A Fine textilic week end

[Mirjam Bruck-Cohen]

Saturday Morning we were invited to an exhibition opening , a Young
artist made `Light sculptures`, The gallery was darkened , the
shutters on the window closed. And The Clouds played their part too!
Dark and pregnant with Rain they Took away any other part of the
light . The light sculptures are made From A Wire Skeleton, Onto which
he glues Wet White papers , Than he added adornments like leaves or
dried flowers , And than another layer of wet white paper and than
some Rice paper, The Novelity were the forms , coming into the
gallerie was like coming into The Bushes and watching a bunch of birds
, bathing in a lake , having just come out and now Moving their wings
to dry them , And one or two are almost jumping into the air to start
their flight. Everybody who entered the gallerie came out with a big
Smile ,, There was something so amusing about Those Sculptures . I met
the artist , Congratulated him , and than had told him That I `suspect
` that when we turn our backs those sculpture Start Dancing around the
room , The feeling of movement that has stopped only for a moment ,
but will resume itself ,, was enormous.
Young artist Told us that until he met Us he did not realize That
Paper was actually A FIBER ,,,, Now he knows.
came home Had marvelous Shabat Lunch.
And sat down to read, about the work clothes.Their Materilas their
colors. Since I am writing Catalog Paper , for an Exhibition where the
painter researches Pioneer Women. Using Old Photographs as sources.
She Excells in painting their clothes. which in most [ of course B/W
photos ] seem to be on the light side of the color spectrum . This
raised in me a question, Light colored working clothes seemed a bit
odd , Unless I can Find a reason !!!. Of course since all Photos are
in B/W. I had To look at many photos of the same period, and what`s
more To find A clothing article Which color I can Identify !!!! and
use this as indicator or measure.
Thus for Two weeks now I look into Old Personal Albums , sevweral
persons Leant me, As well as Photographic commercial books.
I Also had Some Info as to Clothes possibilities in certain years.
Found A man Who used to work in the only textile Factory in the 50s,
and with his help Grouped Photos Of Identifyable clothes.As he Was one
of the weavers He definitely knew certain Colors. now i reshuffeled my
piles and went to look quietly with a magnifying glass at ceratin
photos , comparing them with The Photos The artist uses as source.
I also read several chapters In several books that described Work
clothes , this info i had to group by geographical and cultural
trends.
And of course I am never really Sure but i came Up with some ideas ,
which I am going to phrase into Severl short Sentences in my catalog
essay.
To top the day , had A call from An Ex-pupil who got engaged. being of
A culture where girls Still prepare some hand embroidered articles for
their Future Home. She Told me that she took my suggestion, while I
taught her, and she Actually , made her two embroidered pillow cases ,
into her Finnishing Project of her course. She also told happily ,
that she had done a lot of research , and that since as we suspected
there was not much Written material , She interviewed women of her
family and in her villlage about, legends and any other related info
they could tell her.
Now she invited me to the wedding, and was happy to tell, that her
Family were so impressed by her written work, that they are alowing
her To start University studies as well . I jokingly told her she
would have To embroider her Diploma , or a Big thank you note to her
Embroidery friends !!! Needle , Thread and thimble .
As I wrote in my Subject line It was A Fine Textilic weekend.
mirjam ..

[Dianne Lewandowski]

You made my day!! Thanks so very much for sharing. What wonderful
stories.
Dianne