Tag Archive for Nancy Smeltzer.art quilt blogs

“Elements-Earth”

 I don’t often do series, as I usually get bored with the same colors after awhile. However, after my husband left, I decided to explore the traditions of many spiritual teachings and to incorporate many of these new findings into my art work. I had also taught the history of Aristotle’s elements when I was a middle school science teacher, so I decided to do a series based on his elements, Earth, Water, Fire, and Air, and then added the fifth metaphysical element, Spirit, to the series. Today’s posting is about “Earth.

I love textures, and the surfaces of rocks that are covered with moss and lichens have always fascinated me. I spent a lot of time in the woods as a kid, making “houses” to play in. As I got older, I did the work for a lot of the Girl Scout nature badges, and so I began a life long love of plants. A forest floor that has not been over run by humans teems with various forms of life. Crawling around on your hands and knees with a magnifying glass can be absorbing and consuming as a child’s imaginative capabilities develop. Later on, I enjoyed this fond childhood pastime as an adult, watching a trail of leaf cutter ants, on the rain forest floor in Bolivia, each carrying a triangle of a leaf on its back to add to the nest. This small, green stream of moving vegetation was one of those life imprints that I have stuck in my mind for eternity.

To capture some of those rich visual images that I have of lush growths in nature, I used a wealth of materials, as you can see in the detail shot on the left. One of the first inclinations of people when they see my work is to reach out and touch it. That, too, for me is one of the appeals of my art quilt, as I get to play with lots of diverse objects of different shapes, sizes, surfaces, colors, etc. I like to touch my work, so I’m pleased when others want to do the same. However, touching isn’t allowed in an exhibition setting because of the volume of people going through, so I’d like to think that I offer enough visual appeal that by looking at the plethora of details, there’s enough there in my work to satisfy some of those with tactile desires.

In this piece, I used green buttons and beads, because for me, that’s what I think of when I think of Earth. (Never mind the fact of which I am very much aware that from space, this is a blue planet.) What I was trying to achieve were those “up close and personal” moments that one can experience if you slow down enough to take a close look at what’s out there in the ladnscape to be observed. Besides the green buttons and beads to simulate plants, there are knobby buttons to suggest stones, and dyed pieces carved from bone (the vertical brown and white column in the lower right of the detail shot above). To the upper right of that bone piece is a clear white button with feather-like swirls on it, as if a bird’s plumes had just wafted down on to the forest floor. Costume jewelry and buttons with flowers were added to help create a richly textured documentation of what the Earth represents for me.

I live and create here in the “Eastern Deciduous Forest” in Maryland on the east coast of the USA. Green is the predominant color 3 seasons out of the year, so that was the hue that I chose for “Elements -Earth”.In my own physical gardens outside, during the growing season, I try to create a wealth of scenes to inspire me. There are also landscapes that I’ve seen in West Virginia that have rocks whose surfaces are as richly textured with vegetation as what I depicted in this piece. It is from these souces that I created from my own impressions and experiences this first piece in the series. “Elements” is my homage to this planet that we live on.

To see more of my art work, please visit my web site at www.fiberfantasies.com .

“Sanctuary – my home away from home”

This piece was done in 2004, when I was just starting on my spiritual journey. I was working with a cranial-sacral massage therapist on some of my chronic back pain. He asked me to envision a place where I felt emotionally safe, and I realized that I didn’t really have such a place. I was pretty surprised, as I have quite a vivid imagination, yet I couldn’t come up with such an image in my mind. Thus, this small piece, “Sanctuary” (13″ W x 13.5″T) was made., originally to give me an mind picture to focus on.

Then, the concept became to have a small piece that I could carry with me wherever I went, along the order of the portable altars that you sometimes see in medieval art. Then, I could always have an image of the safe place that I had created with my hands that I eventually learned is really inside of myself. It has a number of buttons and bead, or course, but in addition, has several small, gold window frames. They could be interpreted as “windows to my soul”, or as “windows that open on to answers”, or any number of interpretations. I find that since viewers tend to make up their own interpretations anyway, based on their own experiences, it’s probably best to leave the meaning of the windows to “viewer discretion”. The black butterflies and leaves, all favorite nature themes of mine when in their more natural colors, are to remind me that while darkness might surround me, there is always brightness in the center of in my heart.

In the detail shot below, you can see more of the puffy center effect that I created to look like clouds. I think it would be a really cushy place to crawl into and be warm and cozy. You can also see one of the little shi-sha mirrors in the upper right of this pic. I love to use those little, tiny mirrors to add shine and gleam to a piece. Sparkle seems to attract people’s attention and is a design element that I use a lot, as people seem to respond to it well. There are also some gold, commercial cloud appliques you can see in the upper left and the right middle to add to the celestial concept of this piece. Not a bad image to carry around, no? It certainly makes me smile when ever I see it.

 

Do you have a favorite piece of fabric/art work that brings you comfort?

 

 

 

To see more of my art work, please visit my web site at www.fiberfantasies.com .