When “happiness is in your hands”, it shines through in the finished work, just like the baskets made in class with Jeanette Biederman and the bluebirds from Jerry Landwehr’s Carving Songbirds class. The week was filled with patterns, colors and a multitude of baskets just like previous Independent Study classes! A number of students focused on trays with many complex designs seen in the studio. We like to think the happiness generated in class was tucked inside all these baskets before they went home! Using basswood or butternut and starting from a rough-cut form, the carving students brought their bluebirds to life in just two days time. If “happiness is in your hands” could these be […]
September
Before these glorious days of September turn to more traditional fall weather, we wanted to share some Washington Island views and an old elementary school poem about this lovely month. September The goldenrod is yellow; The corn is turning brown, The trees in apple orchards With fruit are bending down. The gentian’s bluest fringes Are curling in the sun, In dusty pods the milkweed Its hidden silk has spun. The hedges flaunt their harvest In every meadow nook, And asters on the hillside Makes aster in the brook. From dewy lanes at morning The grape’s sweet odors rise, At noon the roads all flutter With yellow butterflies. By all these lovely tokens September days are […]
Sievers Gathering Update
It’s getting closer to Sievers Gathering time! The weekend begins with our workshops, Bead Embroidery Basics with a Side of Weaving offered by Francie Broadie and Beginning Splint-Woven Basketry with Geri Rock. The workshops will run Thursday, September 27 at 2pm until Friday, September 28 at 4pm. Some of our updates since the last posting in July: Our Friday evening social time with cookies and refreshments will be held in the Walter Studio from 5 pm to 8 pm. Some of the Sievers history and photos will be on display there. The Sievers Shop will be open until 8 pm as well. Judie Yamamoto will be demonstrating Japanese Temari on Saturday afternoon. Two additional vendors have been added: Island Edibles and […]
In contrast
There’s been a definite contrast this past week between Kay Rashka’s Metalwork Jewelry Boot Camp with students using hammers, drills, motorized hand tools, torches and all sorts of shiny and possibly even sharp-edged components for fabricating jewelry and Betty Glynn Carlson’s Navajo Rug Weaving class where students quietly and reflectively place each strand of authentic wool yarn within the warp. Come along for a tour! With Kay Rashka’s instruction, each student leaves with a collection of interesting, personalized and textured art jewelry. Navajo Weaving in itself is a journey, using unbroken warp threads and meaningful designs woven out of (often) specific naturally dyed wool. To finish one piece in this 5-day class is a real accomplishment. Some of the students had started a rug in a prior year […]
Unique, Tiny, Precious
These are just three of the words used in the descriptions for Mary Hettmansperger’s Expressions in Jewelry and Chad Alice Hagen’s Tiny Book Necklaces classes. Add to that “creative”, “fun” and “fast-paced” and you have a lot of options for very personalized and special wearables. Starting with sheets of copper or brass and an assortment of found objects in Mary’s class, students then added layers, embossing, hinges and their own style to create a unique jewelry wardrobe. Not every piece was made to wear as jewelry. Some of these colorful metals may end up in other mixed-media art work. As Mary’s class description says, there are “endless options…”. We loved seeing so many of them! If you love books, you love them in all […]
Be All You Can Be
Attention!! The recruits in Deb Jones’ Spinner’s Boot Camp grant permission for you to inspect their field of operations (aka the Walter Studio). Deb brings so much for the students to experiment with, from wheels to blending and carding tools to an amazing array of fleece. It certainly allowed them to be all they can be! In this class, the boot camp atmosphere began with each student receiving a fatigue hat to form a spinning squad. Daily training in techniques and challenges were part of the week’s wooly “obstacle course”. To become a more intentional spinner along with instilling more skills and confidence were the goals of these training exercises. At the end of the first day, the comments were, “I’ve learned so much already”. […]
A Natural Combination
It’s hard to imagine a nicer combination than combining willow and driftwood to make a basket! In Jo Campbell-Amsler’s class they did just that. These one-of-a-kind baskets took some planning, determining the best use of the driftwood depending on it’s size and shape and how it should be featured in the finished piece. With many options to explore, each student had the opportunity to create more than one basket during the four-day class (some went home with two or three baskets, plus prepared frames for more). Washington Island is blessed with many of nature’s gifts…willow and driftwood among them. We love the late-August wildflowers along the roadsides and in the fields, just one of those many gifts given. May […]
Without Boundaries
After learning the basics, there’s no boundaries to what you can create. Experimenting builds new opportunities and that was definitely part of our last two classes. We start by continuing with a few more fabrics; direct painted, dyed, printed and screened from Stephanie Robertson’s Making Your Mark class. A family tree branched out on one piece, and after preparing the first stage of this mountain scene, it was definitely time to sit back and admire it with feet up! An idea proposed by one of Stephanie’s students and carried out in class this year was to hand-dye cotton that could be used in the Washington Island-made Quilts of Valor. Each student participated to create this array of fabrics for these meaningful quilts. […]
