More Summer Projects

Before I start being overwhelmed with schoolwork, here are some photos of more projects I did this summer. 

I think I've finally have an inkling of what I'd like to do after I finish college in two years. I realized recently that what I truly love to do is make costumes. So I'm going to run with that and see where it can take me. Perhaps I can get an internship with one of the local theatres during my fourth (and final!) year. I'm taking the wearable art course at my college, which is the only fashion/garment focused class in the whole school. It's going to be awesome, but very challenging. We're having at least two shows, and one of them people are paying over a hundred dollars to see it. No pressure! And there will be a lot of work about networking and self-promotion. I'm really excited, but a little scared.

Still, I'm really happy school has started again. It's going to be an awesome year.

summer sketches

I'm trying to keep my creative juices flowing, which is difficult in the middle of summer vacation. My current goal is to draw, or do something creative, every day. I'm hoping this will help me stop being hung up on needing to make Good Art, or come up with Good Ideas. The process itself gives its own satisfaction.

over the pond

I just got back from a two-week trip to London. It was amazing. This was my first major trip by myself, and there's something rather exciting about being able to explore a strange city by oneself. Particularly one as exciting as London. I did spend quite a bit of time with the lovely Kait, who toured me around and either showed me or sent me to all the quirky, exciting neighbourhoods. But most of the time I was pretty much self-directed.



I saw a lot of museums and galleries. It helps that most of them were free - or by donation - and I didn't have much in the way of spending money. But I also wanted to see bits of art and culture that I don't really have access to here in Canada. To see the paintings and sculptures that I'd learned so much about in school but never had the opportunity to appreciate in real life. If you only know one thing about art, know this: no matter how great a picture is, it never can compare to the original.



London was amazing. It also was overcrowded, cramped and dirty. I'm glad to be home. But I would so go back again if I could.

It's raining jellyfish! Hallelujah!

Wow, it's been a while. Life's been ridiculously busy. Two more weeks until the end of term! It's been crazy. I don't think I'll try doing four classes in a semester again. I've been a slave to my to-do list since January.



Still, I've gotten some interesting things done. We did some work in Photoshop in my weaving class. Which seems rather bizarre to me. I'm sure some of the traditional weaving techniques we use haven't changed much in a couple hundred years. Still, the department ordered a jacquard loom, which is one that can weave images from digital files. Our class learned to use the software, so that when it actually arrives we can be the guinea pigs and see how it all works.



I must admit, making ridiculous images in Photoshop is really fun. This coming from someone who occasionally wonders if society would be better if the computer had stopped at the loom. *grins*



These are some of the images I did. I kind of love the jellyfish one.

2010

I supposed I shouldn't start the new year without recapping what happened last year. And showing off the pieces that almost no-one has seen.

This was the year that I started defining the direction I wanted my practice to go, and the year I created some of my more powerful gender-themed pieces. Sometimes I still have troubles telling myself that others will be interested in the very autobiographical works that I create when exploring the ideas of gender and identity, but every time I bring such a piece into a critique it creates a lot of discussion. I've spent so long thinking about gender that I have to remind myself that what seems obvious to me is new ideas for other people.

I've started wondering what I'm going to do after I graduate. It doesn't seem so far away now, although it'll probably be another year or so. Time seems to be going by faster and faster, and I want to start preparing myself for what comes after. Life doesn't end at graduation. I need to have plans. I've been throwing ideas around, but nothing is definite. Do I want to get my masters? Start my own business? Go into fashion? I'm not too worried yet. I know that if I keep the questions at the back of my mind, in time the answer will become clear.

I'm excited to start another term at school, and to see what the new year will bring.

patchwork

second last project of the year.

*takes a deep breath*



I ended up changing my plan at the last minute, because my previous idea was not working at all. This idea actually terrified me for a while. To make a work that deals this much with my own personal history is to be naked and vulnurable more than anything else I've done in my practice so far. That is probably what makes this seem like such a powerful work.

Anyways, here's some pictures and my artist statement.

Stories, and storytelling, are an important part of life. Stories connect us to other people, they help us understand the world in which we live. This work explores the changing relationship I have had with my body throughout my life, and the long road that led to acceptance of my body and my gender. Because being transgendered is not something commonly understood, this is a story I've had to retell many times to many people. Indeed, being transgendered sometimes means becoming a storyteller of ones gender history: to oneself, to friends and family, to the doctors and psychiatrists in charge of approving transition. Using found materials – including some that were used in my clothing as a child – I embroidered and embellished fragments of my past and then stitched them together to create a coherent whole. The quilt motif refers to the comforting and protective roles that textiles play in our lives, as well as the use as quilts in history as a way of telling stories.

This project has been an intense process for me, because it forced me to relive the past and face the embodied memories caught in the cloth I worked. I found cloth from a dress my mother made me when I was very young – one that she treasures still, each stitch sewn with love for the girl I was supposed to be – and I was able to transform it into something new and meaningful for the person that I have become. In reworking my past I learned to have compassion for it, and I hope that in sharing my past with others I can help spread understanding.

best final project ever: cookies

So, instead of a final exam, or essay, one of my instructors decided we'd do a "Textile Bake-off" instead. We have to make food, and justify it as being textile related. Any kind of food whatsoever. We're meeting up today to talk about the food we made, have tea, and eat it all.


I made cookies shaped like drop spindles, and spun sugar.



I love it when homework doesn't feel like homework.