Fire Bird at Burning Man

Alan attaching the first wish to the Fire Bird

2011 was my fifth year of attending Burning Man, a temporary city of over 50,000 in the middle of the harsh environment of the Black Rock Desert of Nevada. Burning Man means many things to many people. Some see it as an opportunity to cut loose from the norms of society and party their naked asses off. That’s not why I go.

For me Burning Man is a place for art and community. It is an amazing blank canvas surrounded by sky. People work so very hard in tremendously difficult conditions to give their art to the community for just one week. Much of it is burned at the end of that time. The effort and beauty are awe inspiring, even if a piece doesn’t completely work.

This year’s Fire Bird was my third attempt at bringing art to Black Rock City. The first two didn’t really work. Stone, metal, wood, and fire are all mediums that translate well to the playa, fabric not so much. Strong winds and the ever present fine alkaline dust create challenges. Every time I think I have it figured out I am reminded not so gently that, no, I don’t have it figured out quite yet.

getting ready for installation

Lesson one: nothing ever happens at Burning Man quite the way you planned it. Installation was relatively easy given that upon arrival I was told that my space wouldn’t be ready until 8pm and that we had to be out of Center Camp by 8pm because there was a private party there. A head scratcher for sure. It all worked out with my trusty assistants, Alan and Corey, there to help. Some quick edits, some additional structure, and some flexibility and we got it done. It really looked great.

Lesson two: everything instantly gets covered with playa dust. This actually didn’t bother me at all. It felt as if the piece became a part of the playa although I could have skipped the step of dyeing the reed.

covered in dust

Lesson three: Burning Man is really distracting. Duh. Although some people got the idea and added to the effigy on their own, it was much more active when there was someone there to tell them about it. I found this difficult to do but Cat, my wonderful campmate, spent time there encouraging people to interact with it. It was lovely to see people get the idea and witness their interactions.

Lesson four: carrying a really long piece of unlit fabric in the dark with people zooming around (high) on bikes isn’t a good idea. Duh again. Luckily Alan and Corey thought this one through before I did and we kept the fabric short while carrying the effigy and fabric to the fire.

Lesson five: trying to get people who are tripping at the remains of the Man fire to move and/or hold a long piece of fabric is very difficult.

Lesson six: as an artist I am merely creating a space or structure where an audience can choose to participate by attaching their own meaning. In this case, I was honored to get to witness this.

Lesson seven and the most important: I can’t do this alone. Although the concept was mine, many hands, hearts, and minds touched the Fire Bird to make it what it was.

In some ways the installation fell short of my expectations. I wished for higher participation. And I really wanted to see that 150 foot long piece of fabric carried out the fire in a solemn procession. If I choose to make art for Burning Man again I want to site it on the playa itself. I think that I’ve learned enough now that I could do that. Successfully? I don’t know.

I can’t thank Rumor Camp enough for their embrace of this project. It still would have been pretty and we still would have burned it, but without the pre-ritual that Rabbit led in our camp and the intention that we seven camp mates put into it, it wouldn’t have had the depth of meaning that it came to have for me. I was touched beyond measure. The eight necklaces that Alan made, one for each camp mate and one that hung in the Fire Bird, gave us each a token to hold on to that is imbued with the meaning of the project. I’m wearing mine now.

The installation far exceeded my expectations in the meaning it had for me. Seeing people interact with it genuinely and hearing what it meant to my camp mates made it truly represent a Rite of Passage. It was personal.

And the Burn itself? It was powerful. Asking people nicely, yet firmly, to please clear a path and hold the fabric. Standing at the edge of that powerful heat and making the decision to walk into it with Rabbit and put the Fire Bird into the embers. Watching the Fire Bird catch and then be consumed by the flames. Feeling that intense heat be absorbed into my core self. Collecting the fabric back from those holding it and being thanked and hugged by those who had witnessed the Transformation. I can still feel all that.

Yeah, it was powerful.

into the embers

transformed into heat and ash

Seabeck Batik Weekend

Every year since 2002 my family has been attending a family camp coordinated by friends at Seabeck Conference Center on the Kitsap Pennisula. Here we enjoy the woods and water, stories, arts and crafts, games, puzzles, a treasure hunt, and a talent show all coordinated by the campers for the campers. Each year the kids grow older and more independent and the adults get more relaxed.

For the past six years I have set up a batik studio at the camp for everyone to enjoy. We use soy wax resist and paint dyes on to silk scarves, bandannas, banners, tshirts, etc. This year I added a set up for low water immersion dyeing or, as the campers call it, “tie dye.” One of the great joys for me to witness is the way people have learned and expanded their skills over the years, especially the kids. It’s a working vacation for me, for sure, but I feel fully appreciated by the participants and there’s always lots of helping hands to ease the work.

Thalia's waxed design before dyeing.

Thalia, one of our talented teens, painting dye on her scarf.

Ben's orchid banner

projects drying on a the rack

Thea's tshirt

the scene around the dye studio

Lorraine Torrence Talk at CQA

Nemo's Ecstasy by Lorraine Torrence, 1997

One of the great benefits of being a member of the Contemporary Quilt Art Association (CQA) is that at each month’s meeting there is a program. The speakers range from people directly involved in making art quilts to artists in other mediums and experts in the business side of art. The August speaker was Lorraine Torrence who has made art quilts, art to wear, designed patterns, written books, and taught for over 30 years.

I have never taken a class from Lorraine but many CQA members have. I’ve looked at her books and I can really appreciate her teaching and writing. Her talk was about Finding Your Personal Voice as an Artist. It was a pleasure to listen to someone who has been teaching for so many years. I really admired her organization of material and her ease and assurance as a speaker. As a teacher myself, I find that I learn as much about teaching and presenting from good teachers as I do about the material they are presenting.

Here are notes (taken by Deborah Rychert) on Lorraine’s six steps toward finding your voice.

1. Do what interests you and what feels right.
2. You have to do something more than once to find your voice, do it many times.
3. Look at your quilts critically from a distance or with a reducing glass, viewfinder from a camera or a photograph. Don’t get hung up on the details. It’s the design that’s important.
4. Practice, practice, practice! Keep a journal, a visual record. A line library, shape library, stitch library.
5. Don’t be discouraged by failure. In baseball .300 is a good average. That means a batter misses 7 out of 10. Don’t be discouraged by a 70% failure. Embrace your failure and use it as an opportunity to learn.
6. Experiment with different styles. Sketch, keep recording ideas. When you have a dry spell go back to your visual record.

I really appreciated her identifying the importance of “failing well.” It’s so important to recognize when something just doesn’t work and the lessons we can learn from our failures. Looking critically, but with compassion, is our most essential tool.

I think those are pretty good rules to follow. Thanks Lorraine!

Breakfast

This lovely Sharlynn melon was breakfast this morning. We all admired it for a day before I cut into it. It unfortunately wasn’t as tasty as it was beautiful. Kind of a cross between honey dew and cantaloupe and not very sweet. But what a thing of beauty!

Dyeing with Mandy Greer

On Saturday I was a visiting artist at The Project Room, a multi-disciplinary arts space. Mandy Greer is doing a seven week residency there and invited me to come and do a dye day with her.

mandy Mandy’s an amazing fiber artist using crochet to create site-specific installations. Her work is conceptually rich and deep and yet she uses very simple techniques. I’m really attracted to the way her work is tied in to community. Her materials are all donated to her. Working within a color theme, she uses donated fabrics, yarns and used clothing, tearing it into strips. Mandy also hosts open crochet parties where people can come in off the street and become participants in her process. She can teach people to crochet in 3 minutes or less and the simple strings of stitches they make get combined into multi-dimensional, complex, organic webs. She has worked with the Degenerate Art Ensemble and has done installations at the Bellevue Arts Museum, Museum of Contemporary Craft in Portland, and in outdoor settings including Camp Long.

Bellevue Arts Museum installation

Mandy and I met a few years ago when she was having a crochet party literally in the middle of the street during a block party in my neighborhood. We’ve kept in touch and I often give her my scraps that are too dear to toss and especially the strips that I cut off the edges of my pieces when I’m constructing them.

Mandy is doing the first residency at The Project Room, an arts space that is being curated by Jess Van Nostrand and is a space that is about art making as well as art viewing. The space has just opened but the basic premise is that over a twelve month period artists will be invited to work in or show in the space with an emphasis on an overriding question. This year’s question is “Why Do We Make?”

Mandy is using the space as a way to launch her next project which is being informed by an upcoming residency in Iceland. She is working with literary and folkloric inspirations.

So, why was I there?

Well, the easy answer is that Mandy has a bunch of white fabric that she wanted to turn into shades of gray for her project. The second part of that is that she is using this residency as a structure to bring artists in who she is interested in learning from. It was a pleasure to share my knowledge of dyeing with her and the other folks who came to participate. There’s not much I love better than geeking out over fabric dyeing and they were a very receptive audience. We talked about low-water immersion dyeing, about the chemistry of dyeing cellulose versus protein fibers, about dyeing with mixed colors especially blacks, and simple shibori techniques that give complex patterning all the while looking at and fondling samples. Then we spent some time dyeing. Fun was had.

I can’t wait to go back by and see how our dyeing washed out. I’ll be giving a talk at The Project Room this Thursday evening as part of the Capitol Hill Arts Blitz. Come by the space at 1315 East Pine. Mandy will be having a crochet party from 5-8pm and I’ll be giving my talk at 6pm. It’ll be pretty casual, I’ll mostly be bringing some samples to look at and answering questions, but I’ll also spend some time talking about my process and “Why I Make.” I hope to see you there!

mandygreer3

Summer Camp

It feels strange to be spending so much time on a project that isn’t in line with my “work”. I feel like I keep having to defend it to myself, and I’m a little embarrassed to share it. But really, I’m having a great time doing it. And you never know where things will lead.

I was telling Anna and Paul McKee, my studio-mates, that it’s like being at Summer Camp in my studio these days. Only instead of making a basket, I’m making a giant bird that I’m going to set on fire. Kind of freeing, really.

The bird shape is complete for now. I still need to able to remove the wings for travel so am not adding any additional structure around the shoulder girdle. I’m still adding detail on the wings and may add some around the neck. My daughter Vida was at the studio today helping me tie raffia around all the joins. Still plenty of work to be done and I haven’t started on the nest yet.

the work table

now that it's got eyes it needs a name.

wing detail

Building a Bird

Yesterday, having gotten both wings pretty much together, I had to decide whether to keep adding details to them or to go on to figuring out the body. I knew that going on to the overall structure was the right next step but I just didn’t feel like it. I went ahead and started on it by making shapes for the body and the head but got frustrated. It was hard. And it was a beautiful day outside. And I didn’t want to be inside. And I was cranky.

So I gave myself permission to take a day off. I spent a lovely afternoon in my garden reading and smelling the heliotrope. Aaah, just what Dr. Cameron ordered.

This morning I was able to come back and start over with a fresh mind and new perspective. And instead of being frustrating it was a fun and challenging puzzle to figure out.

I started with the basic shapes I had made the day before and joined them together to make the head, neck and body. It took some time because it was all about getting the proportions right. I didn’t want to make a mistake at this point and have to spend a lot of time later going back and fixing it.

Once I got those shapes together I made the base. I made a tripod out of bamboo poles and fixed them into a heavy, round, wooden platter I found at Value Village (along with some fabulous red platform boots!). I drilled out divots for the poles to sit in and tacked them with hot glue. So far, so good. The time spent doing the drawings and the macquette really paid off. It all went together pretty much the way I had planned and the proportions are all working.

At this point I realized I needed to reorganize the space in my studio–this thing was getting big! My big table space is made up of two tables side by side and covered with laminate. So I moved everything to the side and now have a big(ish) space in the middle of the room.

The biggest challenge continues to be making it in a way that it can be taken apart for transport and reassembled once I get to Burning Man. After today, I think the body with tail won’t be fixed onto the base until we get there. Otherwise it will be too hard to get the wings attached. Any way I do it it’s going to be a little tricky but should be much easier with a second (or third) set of hands than it was bracing and tieing it myself today.

I got as far as framing out the legs and adding some form on the legs, chest and bill. Next is working on the tail. It’s looking a little lopsided at the moment. But basically I’m really happy with the way it’s turning out.

Taking Wing

Yesterday, after drawing and reading about bird wings and feathers and tails, I decided it was finally time to stop preparing and just start on this Fire Bird project. There’s only so much planning you can do before it becomes a way to avoid getting started. Not to say that research isn’t valuable, but after a point it can become procrastination. The questions I still had needed to be answered with my hands on the materials.

framework over full size drawing

So I started.

It was a little rough figuring out working with the reed but I feel like I’m getting the hang of it. I started with the wings because they are basically two dimensional. Once I finish them I should know the material well enough to move into the three dimensional body. One of the trickier issues is that I want to make it in parts and do the final assembly once I arrive to make it easier to transport.

But that’s in the future. For now, I’m happy with the way the wings are coming along.

two days work, two wings

Hatching Plans

I’ve been incubating plans for the Fire Bird for Burning Man (and trying out as many bird puns as I can in here in the blog). I’m going to make it using bent reed which is a new material for me. I’ve used it a little bit to make lanterns, which is basically what the Fire Bird will be, minus the skin of paper. I have friends that have worked with it pretty extensively, Sarah Lovett has made some quite large scale kinetic sculptures for the Solstice Parade and my friend Nicole has shown me how she uses it to make luminaries. So I’m not quite flying without a net but definitely figuring it out as I go.

First step was a trip to NW Cane Supply, just North of 80th on 15th NW, where I picked up some #7 and #5 round reed and had an amusing chat with the guy who works there. Next step was to test dyeing the reed. I followed the really simple instructions in the Dharma Trading Co. catalog and it dyed up beautifully.

Yesterday I came up with a drawing I liked but felt I needed a maquette to figure out the scale and determine the amount of materials. I don’t want to start dyeing the reed until I know how about how much I’ll need. So today I made a maquette out of really basic materials: pipe cleaners and bamboo skewers. It helped to get my hands on some three-dimensional materials. I can only go so far with drawing, everything starts to make more sense once I start moving it into three-dimensions.

I’m feeling much more confident about the project now. There’s still a lot to learn and I’m very much flying (!) by the seat of my pants but it seems to be the way I always work. I wouldn’t go buy reed and learn how to use it unless I had a project it was going toward. And it’s pretty low pressure gig, I am going to burn it when it’s finished, after all.

And now . . .

I’ve just gotten confirmation that I’m going to be doing an installation in Center Camp at Burning Man. This year’s theme is Rites of Passage. I’m excited about it because it’s another try for me to find a way to bring my art to Burning Man. The festival is near and dear to me but it’s just not a soft and squishy fiber art kinda place. I’m hoping that the structure of Center Camp will create a more protected space and also a place to focus on smaller installations.

I’ll be using the 150-foot-long piece of silk I dyed for BM a few years ago. I’m going to drape it like a valance across a 12 foot pole that spans the entrance to an alcove formed where the shade cloth comes down to the ground. I’ll be making a Fire Bird, or Phoenix, effigy out of rattan, paper, and perhaps some fabric. People will be able to add remembrances and stories of transformation to the effigy over the course of the week. Saturday night after the Man burns, we will take down the fabric, unwind it from its pole, and process with the fabric and effigy to the remains of the Man fire. There we will cast it into the flames and the Phoenix will be consumed by the fire.

Or something like that.