Leni Wiener

I have not posted for a few days, because, frankly I wasn’t accomplishing anything.  Often when I feel blocked it is a message that I need to evolve, need to find a new expression that excites me and makes me want to go into the studio and work.

Prior to the flamenco piece (which is still on the design wall waiting to be completed) I did two pieces that I felt marked the end of something for me.  One was “Market Day, Sarlat” (based on a photo my friend Peggy took in France).

As much as I enjoyed working on the woman, I found myself bored by having to create the environment around her.  The other was Tourist Season:

I loved working on all the people in the piece, but when I had to create the environment, I kept it very simple, in part so as not to detract from the people, but the truth is, I felt I wanted to move away from photo realism and towards abstraction–something I have always wanted to explore.

Flamenco was a piece that I wanted to make, and again, kept the background to a minimum.  I felt while I was working on it that it marked the end of something, and I needed to enter another phase.

It is important to continue to grow as an artist, or it becomes too boring, too routine.  I have found that the exploration of how to evolve and where to go is as much a function of establishing what I love to do as it is an admission of what I no longer enjoy.  In this case, much reflection has led me to understand that I am still interested in the human element, but want to move away from the buildings and and the background–towards a more abstract presentation.  As I am still influenced by (and want to work from) photography, pure abstractionism is not for me–not now, anyway.

Having said that, a photo I took of a window revealing a staircase at the Museum of Modern Art has been in my head.

This photo offered me the opportunity to focus my attention on the staircase and figures without a lot of stuff going on in the environment.

The gorgeous hand-dyed fabric I have been holding onto for some time now (I purchased it, I did not make it) becomes the perfect environment for the more stylized depiction of the photo.  This is still very rough, but I like where it is going.

Remember, if you feel blocked artistically, it may be a message from your subconscious that you aren’t challenging yourself, or growing.

I would love to hear your comments!

Now that I am only a week away from the silent auction donation to benefit the United Way, I decided to finish the two thread painted pillows.  The first you saw in development in this blog:

You can see what the right fabric can do to complement and complete the thread painting,  here is a detail:

The second pillow I made is from a beautiful fabric I used for a pillow in my thread painting book:

By thread painting one of the motifs and then fussy cutting it and doing a machine applique onto the pillow, I get a nice effect.  Here is a detail of the thread painting:

Finally got back to the Flamenco this morning.  I decided to go with the second version–I like the chair but felt the figure in the doorway was distracting.  I also really wanted a vertical format.  The next step was to look at the details–little changes mean a lot.  If you look closely you will see:

the skirt was made fuller on the right and given more movement

the neck of the guitar was made darker so that it would blend into the background

Now it is ready to sew together

After pondering and looking at it, I think I have decided to go with the second version.  Although I love the idea of the doorway from the perspective of telling a story, it doesn’t relate visually.  I also think the piece will be stronger if it is a vertical format.

Thanks for all your comments.

I will post photos as they move forward.

Now that I know comments can be posted, I put this to you:

which do you like better:

version 1:

This includes a figure in a doorway in the back.  This is (I hope) an interesting and thought-provoking addition which will require the viewer to fill in the story.  I am not sure if the doorway is a distraction, and if the square format dilutes some of the energy.

version 2:

The doorway is cropped out, returning the piece to a vertical format–stressing the length of the dancer’s legs and giving the quilt more energy.

version 3:

The chair in the background has been removed.  It was included as a visual bridge from the action of the front to the doorway in the back, but the space looks empty now.  It added a sense of depth and perspective.

what do you think?

Yesterday I was able to spent some real time in the studio working on the flamenco dancer.  Satisfied with her and moving on to the guitarist in the background, I added his lower half!  Initially, I used the fabric with the silver swirls for his sleeve, but decided that it would be great as the floor so I changed his sleeves.  Looking at it, I got the idea of a rose on the floor at his feet–I am thinking rather than title it something like “flamenco” that I may title it something more intriguing like “unrequited love.”  I know the background needs to be substantially black, but will work next at trying to add other colors or other shades of black so that it isn’t so flat and uninteresting.

I am told that the blog has been fixed and will now receive comments.  I would love to hear from you.  Please give it a try.  If you want to leave a comment and find that it is still not possible, please email me at Leni@leniwiener.com and let me know.  (if the link doesn’t work, please copy and paste the email address–I am still learning how all of this works!)

Sorry about that!

I have heard from a few people that they have tried to post comments and were unable.  There is something going on with my blog set-up, but from what I understand from my son (my web guru) it isn’t so simple and he is working on it.  So please, don’t give up on me–I really DO want to hear your comments.  As soon as it is up and running, I will post so you know.

so sorry.

I didn’t get too much time to work on this yesterday, so this morning I spent some time on it.  I started with a little tweak of the sideways facing foot–it just didn’t look right to me.  Although it looks better, I am still not certain it won’t be changed again.  But I needed to step away from that for now and moved onto the guitarist in the background:

I am putting that tree quilt behind me while I let my ideas about fabric weaving percolate in my head.  For now I am back in my comfort zone, working on another fabric collage.  This will allow me to accomplish two things–first it will get this out of my head where it has been nagging for a while, and secondly, it will allow me to clear my mind a bit so that I can formulate more specific ideas about what I want to do next.

This piece came from a video of a Flamenco dancer my friend, Sandra shot in Spain recently.  As soon as I saw it I knew the fabric in my stash that had to be the skirt.  There is so much movement in the fabric, and the light and dark look very much like the moving ruffles.

On another note, I discovered quite by accident that MOMA (the museum of modern art in NYC) is opened on Monday.  Not the perfect day to go as every tourist in the city has discovered the same thing, but none the less, worthwhile.  My friend, Eileen and I were not able to get into the new Van Gogh exhibit, so we wandered through the permanent collection.  Despite having seen the permanent collection many times, I discovered lots of things I hadn’t really noticed or focused on before which relate to what I am working out in my own art.  Now that museums allow photos in most galleries (hooray!) I took lots of photos and have lots to absorb.  I am working out in my head a new direction for my work, and will share those photos and my new pieces as I sort them out.

Where ever you live, get out and look at art!  Especially looking at different media will influence you in ways you can’t imagine.  No matter where you are, there is someplace to see some sort of art.  Take an hour off from your day and do it.  It really gets your creativity working.  I went with my friend Eileen (a very talented ceramicist–check her out at www.eileenbraunceramics.com) and interestingly, we often responded to the same pieces and saw in them ideas to play with in our very different materials.