Back to landscapes

I don't remember now what drove me to make a new landscape. But whatever the reason it happened at a good time. I had just been asked about teaching a landscape class here and was really not sure how I was going to answer. I was not enthusiastic about the idea of teaching the class again. But while I was working on this new landscape I realized that part of the problem was that it had been so long since I had made a landscape using the techniques that I teach. While I was laying out the fibers I found myself thinking of ways to explain the hows and whys of what I was doing so a student could understand. I started to get excited again about being able to share my knowledge and watching students when they get that "aha" moment.
So I have scheduled a class for May 4th and 5th. If anyone is interested in taking this class please email me at dchristianart@gmail.com for details.
Here is the landscape that I was working on.

It is another piece that I don't consider finished but I am getting to be OK with that. If I can get out of a piece what I wanted to feel, or learn, or express, does it matter if I take it as far as I feel it could go ; especially when there are so many more ideas to try?
And I have been trying quite a few new things. I wanted to participate in the "Sister Mississippi Textile Fiber Arts Project" and made a piece that is inspired by the colors of water. (Use the link above for more information about this project and the water walk.) Making images of water is not new for me. On my Facebook page  I created a photo album of just pieces that were inspired by or contained images of water and found I had 34 pieces to show. For the Mississippi piece I experimented with embeding some cording that we have here from when my mother did macrame. I am really pleased with all the textures in the piece.

 

I also did some new-to-me dyeing using ice and snow. I got some wonderful results.

The center of that piece had this image of a butterfly in it.

I had a piece of silk yardage that I dyed at the same time as the green scarf above. I decided to use it as the trial to see how the pattern felts up. I also wanted to see if the dye stayed put....it didn't...but I still like the piece of felt. I will need to research more about how to set the dyes. Doing this piece I was thinking that I should change my business name to 'Felt Impatient' because I rushed through much of it and as a result it is not a nice even piece of nuno felt. Taking my time might have helped when I was reading the instructions about this type of dyeing too!

The other bit of felting I did was the result of cleaning up the 'studio' for the Easter holiday meal. I had a bunch of silks out and while I was sorting the scraps into colors I decided that some of the bits were too small to keep. But instead of throwing them away I decided to throw them on a pile of wool and felt them in. The result was a piece like the one I sent to the Sister Mississippi project.

Sometimes it is fun just to experiment with colors and textures without aiming to make anything in particular.