May Take It Further Challenge Completed

For the month of May Sharon B issued this challenge:

What do you call yourself, and why? 

This question has a very specific focus with regard to those of us who work with fibers, fabric, color, design, etc. 

The challenge color palette uses these colors:

At first I wanted to make some kind of garment, either a jacket or a clergy stole, because it would be a very visible symbol of “what I call myself”, and carries the theme in my faith tradition of “putting on” a new garment or name to fully describe oneself after a period of transformation.

However, I knew that would be pretty hard to design and complete well in one month, so I’m setting that plan aside and will work on it later.

I decided instead to make another journal using a gel print on cotton that I had made before this challenge, but seemed to fit.  I added hand embroidery and beaded sequins to this flowing ribbon design.  The ribbon design came from a series of doodles I did that came out like ribbons.

It’s one of my favorite doodle motifs, and is a motif that symbolizes much of my life:  like a flowing, shifting, floating, turning ribbon, that has a different appearance as it flows, yet is still the same ribbon.

To illustrate what I call myself, I used this ribbon, then embellished it with fibers that flow around it, adding beads and sequins for sparkle and texture.  I continued the flow of the ribbon beyond the cover bounds with an organza ribbon tie.  With the journal cover alone I think I can explain to people who ask what it means to be a fiber artist.

I have resisted for a long time calling myself an “artist”, thinking of myself more as a skilled craftsperson.  However, as I have moved more and more into the realm of creating pieces from my own designs I feel more comfortable with the term “artist”, even though I am pretty much self taught and have some trepidation based on my lack of formal knowledge of art technique and history. 

With that said, I believe artists bring together elements in ways that haven’t been brought together before, often bringing order out of chaos of element and arrangement, producing design. 

It is, I believe, the creative character of all human beings, in many different endeavors, that gives us the deepest connection to the divine.  When we create, we transcend the mundane–even when creating with mundane elements–and we sometimes, thus, are able to glimpse our true selves.  That transcendence does not come without struggle, however, if it is true creation.

I chose to make my gel printed embroidery piece into a journal cover that encloses pages for recording quotes, ideas, and goals that are bounded by signature covers of hand dyed fabrics.  On two of them I have placed triangles to symbolize the work I do with piecing and quilting of fabrics. 

  

The inside cover and pockets (front and back) are also hand-dyed fabrics. 

If I carry this journal with me and am asked about what I do, I can use it to tangibly show:  painting and printing on fabric, stitching with fibers and beads, hand dyeing fabrics, sewing, and quilt making.

Throughout this month’s exercise I have tried out different word descriptions of what I call myself and why:  craftsperson, quilt maker, embroiderer, artisan, textile artist, and fiber artist.

I keep coming back to fiber artist.  It’s the nomenclature I’ve most often used, and feels most comfortable rolling off my tongue, even though it means I usually must add an explanation.  In that explanation I am able to open people’s vision to a broader idea of what the word “artist” encompasses.

My palette is not just paint, but an entire array of textiles, fibers, dyes, beads, and even found objects.  Creations are usually multi-dimensional with both visual and tactile texture. 

I am also a writer in my professional career as a clergy woman, so placing my fiber art around pages for writing adds another dimension to the descriptive piece. 

In the same vein as this month’s challenge, I have begun to read sociologist Richard Sennett’s latest book, The Craftsman.  It explores what it means to do or make something well simply for the doing of it as opposed to as a means to an end.  He posits, I believe, that our post-modernist cultures have lost that value in many areas, while engaging it in other ways that are new and unexpected.

I’ve just begun the book, so I’m looking forward to seeing where he takes this theme.