A New Direction

(Please read my previous entry "What Does Magick Have to Do With Anything.")

Recently I have been sculpting with wool less, and playing with other techniques, like painting wool on canvas,  2.5 dimensional applique sculpting, and wet felting.  I've also expanded the types of yoga I've been practicing to include Kundalini (the results of which sort of remind me of Israel Regardi's Kabbalisitic "Middle Pillar Ritual." ) It's been fun, but for the longest time it seemed like it was going nowhere. 



Pre-sculpted wet felt



I've decided to share the story behind a new creation because. . . well, I like to share no matter how nutty it's gonna make me sound. 

So I had an idea that was an integration of all the experiments I've been doing with wool.  I wanted to create a wet felted "wall hanging" with a very primitive look to it, sort of like an animal pelt, and to use that pelt as the "canvas" for sculpting an image onto.  My idea was to combine "pop and primitive" and I wanted to do an image of H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu (because I enjoy Cthulhu as an image, and wool locks work well for his tentacled face.)  But as is often the case, what I WANT to make and what ends up actually getting made aren't the same. 

When I conceived the idea I had for weeks been in a near constant state of bliss, practicing yoga with a renewed energy and interest, and swimming regularly.  Not that it probably matters, but this was shortly after the lunar eclipse.  It wasn't until the moon was moving into Capricorn (goat) that I was ready to get working.  Then a series of interruptions happened.  Just mundane life stuff, but I let it get under my skin until I let myself get into a really angry place, really resenting that "my only day off to fully work on the new idea" was getting "ruined."  It was pretty ugly.



"Valour"

 I calmed down somewhat and went to my kundalini yoga class, which I hadn't been doing for very long.  This type of yoga deals with raising energy located at the base of the spine.  When I had done this class before, it always left me feeling invigorated, light, joyous and filled with a love that seemed to radiate from my core.  On this day, the anger I had been feeling was gone afterwards, but in it's place I was just tired.  About two hours later I was running a fever and went to bed.  I slept for nearly two days.

When I was feeling well again and had an open space to work I began with a deep mediation, followed by contemplation of a single tarot card.  I used a different deck than normal (Bohemian Gothic Tarot) and I don't know why.  I only have the deck because I enjoy the artwork in it.  I drew the seven of wands.  Sevens represent a degradation of their element, and wands are fire or primal energy.  This particular deck is unusual in that it associates this card with a goat image.



Mounting the piece

 I had actually prepped and laid out the wool for wet-felting some days before.  The process of wet felting can be really surprising, especially when you use a number of different types of wool.  The way it shrinks brings about shapes and edges that you can't predict.  The picture of the wet felted piece above was quite different than I expected and it's shape was all wrong for the Cthulhu image I'd wanted to sculpt on it.  But there were five definite points and an implicit goat shape.

I was actually doing this piece as final project for a mixed media sculpture class, and one of the things the instructor had been emphasizing was the juxtaposition of topic/image with material.  How perfect then, to evoke an image of a goat in the hair of sheep?  Not exactly a profound idea but the individualist/goat emerging from the herd/sheep was thematically coherent and the essential shape was suggested by the way the wet-felt had dried, like Jesus in a corn tortilla. 



Fuzzy Ears Are Fun to Rub!

 The process of actually sculpting the image, as is often the case, flowed almost unconsciously and even now seems sort of like a dream.  But it was a goat alright.  Of sorts.  And so soft and tactile (pure merino wool). . .it's ears feel really, really cool. 

I had also originally planned on hanging this piece by tying the four corners to a frame of sticks, but that just seemed all wrong.  It just seemed to beg for rusty nails and ragged old wood--like nailing an animal hide to a decrepit barn.  I figured there would be no way I'd find the right wood mount before the sculpture class ended, but I literally stumbled onto exactly the right size (and decrepitude) of wood on a morning walk at Ocean Beach. 

I thought about leaving out this next little bit of info as being a too creepy and weird--even for my most open minded of friends, but well. . .I've gone this far.  And synchronicity is interesting.  So here it goes.  The morning after I finished the sculpture (but before I had nailed it to the board) I snapped a quick pic of the piece with my phone. . . and happened to notice that it was the 666th picture on my memory card.  And when I checked my email right after that, I had received a notification that was time-stamped at about the same time as I was finishing the sculpture.  It was a notification that my "Bastet" sculpture had been featured in a "Goddess Treasury" on Etsy.

Bastet was created back in November of 2010, and prior to this experience, was the single most intense visionary and artistic experience of my life, and preceded a phase of true and meaningful personal growth.  How fitting that this goddess should get her first exposure in a treasury at the exact same time I was finishing an ancient god-image (Baphomet) associated with fertility, virility and individuality? 

I don't make too much of all this, but I don't dismiss it.  What does it all mean?  Anything?  Nothing?  Selective perception?  Coincidence?  Who knows.  All I know is what it feels like.  It feels like hard work.  Like overcoming challenges.  Like growing pains.  It feels like being the goat, being an individual, is painful business.  Because it means being honest and embracing the entirety of one's humanity: the animal, the angel, and yes, even the demon.

This piece just begged for a dramatic tongue-in-cheek "heavy metal" cliche photograph.

What does magick have to do with anything?

My Etsy profile says "Armed with mythology, pop culture, magic, yoga--and some really sharp felting needles--I pursue the deities, faerie folk, and strangely beautiful creatures hidden in humble locks of wool through a process that often feels more like conjuring than creation." 

How much of that is whimsy?  What do I mean by magick?  I have mentioned consciousness and magick previously in this blog, but I have kind of shyed away from talking much about it because I know it is scary to some people.  However, because of the nature and circumstances of my most recent adventures in the Wooliverse, and I wanted to address the topic head-on.

I am by nature a scientific rationalist, and a skeptic.   I do not believe in the "supernatural" (though as a skeptic I don't completely rule anything out.)  What use does a rationalist have with "magick?"  Or with things like the Tarot?  Or mythology for that matter? 

Mythology and Pop Culture are both great sources if imagery.  And Pop Culture is itself a rich of form of mythology (think Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, or H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos.)  Tarot is also a system of symbolism (it is, in fact, a brilliant pictoral representation of the human psyche and our journey through life.)  Symbolism is a powerful way for the conscious and unconscious mind to communicate. 

When I say "Magick" I'm referring primarily to techniques that unite the conscious and unconscious mind, or at least allow communication to occur between the two in such a way as to stimulate not just creativity but self-awareness.  Training the mind with archtypal/universal symbols such as those found in the Tarot is one way to increase your ability to travel more deeply into yourself to find understanding about who you are, and why.

For me, creating things out of wool is a very primal and magical experience most of the time.  Felting is such a slow, repetitive process that even if I haven't initiated a new creation through ritual or meditation, I often enter into what I can only describe as a hypnotic state.  Many creative people--musicians, writers, painters, poets-- describe feeling this way when working.  I can literally lose awareness of everything else around me. 

I am a beginner as a visual artist.  I am a beginner in my practice of yoga.  I am a beginner, honestly, at "being P.J."  I have learned a LOT about myself the last couple of years while exploring the "Wooliverse."  I am slowly learning to SEE, and to be a happy person. 

Some things that come out of the process are dark, because those are aspects of myself that rise up and must be confronted.  Other things are whimisical and fun because I am that too.    Magic, tarot, yoga, explorations of consciousness. . . I have definitely known people who think that is all just "satanism" and I can only feel sorry for people limited by fear.  The scariest thing is really knowing yourself, both your ugliness, and the deep responsibility of your true beauty.  Those are things I'm dealing with in my practice--of yoga, art, and magick, whether the end result be a goofy looking brightly colored snail, or a hideous monster.

Steampunk Lamps

LOTS going on lately that I want to write about.  Started a mixed media fiber sculpture class, am branching out into other kinds of yoga (with interesting results), and finished a fun and very strange piece that I haven't photographed yet.

But for now I want to step aside and show off the steampunk lamps I recently found out my stepfather started making.  Head over to Bilmore Studios and take a look at what Bill has been making out of re-purposed vintage items like Clayton Lambert blowtorches, Kwikway floor heaters, and a Hamilton Beach sewing machine foot pedal. 

The Lambert

I really like this one a lot, and because I can't word it any better, I'm just gonna plagiarize the description right off of his blog: 

"The base was salvaged from a vintage Clayton Lambert blowtorch, circa 1921. It features a porcelain socket, tubular bulb, bakelite rotary switch, and copper and brass accents. Measuring just over 10 inches tall, it offers a unique focal point for any home or office setting."

The Aerovap

To the right. . .well, again, just let me steal a description from Bill: 

"The base was salvaged from an Aerovap pest and germ eradicator, a device leased to hospitals nationwide circa 1943. The lamp features a forged aluminum housing, chrome top bulb, vintage toggle switch, and the unique red-letter art deco Aerovap logo. (Other bulbs may be substituted for different lighting arrangements.) At almost 15 inches tall, it offers a unique accent for any home or office setting. Note: This is an extremely rare piece of repurposed Americana. "

There are many more creations to see at Bilmore Studios.  Check them out.  Great work Bill!

Sheep Dream of Gold in Heaven

In my last post on "Li Symmetries" I mentioned how "wrong" it felt to drench wool in paint.  One of my favorite things about wool is how it feels, so destroying the way it feels by sealing it under dense layers of paint and resin seemed unthinkable to me.  Which meant it had to be tried. 

"Sheep Dream of Gold in Heaven" started out as raw wool that I stabbed together along random clumps and whorls. It's affixed to canvas with thread and glue, and painted.  I posted a picture of the unpainted wool piece previously in "Li Symmetries."

I have no idea if I like it, or if it is likeable.  It's impossible to be objective at all yet.  I wanted to share some pics anyway because I had a lot of fun doing it.  It's been good to get away from literal creations both cute and monstrous and just do something totally different.

This was more a learning process and an early experiment.  I can't say for sure. . .but I'm thinking of doing more of these because this just feels like a doodle, like there is SO much more to play with here conceptually.

Li Symmetries

You MUST read the Quadrivium!

The Quadrivium is a superb coffee table book.  The Quadrivium are the four classical sciences of number, geometry, music, and cosmology, "studied from antiquity to the Renaissance as a way of glimpsing the nature of reality.  Geometry is number in space, music is number in time, and the cosmos expresses number in space and time."

I'm not a math or science person, and you don't have to be to enjoy this gorgeous book's one page topics.  I like to just open the book at random and read one.  This morning was the concept of Li Symmetries.  Li Symmetries are patterns found in nature that are self organizing, and differ from "static symmetry" in that "they are primarily caused by interaction between processes and materials."  Some of the most readily recognizable examples of this in nature are tree bark, or the ribbing of the sand in the beach caused by wind.

Clouds are also an example of this, and I've cited clouds as a reference point many times for how I often approach working with wool.  I see symmetries in raw wool that arise in the sheep's coat as it interacted with the elements and the sheep's movement while it wore the wool.  So further when I'm am looking for pattern's in the wool (meaningful or otherwise), a second "interaction between process and material" occurs between my felting needle and the inherent symmetries in the wool..

It struck me as odd (I don't know why, because this is just how my life works) that I opened to the Quadrivium's entry on Li Symmetries this morning, because last night I got sucked into working in a really different way with the patterns in the wool.  I'm working in an abstract way at creating a 2.5 dimension piece of patterned wool which will likely be attached to a canvas and covered in paint and or resin.

It seemed a little "blasphemous" to me at first because part of the joy of wool is the tactile nature. . . even if you don't touch it, it's "tactile to the eye" somehow.  Covering it in paint. . .it's like it isn't wool anymore.  But I've been playing around with painting it anyway, and I think the results are interesting, even if it is far, far away from the material's roots.

I don't usually show stuff still in process, but this is just playful and fun, and I have no idea if it will be remotely successful in the end, but the process itself has been really rewarding and freeing, to just play in anyway I want with any materials that occur to me.  I love the strange patterns in the locks, and so just randomly capturing them rather than vision questing  "cloud dreams" and affixing them as the surface of a 3-d base sculpture is divinely meditative.

I LOVE walking in the woods and noticing symmetries in the bark, and the symmetries of branch-growth as affected by the ocean winds.  So as different as this wall-hanging piece is (whether it ends up affixed to canvas, or to a quilt even) I feel like it's absolutely a continuation of my past explorations with wool.  Which, even if it ends up as bad art, is a rewarding growth process.  Which is all that is really important.

Catharthsis

Meet Avril, the music box ballerina I've been working on for half the month of April.  (I was going to name her April, but my wife thought French would be fitting since it's ballet.)

This custom request was a frustrating and difficult challenge, but ultimately I'm really happy to have a project that pushed me this hard.  This is not a wire-frame doll, or pose-able. . . it is a very densely needle-felted sculpture.  Her tutu was cut from a piece of fabric I wet-felted.

Though there is no wire, to mount the piece I embedded a felting needle in the wooden base, and it goes up through the point toe and part way inside the left leg.

AND NOW IT'S TIME FOR EVIL CLOWNS!

I don't have anything against creating cute or beautiful things, but I have a special spot in my heart for the slightly (to extremely) bizarre, and spending so much time working on the ballerina, I sat down to doodle and without even trying out popped this evil clown.


 A kind woman whom I met at fiber club (at Urban Fauna), after seeing one of my Wool n Spool dolls,  gave me a number of vintage spools of thread that had belonged to her mom. 

This clown is in stitches!

I have promised to make her a beautiful "Wool n Spool" doll which honors the history behind the spools, but she requested rather than fabric which I normally glue around the spool, that I leave the original thread on the spool for the piece I make for her. 

  I did a practice run at doing something "dressed" in the original thread and this clown is what came to me.

I am still going to make her something beautiful to express my gratitude (this clown is SO wrong considering the context) but I must thank her for the inspiration, because the thread is beautiful, and additionally I was able to work it into the head itself.

When I started stabbing around at a head for this spool of bright red thread, there was a retrospective about Charlie Sheen's career on TV, from his childhood to the recent poetry filled outbursts in the press. There is no conscious correlation between this clown and Sheen, it just happened to be on. . . but it undoubtedly imbued some kind of essence. 

So, I present to you, "Winner the Clown."  All clowns (evil or otherwise) love hookers, cocaine and beckoning to children from storm drains with the raspy promise that "We all win down here."

WINNING!

Avril, music box ballerina

Winner the Clown

Video Games

I love electronic gaming, and I love wool, so it's been a delight to have two games released in the last six months that are visual homages to the textile arts:  Little Big Planet 2 on Playstation 3 has a LOT of textiles in it's texture palette, and Kirby's Epic Yarn for Nintendo Wii has visuals that are drawn entirely from yarn, felt and wool.  Both are incredibly cute, simple side-scrollers awash with gorgeous visuals and infectious music.

We just had the Game Developers Conference here in SF and I got to spend a little time with a friend who contributes to the PSNation podcasts and finally got to show him my needle felting work in person.  When he mentioned that he wanted to plug my etsy site on the podcast, I thought it'd be cool to make and upload at least a couple gaming related items. 

Needle felted Kirby and 1-up Mushroom by Wooliverse

I know the original monsters I make also appeal to game and comic fans, but I thought it would be good to have a couple actual gaming related items, if for nothing else than to have a point of reference for anyone who wants to custom request a video game character.  I knocked out this Kirby and a Mario 1-up mushroom (which now that I think about it, by definition fits into my "spirit mushrooms" series!) And in a few weeks when I've finished some special requests will do a Yoshi and Mario for the fun of it.

While we're on the topic, here's a chance to give some recognition to my favorite gaming related textile artist, San Francisco's NerdJerk, who makes--among other things--the coolest Amigurumi Bob-ombs.  Check it out.  You will want one of her creations to set next to your gaming rig.  Trust me!

Amigurumi  Kirby by Nerd Jerk.

Now. . . the only thing we need is. . . . .FREE TIME AND AN EXTRA SET OF THUMBS!