Pieced Reflections

Since the beginning of the year, I've made an effort to begin writing in journal form again and it's showing up in my art work. Small bits of text find their way onto paper, and I'm working on pieces that are deliberately sequential. I'm thinking about seasons, passages of time, and the way in which the seasons provoke us to change our direction.

This is not new, I've been intrigued by the seasons for many years and have woven that into my work, whether in drawings, paintings, or prints. The difference is that I've begun to track more incremental changes, moment to moment and day to day. I've begun to work in smaller squares and rectangles, each piece representing a fragment in time, a feeling of the sun's placement in the sky.

I had spent just a couple weeks on several panel pieces when I received an email from artist and gallery owner, Sara Post.

Early last year, Sara opened up Art 26, a gallery and studio whose space is light, intimate and filled with inspiration. When I saw it, I thought "I'd like to exhibit here." That thought was reinforced by a series of excellent exhibits.

The email said that Sara had a cancellation in the gallery for February, would I like to step in? Would I? It was a great opportunity, not to be missed and, a way to take the temperature of my new series.

Here's the scoop:

HANNAH HUNTER : LOVE NOTES

ABSTRACT BOTANICAL PRINTS / COLLAGE

FEBRUARY 10 - MARCH 6

ART 26, 231 G ST. #26 , DAVIS, CA

ARTIST'S TALK: FEBRUARY 10TH AT 6:00 PM, RECEPTION: 6:30 - 8:30

FOR MORE INFORMATION: sarapostart@gmail.com

If you're in the area, join me at the reception, or or drop by the gallery this next month and take a look.

I'll be giving an artist talk on Friday, February 10th at 6:00 pm. Come and celebrate the month of love!

It's a New Year

There are so many ways that we can slide on that delicate bridge of seconds from one year into the next. Like a newborn child, we can burst out suddenly, or, perhaps, be dragged by our head or legs, reluctantly surrendering the comfort of a warm, familiar home.

In turn, we have created many rituals to ease the transition from one year to the next: celebrations, recounting stories of the old year, hopes and goals for the new. All of these rituals help us to make it over the bridge of years

One of the rituals I enjoy the most is looking back over the year.

I began the year with a challenge to myself: to make 30 collages in a period of 30 days. I started in San Francisco, transitioned to Kauai, and completed the 30 days in my studio in Davis, Ca. Not one to rest easily with only one challenge, I posed another to myself; this one physical, emotional and spiritual: yoga teacher training. I was the second oldest in the class, but determined that my age would not exclude or daunt me.

I loved it and I hated it; it tested my intellect, my body and perhaps most of all my patience. To stand, sit and move in one space for the period of 6 hours at a time, drew on my inner resources. I made it through.

Artistic challenges also filled the year including one with the improbable title: "99 Problems, But a Print Ain't One of Them." The exhibit required a series of 13" x 19" prints. I hadn't printed on that scale before, instead, composing larger pieces by putting together smaller ones. As a result, I spent a lot of time at Blick Arts in their paper section! Thank god that Panera Bread was right next door for refreshments!

Inspiration also found me in the teaching realm. I had wonderful students; eager, excited and indefatigable. I was amazed by their ability to create vibrant monoprints that radiated the stamp of their makers.

I can't get enough of learning. From the Master Class with Lisa Call to my classes with Sara Post on abstraction, I found that each contact with either group or teacher gave me a tiny burst of inspiration and enthusiasm; a nudge, a push, or invisible fuel that allowed me to take the next step or steps in my work.

They help me to catch hold of slender threads within that often elude me due to voices of inner bosses, outer cultural snobs and transient winds of change. With support, I can reach beyond them and catch those threads that have been dangling, just waiting for me to grasp hold of them.

And that's what I want for this year, to pay more attention to the threads that dangle, sometimes just beyond my reach. because when I can catch them, and pull gently, I'm taken on roads that I cannot imagine.

Days of Gratitude

MAHALO / THANK YOU

It was a weekend of gratitude. There was much baking and chopping, talking and walking in the midst of this delicious weekend, which heralds the beginning of the holiday season. And it's not over yet. I've still got two tubs of persimmon pulp in the frig just waiting to turn into fragrant loaves of bread.

As I follow the string of days, deeper into the darkness of winter, I imagine all the people I know, all of the people who support and encourage me in my art like many tiny flames, lighting the way.

I'm grateful to all of you who have taken the time to write to me about my work, and to those of who've come up to the studio and said, "keep going." I'm tickled and delighted when you come to open studios and exhibits and perhaps decide to take art home with you. And classes--well--I learn as much as you do. You all stretch me way beyond where I think I can go.

However and whenever you choose to mark this season, may it be filled with people you love, time to see or make art, and a good helping of inner wisdom for these times.

HOLIDAY FARE:

Look for my work in several venues this holiday season:

The Southern Gallery in Charleston, SC is hosting a show called 99 Problems, (But a Print Ain't One.) You can check out the entire show in their shop and I've linked to my work here

View fullsize

Closer to home, The Sparrow Gallery will be hosting their holiday show beginning in early December and I will have several of my favorite botanical pieces there for you to visit.

POP UP HOLIDAY SHOP!

Join Linda Clark Johnson, Leslie Colby, Allison Spreadborough and I at a collaborative pop-up holiday shop at Linda's home studio.

Sunday, December 18th from 1 pm - 5 pm.
2379 39th Street, Sacramento

There will be lots to choose from: prints (great sale prices!), a new selection of cards, and my coloring books too. Come join us for an afternoon of hot cider, and art.

Traces: A New Series

Right from the get go, this summer presented its challenges. I say challenges because I like to think that I can rise to them, rather than being overcome by them.

So, when my 85 year old mother experienced a series of unfortunate events (think Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day), it was time to put my thinking cap on. She was beset by one malady after another and while helping her through, I knew that I needed to re-craft my art practice. This is because art is both a vocation and something that’s hard to go without. I had to create a series that was a marriage of necessity and curiosity.

Right away, I decided to reduce the size of the prints. I’d been working in sheets of 9″ x 12″ that arranged in 3 rows of 3, created a piece. “O.k.,” I thought, “I’ll jump back to the 30 x 30 challenge. 6″ x 8″ it is!”

And my topic? Over the last few years, I’d noticed that the recycled copy papers I use to mop up extra paint produced some extraordinary layers. The effect is something like a stucco wall with many layers of paint; an inadvertent fresco.

Sample of Traces

But how to create that effect on the thicker art paper?  I began by simply putting pieces of paper down on the painted plate and leaving them there for a time. In this hot, dry valley, I didn’t need to wait overnight. Several hours could produce a paper with a thick layer of acrylic, very satisfying to pull off the gelli plate. I also added one or two layers of gel medium, tinted to bring out the color I was working with.

It’s been tremendous fun and the smaller sheets of paper provided a journal format; a way that I could record the mood of the day, the season and my own internal drive to leave traces of these days.