Leni Wiener

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.

I got the idea to try weaving the background, controlling placement of colors.  Although I do not adore this final quilt, I do like the idea of the background enough to play with it.  This is often how a series develops– exploring an idea or technique until the seed develops and grows into something that is uniquely your voice.  Right now it looks too much like piecing, and like ribbon weaving.  But I want to play with it.  Check back to see where it goes.

To finish and complement the trees, I need to audition backgrounds to see what I like.  I find that the easiest way to make a decsion is to use my digital camera to record the possiblities and then I can compare them.

My initial thought is that I do not want to worry about the path and the other trees in the background, but to make the background less realistic.  I have decided to start by looking at both hand-dye and hand-dye lookalikes to see if I have something that works.

This fabric is close to the photo in that it is red and green, although I wanted more green and this is more red:

By adding another piece of the green to one side, I have gotten the balance closer to what I envisioned:

But I decide to look at other colors that may not be true to the original photo:  the purple surprises me, I like it more than I thought I would:

The yellow looks a little over-powering:

more orange–this fabric is very bright and seems to fight with the trees:

more yellow?  this fabric is maybe too realistic for the more graphic trees:

finally, more green, which is more naturalistic:

I am not loving any of these, so now I am considering “creating” the look myself using fabrics so I can control color placement.  Feel free to post a comment and let me know what you think.