Workshop and Presentation in Bemidji?

Occasionally a workshop get initiated under unusual circumstances. I came in contact with Dawn, the creator of intricate knotted creations a few years ago, when she was looking for mentor in the art of Cavandoli knotting. Then again when she was looking for thread. We have corresponded by email since. I included some of her beautiful creations in the presentation on 'Cords, Thread and Fiber Jewelry'.

This visual presentation premiered last August to the Bead Society of Northern California. It was received positively and described as a feast for the eyes, or pure 'eye candy'. See August 18, 2009 entry. Initially this presentation was supposed to be all about cord and thread, but when I requested digital images from friends, designers and customers to show the wide span of work being currently created with cord and thread, I got such a wonderful array of images that the presentation was transformed to an incredible array of artwork done in various fiber techniques. I thank everyone who contributed work to the visual presentation and it will be a pleasure to present it again in Fresno, California on March 20, and in Bemidji, Minnesota on March 26. Cord and thread, and the work done with it is a subject I am passionate about!

Last October, somehow in our emails, the subject of teaching came up, and I told Dawn that I would teach anywhere as long as I am invited. Dawn became the local coordinator, organizing the partial funding from the local arts council, Region 2 Arts Council, making this weekend workshop and presentation possible. At the time she told me she was in Minnesota, but I did not think beyond that. We worked on the actual program to create a weekend program during which students would learn a wide range of techniques that would be of interest to fiber artists, jewelers, and bead artists alike.

We set a date, March 26 for the visual presentation and a small trunk show, and March 27 and 28 for the 2-day workshop and we narrowed the program to...

... Cord making, 2-ply and 3-ply cords. 2-ply is easy and very useful for beading and micro macrame as one of the end is folded with no ends of thread sticking out. 3-ply cords can be made with a variety of colors and are fun to make and perfect as finished cords.

... Four-strand kumihimo braiding maru dai-free and disk-free. I taught myself this form of braiding from old nautical books before I had ever heard of kumihimo braiding in the late 70's. I remember meeting Kaethe and Jules Kliot in 1978 at the American Craft Council in San Francisco and when they saw my braids they told me I was doing kumihimo... I bought Jules' book, Kumi Himo (1977, Some Place Publication, Berkeley, Ca). It was my first introduction to traditional Japanese braiding techniques. My second book was Braids by Rodrick Owen - See an earlier bog entry on his presentation. The method I will be teaching is done entirely by hand. Although a bit more challenging to learn than the basic kumihimo braids done with the disk or maru dai, once learned, it is very fast and it creates a beautiful spiral braid.

... The 'Corkscrew Style Whipping' named by one of my student (thank you!), a form of whipping very useful for construction. Often concealed later either by either an end clasp or an ornamental covering made with several fiber technique. This corkscrew whipping is extremely useful when ends of thread need to be hidden and cut.

... Techniques for ending (and beginning) cords and braids, and how to incorporate clasps seamlessly.

... Button and toggles made with beads; loops made with larkshead knots.


... Method for covering over ends and the corkscrew whipping such as a clean whipping, a wrap, square knot sennit and open fender hitching (aka single detached buttonhole hitching) and finally the turk head knots with the introduction to the five-strand turk head knot.

It is an ambitious program, with a lot of techniques to learn. Not all will be aquired and mastered on first exposure, but this program offers many techniques that will be easy to learn for a beginner and many that will be of interest to the experienced artist.

Funding got approved, so now all I need is a flight from San Franciso to Bemidji that fits within the budget or a ride from Fargo or Minneapolis. Who would have believed that soon, I will be on my way to meet Dawn in Bemidji - Wait, where is Bemidji, with a name like this, it should be on a tropical island, but no, I had to google Bemidji, and I found out that it means 'a lake with crossing waters' as the Mississipi River passes through the lake and it is indeed in the Lake area in Northern Minnesota. Oh, yes, now I remember references about Bemidji in John Sanford's books featuring Virgil Flowers! - Marion

The top left picture is one of Dawn's pieces. To see more of her work, go to> Dawn's Creations on Etsy
For more information on the worshop and presentation, go to> Workshop

'Paracas Headband Textiles Revisited' with Rodrick Owen

Rodrick Owen is a leading expert on Pre-Columbian and Japanese braids known for his seminal book 'Braids, 250 Patterns from Japan, Peru and Beyond' published by Interweave Press in 1995.
A friend gave me a hardcover copy when it was published. I browsed through the book, considered some of the techniques, but kept to my methods of braiding at the time. I had discovered braiding through nautical knotting books in the mid 70's and only heard of the term 'kumihimo' in 1978 when I met Jules and Kaethe Kliot while exhibiting at the San Francisco American Craft Council Show. The Kliots had published a booklet on kumihimo the previous year. Jules Kliot owns Lacis in Berkeley.

I have since then revisited Rodrick's book several times when playing with kumihimo at first with a maru dai, then recently when trying out braids with nylon cord, the kumihimo disk and EZ bobs.

It was a great pleasure to meet Rodrick in person last Thursday at his presentation at the Black Sheep Handweavers Guild. He started by tracing the movement the people who came over the Bering land bridge 30,000 years ago and then showing various sites where excavations found signs of civilizations and textiles in burial sites. In the Paracas necropolis, mummies were bound in place by cords and wrapped with many layers of intricate textiles, such as tunics, mantles and headbands.

He took us then on a visual tour of Paracas and Nazca textiles from around 600 BCE to 400 CE, stunning us with braids, weaving and embroideries of such complexity that no one now knows how to reproduce them. Visually, some pieces were like modern art. One textile design depicted abstractions of windows and modern buildings in the style of a Hundertwasser's. Others had interconnected designs precursors of M.C. Esher's tesselations.

We got a chance after the presentation to see some of Rodrick's samples of interlaced, fingerwoven braids. Go to Rodrick Owen's website at http://homepage.mac.com/billgreene1/owen/owenhome.html

What a treat to look at ancient textiles and modern creation of forgotten fiber arts!

On the Road to New England

Occasionally I leave my studio and go on a trip to show work or to teach.

After a number of emails with the workshop coordinator of Bead Designer International/Bead Society of New England, we were ready with a clear curriculum, manuals to be printed, bead kits to prepare and bags to be packed, supplies to be ordered and shipped to the workshop location and most importantly students signed up. In the meantime I had forgotten about Spring Break, taking time away from work, so of course I scrambled to prepare all the bead and pre-cut thread kits. Then I was off in the plane with 90 pounds of supplies and 8 pounds of personal stuff and a heavy carry-on. 5 boxes had already been shipped from various locations.

The trip to New England went amazingly well. The lecture about my personal journey as an artist went well, I believe. Public speaking used to make me very nervous. But several years ago, I decided that speaking about my work should be easy as no one else knew the subject better than I. Yoga centering and grounding techniques have been a great help as well...

A side trip by train took me to Portland, Maine, just in time for a last Spring snow fall. Downtown was deserted as everyone there was so sick of snow, but I had a great time waking around until my return back to the Boston area.

Back in the Boston area, the BDI coordinator took me on a short visit of Concord, MA. We spent some time walking around the Concord Greens with the Old North Bridge and the Minute Man sculpture memorialized by Emerson's words 'the shot heard around the world'. As a fairly new citizen of this land, I got touched by being there at the very spot were the revolution began more than 200 years ago. As we were ready to leave, after being the only visitors during our visit so far, a Minute Man in full regalia materialized for us (his umbrella gave him away).


We went to warm up at the Concord Library. What a spot, a jewel. It is about 200 years old, a grand place to spent time, and still a public library. If I lived in this area I would hang there... As we walked around: a young kid was sitting in an alcove in the stairs reading Star Wars, what a contrast!

Then out for diner at the old Colonial Inn, and the Minute Man was already sitting at the next table...

In the meantime, I understand better the colors of New England in winter or early spring. The land is buff, the tree truck gray bare of leaves, with a few dark green pine here and there. The sky is either grey or a gorgeous blue when the skies are clear. The shadows are completely different than the shadows in California or Europe... Back in California, the land is quite green right now in early spring, whereas it will be buff in summer when all the grasses dry off, and the shadows have a hint of purple here. The earth is really a beautiful precious jewel.