsewhere, Paula Kovarik, 2017

I say we act like crabgrass. Move with energy into the cracks. Sew up the middles so that the edges have a base to grow on.

Rough layout for Crabgrass, Paula Kovarik

Still looking

These tiles had one thing in common. Black thread on a neutral background.

I'm still thinking about how patterns emerge. And how our brains look for unifying elements to make sense of chaos. Quilts use repeat modules to create a whole from fragments. So, if I brought disparate elements together could I create a whole? Here's a few base thoughts:

  1. Regularity unifies.
  2. Grids are glue.
  3. Lines travel and connect.
  4. Connection = comprehension

So I took a few of the sample thread studies I have laying around and cut them into 2" squares. Assembling them randomly on a background substrate created a tile-like pattern that I emphasized with a grid that holds them together.

Then I started looking for connections. These small tiles really have little in common— just some black thread on neutral fabric. My eyes seemed to bounce around the assemblage, hip hopping to find similarities. So I added a line mimicking the hip-hop journey my eyes were taking. 

Adding denser fill stitching at the intersections of the connecting line and patterned tile added a sense of rhythm to the piece.

Adding hand-stitched details adds action and brings the tiles together in small areas.

Then I turned the piece to the back to see what was happening with my random connections.

The picture on the left is the front of the assemblage. The one on the right shows the stitching I added to the piece. I love the raw quality of those marks. And, I had no idea that I had formed a face in profile when I was working from the front.

Here's another comparison. The left side is dense with stitching and linework that is beginning to represent my idea of complexity and chaos. The back shows a simpler yet texturally consistent stitching that appeals to me. There's a sense of space on that side that brings more focus on the character of the lines.

I'm not sure how much farther I want to take this piece. I love the complexity that is beginning to show up with the layered stitching. And I like the back of the piece. I'll have to study it a while.