The horrific events that happened this week in Sandy Hook Elementary School have hit close to home for many of us. As an artist who works in schools across New England I find myself asking the same questions that many are….”why”. I also wonder what I would have done. Would I have been as brave as the teachers at Sandy Hook? I do know that my first reaction was to get in the car and go to try to lend help, to offer solace and to reach out to this devastated community. But Sunday as I sat in church I realized that here, close to home there is a need for love, solace, and healing. So right now, I will remain close to home, using my skills, my love and my energy to bring just a little bit more love and healing to this community.What a beautiful, loving world this would be if we all did that.
Making Art Count
Journal entry November 2012
It’s been awhile since I have posted here. No big excuses, just preoccupied.There is definitely a shift going on within my studio and my art. My journal has always been a laboratory for learning and exploring, but I now journal daily and plan/sketch out ideas for new works. My loom is where I create work that requires a deeper commitment.There are also several ideas for out door installations for temporary art.
Studio ~ November 2012
This piece on the big loom has been an image that has been on my mind and heart since early summer.I have given myself a challenge: for the next three months I will hyper focus on producing art work. Now that my master’s degree is complete and the Woven Voices project is at rest, it is time to make art count!
Inlay technique on the loom
Journal entry, art work sketch
July is jumping!
As I have said many times before, summer in Maine is THE BEST! While much of the country is suffering with excessive heat, we are enjoying a perfectly lovely summer thus far. The temperature is mostly in the 80s, bright sun, occasional rain and tolerable humidity. There is always a breeze and the nights have cooled a bit so sleeping is easy. My goodness, this period of bliss makes up for the harsh and long winters!!
Hanover St. Parking garage 2010
Last Friday I re-installed “Caught between Us” an installation I created for the city of Portsmouth, NH in 2010. This piece is made from recycled shrimp netting, bait bags, lobster trap headers, and gummy fish lures. It is 12′ by 22′ and originally hung on the Hanover St. Parking garage in Portsmouth. For two years this piece was rolled up in my studio, looking for a new home. About a year ago, I had the idea that it might look good hanging on one of the bait shacks on the town docks in York.
Detail of "Caught Between Us" as it hung on the garage
Net laid out on the dock
After a few conversations with folks in town and a year later, I was able to install the fish net to its new and permanent home on York Town Dock #1. Thanks to the amazing help of Joey Donnelly, Richard Lee and Ben Fowler the net went up smoothly and without a hitch. We had to hang it at low tide, so that the ladders could rest on the rocks and mud. I think it looks pretty amazing in its new home!
Low tide installation!
Pulling it tight ~ teamwork!
Hanging with the pots at Town Dock #1
Summer, sweet as…..
Summer is in full swing here in Maine. All winter I wait for these days when I can get up at 7 AM and have my tea on the deck in a 75 degree sultry heat. At the end the day I swim in the local cove with my dog, husband and perhaps a friend. As the big sign says on Rte 95 as you enter our state: “Maine, the way life should be.” But as with all things in life, this is a temporary time, and so the rule is to make the most of each day.
Siblings making a dream catcher in the trees
I am just back home from a 7 day Artist in Residency at Searsport Shores Campground in Searsport, ME. While I was there, I worked with all ages of camping friends from grand mom and pop to little ones and teenagers in between. It was such a delight see families and new friends working happily side by side.
A talented Mom weaves herself a belt
This campground is a unique and amazing place that is rich with gardens, animals, art and beauty, right on the ocean’s edge.For seven days we wove, shared stories of joy as well as sorrow. We became friends and expanded our concept of family. Each day I would share my food scraps with the goats in the pen right next to my studio. Each day I went for a swim in the cool ocean waters. Each night I slept in a tent inside the studio made from crocheted and embroidered fabrics.
A weaving family
On my last day, I went two miles up the road to the site where my dear brother Weston was killed last August. Although this site brings me deep sadness, it feels like holy ground to me. For the past 11 months I have decorated it with handwoven prayer flags from the Woven Voices project. I was so amazed and pleased to see how beautifully the old flags have weathered the seasons.I added a dozen more flags. Healing from life’s wounds is an unpredictable journey. I am blessed to have beauty, love and community as my companions.
My sleeping tent next to the rug loom.
Weathered prayer flags in Searsport ME
Michy looks for some fruit scraps
happy camper with paper plate dream catcher
Balancing on the Solstice
Here we are….on the official commencement of summer and the beginning of our days decreasing in sunlight (sorry to ruin your day!) This is the Solstice balance, balancing the light and the dark, the positive and the negative, the hot and the cold, plus for us on coastal Maine, the tourists and the townies!
CT workshop for families
For me it is the end of my school residencies and teaching. And today, it being almost 93 here in York, I went for my first swim!
Jim Wilson shows off his vintage reed making equipment.
Yesterday Ben and I went down to Central Falls, RI to visit The Gowdey Reed Co. I have started a blog about Jim’s family business as I am gearing up sales for them. Please check out this new blog, Gowdey Reeds, Heddles and Handweaving, where I explain how this company has been making reeds for 4 generations. The basic process has changed little, and each hand loom or industrial reed is made to order for the customer.Tomorrow I head back up to Haystack MT School of Crafts. I was up there last month, cleaning and repairing all the looms in the Textile Studio. Friday and Saturday, I will return to complete the job with a van load of parts from Macomber Looms. I think we picked the perfect week to be up there, as the temperatures here are going to be unseasonably warm.
My Woven Voices thesis with it's clamshell box
And here is a BIG TAH- DAH…drum roll……. I received my Masters of Art and Healing from Wisdom University this month. I am so proud of my thesis which is a series of hand-bound books that document and illustrate this four year global peace project.
Happy and proud boy with his self portrait for the Mandala
Thanks for checking out my website. I always love hearing from each one of you.Happy Summer!!~~ Sarah
Making books for Kenya
Printing the Adinkra inspired papers
In late April I had the wonderful opportunity to return as Artist in Residence to The Great Oak Middle School in Oxford CT. For five days I worked with 6th, 7th and 8th graders to design, print, weave and bind small books. Our goal was to create two printed sheets of paper inspired by Adinkra images of West Africa that would be cut into strips and woven together to make the cover for a book. Prior to my coming to school, Karen Giannamore, the art teacher worked hard with the classes to help them generate wonderful stories based on a choice of writing prompts. These stories were printed on paper to be inserted as the text for these handmade covers.
More printing!
Printed papers for book covers
When I arrived on Monday, we jumped right into designing the stamps, and printing two sheets of paper per student. I just love the bright colors and the bold designs that the students came up with. After everyone had printed two sheets, we then cut them into strips to that they could be woven together to make the book covers.
Weaving the printed strips together
The printed and woven strips were then laminated to make a durable cover for the books. We then sewed the previously written and printed stories inside these gorgeous covers. Each student also illustrated their story and added reader’s questions as well as notes about the author. These books will now be shipped to a school for the deaf in Wamunyu, Kenya through a program called Kenya Connect. We understand that the students in Kenya are learning to read and write in English so these handmade books will add over 120 new books to their school library!
Illustrating the text.
Helping a partner to sew in the text pages.
The laminated book covers waiting for the pages of text to be sewn inside.
More Mandalas
The Bancroft School Mandala
After school volunteers help to assemble the Mandala
This week I was artist in residence at the Bancroft School in Worcester, MA. I worked with Lower and Upper School students to create a stunning Community Mandala. There was time with each group to have a conversation about the history and cultural connections with Mandalas. During one of these discussion, one student asked me how many Mandalas I had made. I could not answer, but it is in the hundreds.Recently I have been thinking about making my own Mandalas. After the one that I made for the Izzy’s installation, I have been so inspired by the practice of making these mesmerizing symmetrical pieces. Each time I work with students and talk about how the Buddhist Monks make sand Mandalas over and over again as a spiritual practice, I think about what I might learn from this practice.Today it is snowing, and most likely tomorrow we will be snowed in. It just might be the perfect day to start my own Mandala practice.
Detail of the Bancroft School Mandala
Winter play and winter creativity
It has been an entirely snow-less winter so far. I cannot recall a winter that has not only been so snow-less but so warm. Last night at a non-profit board meeting the Chairwoman opened with the question “How you you feel about this winter? Do you miss snow?” The answers were as diverse as those attending the meeting. My answer was YES… I miss snow days. I miss playing in the snow. I miss the unbelievable quiet that a heavy snow fall makes as it muffles all other noises.
1st Izzy's installation
I have been involved with a new arts organization in Portsmouth called 3S Artspace. Last fall they put out a submission call for a winter long installation in a local ice cream shop that is closed for the winter. This collaborative project has three artists rotating installations once a week for nine weeks, culminating in a group installation for the final two weeks. My first installation was inspired by our road trip to Florida in January. Riding in the car ave me the opportunity to sky gaze for hours on end. I saw so many beautiful hawks soaring along the highways edge, and the sky was so wide and beautiful. Each installation is supposed to build on the previous one. I used the red sticks and blue background from the artist before me, stenciled the cranes and added more sapling branches.
2nd installation at night
My second installation followed the same artist who had built these trees out of bark and created this forest scene with glass balls inside the trees and rubber 
snakes. I added these balls out of Styrofoam and plastic spoons and forks. I covered the windows with paper snow flakes and red cellophane, plus added more rubber critters. The spoon/fork balls were on motors and slowly rotated. I felt wintery and bizarre to me.
beginning the mandala at Izzy's
My third installation was this past Friday, and I followed a different artist who is much more of a minimalist. All of the previous materials had been removed and the space stripped clean. She painted stylized mountains on the walls and hung painted pieces of bark (from the a fore mentioned trees).
the mandala completed
close up of the mandala, spoons, forks, twigs, oranges, styro-balls
So on Friday, I came in with the idea that I would take down the bark, but not remove it, and create a 6 foot mandala on the wall using any/all materials from previous installations. Here’s the result. I love it! I also wrote a short quote from Rumi along the edge of the mountains and their shadows.This installation will disappear on Friday when the third artist returns and creates her final installation. What an amazing process!This winter I am also bringing to an end”Woven Voices: Messages from the Heart”. Please check out my blog and learn more about the closure of this four year global community art project. I am in the final stages of completing my Masters of Art and Healing, with a non-traditional thesis on this project.
the last prayer flag
All is well, even without the snow.Namaste ~ Sarah