a little collection

of tangles:

the stack

grows.

In the studio today

Here you can see the tangle sculpture remake fully underway. Layer by layer I've been disassembling, throughly cleaning, and reassembling a new stack. I'll admit it's not my favorite project to work on, but hopefully I'll be pleased with the results.

finished spindle

This spindle is the elegant drawing tool I'd longed for: well balanced, easy functionally, beautiful when still and even more so when in use. The most elusive part, finding a mechanism for holding the lead securely and letting it go for sharpening, had a serendipitous solution after collecting a pile of various pencil parts, a couple days stare time, and a kitemaker. The rest of the tool was calibrated carefully for just the right line quality and wiggle. Handspinners tend to maintain a variety of spindles to spin various yarn weights. In the same way, my drawing tool can be adapted through variations in the whorl weight, balance and size; possibilities abound in adopting a more complex line vocabulary. For now, there is so much to say with just this.

future weaving

On the right: 656 yards plus of oatmeal-colored Blue Faced Leicester spindle spun.

This method of winding a ball I spotted in a book, and the image wouldn't go away until I tried it myself. It's far, far too time consuming; the large ball took over three hours to wind, but still . . . it's lovely to behold. . . and quite dense.

There's always more bits to share, but they seem to be ganging up on me lately.

sighting

An errant tangle revealed itself recently in another's studio, fortunately we were able to capture it in its natural environment before it scuttled off to some dark corner.

new art in my home

Recently I acquired two new pieces of art. One of them is a work by Ruth Whiting I'd been admiring for a long while and my sweetheart purchased it as a surprise for our anniversary in November. It took a bit of wrangling as I was all set to purchase it myself and was hard to shake off. This a quick snapshot in the process of framing it. The birch frame turned out to be a bit too light in color to satisfy me, so I'm on the hunt for a more suitable one. Ruth will be having a Gainesville show in March which I'm sure I'll mention again closer to the opening.
The other piece was made by my brother, Colin Curry, as a Christmas gift to me. It's indicative of some of the work he's done before but unusal in its limited color palate: white black and the color of the birch panel peaking through the paint.

spindle tool

In tandem with returning to returning to the tangle sculpture, I'm revisiting my spindle drawings. The couple I've finished so far are quite pleasing so far, but the tool I've been using leaves quite a bit to be desired. This is the next gen, an acrylic whorl on a carbon fiber shaft. This piece turned out to be a bit too heavy for the kind of line I'm looking for, so I plan to drill out some of the mass in the center.

woven

A couple of months ago, a beginning weaving workshop was offered through the local weavers' guild. It took place over the weekend and finally convinced me to dig out the little table loom I acquired years ago, but never worked out how to rewarp after the last existent warp disintegrated. My friend, Liz, joined me and over the weekend, we wove plain and twill samples, learned how to decide how much yarn is needed for a specific project and how to dress our looms to make a narrow bit of cloth. Sunday reached its end and I came home, but continued to weave into the night, watching the cloth grow quickly before me, and enjoying the created rhythm in throwing the shuttle, beating the threads and changing the shafts. I went to bed with the clack of wood and jangle of metal heddles in my mind.
I woke in the morning to the loom brilliantly lit by morning light, and continued weaving all morning. Then continued still later, when friends called me over to visit, taking the loom with me and worked there, chatting with them as they carried about on their own making. Soon enough the warp ended and I whipstitched the edge to ward off fraying and cut it loose. The length would wear well as a scarf if the grey wool used for weft didn't itch my neck quite so much. Instead I'll opt to make a messenger bag. Once I'm able, I'll redress the loom for a narrow strap and stitch it all together when I'm done.

Meanwhile, the Florida wool I was given last spring is still being processed one bathtub load at a time. The Hamilton flock from Williston is finished but the UF stock is only a quarter done. One five gallon bucket stuffed to the brim with dirty wool often takes two days to pick through and wash. Other fleece, especially those that have been coated don't take quite as much time, though it costs more and I'm thankful to those who were so generous to me. Fortunately other small tasks can be accomplished while the wool soaks in hot water, but it's a practiced juggle. Once finished with the washing, ideally I'd get my hands on a picker, a vicious looking tool to help fluff and filter out the remaining sand and begin the next stage of preparation. Little of the Florida will be used for spinning as it's not as soft and regular as I'd like (though some of it is quite sweet and I'll sort it out for spinning and perhaps weaving). But ultimately most of it will be used to felt with.

studio update

My current studio project involves taking apart and remaking the large tangle sculpture I completed earlier this year. It's had a few mishaps, one of which was being knocked over in in transit from one side of my studio to the other thereby shifting the sheets of acrylic against one another and incurring a number of scratches throughout the inner faces of all 24 pieces. I'll be polishing them out for an indefinite amount of time. This one scratch is halfway through the process; this project will be a test of endurance.
In case you are wondering how one might polish acrylic sheet perfectly smooth again, Novus plastic polish is helping me along.