Just a wisp of Mohair!

A wisp of mohair was left on the floor, like a fallen feather, when Karen and Katie left the shop today. It lay as a reminder of a significant interaction: shiny, beautiful, sky-like, as though it had taken flight and landed gracefully.

I had a visit from Karen Lohn, the author of Peace Fibres today. You can follow her blog at http://www.peacefibres.com/blog/ . She came to see Libbie Soffer's show the show in the gallery and to re-connect on the theme of peace and fiber. We had talked at Shepherd's Harvest over Mother's Day weekend. We connected deeply over the search for personal and corporate peace and the role that fiber can play in the search.

It is an odd thing, this relationship with fiber. Perhaps it reaches way back into our early hominid history...to that time of early discovery of the protection and utility of various fibers...they ways they could be employed to tie, net and wrap things...the sinews that could hold the furs to our feet, that could lace skins together, the vines that seemed to invite the invention of basketry, the long thin fibers discovered in the inner back of downed trees, the stupendous fibers of the spider and the caterpillar...

I hope to read more about the history of the development of fibers. But, what I know now is this:

When I am in contact with fibers, I feel a peaceful ease fall over me. I breathe easier. I feel in contact with some kind of deep history of women's work. When I spin it, I feel bliss.

Give yourself space to breathe & thrive: try spinning.

The wool shop reopened today. ALL of it was packed for Shepherd's Harvest and needed to stay in the garage for the duration of the Mending Circles we had with the current show. With the exception of Memorial Day, I will be open on Mondays 10-5 and by very generous appointment. Come, pet the sweet, soft fibers.

Yarn about art? Art that is yarn?

I was talking with my friend Ann today, a fabulous spinner. We both share the utter enthusiasm for the variety of fibers, breeds of sheep, styles of spinning available to us as spinners. We get so excited talking about prepping new fibers and the discoveries that lurk around the corner! We see each other as our primary supports in our quest for spinning as fine art.

I seek to make the skein that is so beautiful, or so odd, or so laden with meaning that it can only be perceived as sculpture!

Ann seeks the skein that so expresses its "selfness," the twist, the color, the crimp that expresses the uniqueness that that fiber can become...often in garments. She spins yarns that cannot be found in the natural habitat of the yarn store.

Are we nuts, or something? Are we tilting at windmills? I don't know the answer to that question. But I do know that she and I will talk again soon about an idea that is beginning to form for us:

What if we formed a group of like minded spinners, who were interested in stretching the envelope of what yarn can be?

We are thinking of forming spinning group, but not just another spinning group where we eat and drink and spin. ( Even though we do like to drink and spin especially well!) We don't know what this group would look like, but we know that we want to create a more prominent place at the fiber table for spinners. We want spinners to be noticed as spinners of art, not imitators of store bought yarn.

What could we do? spin together, study together, encourage one another to stretch our skills and ideas, create exhibitions together...other stuff?

You tell me. Are you interested? Do you have ideas? Share them.

An Interesting Transformation

This sweater turned into this yarn! What an ugly sweater! What beautiful yarn. Hmm. Makes you look at 1970's fashion in a different light!

South Minneapolis Wild Wool Market

Returns in time for Holiday Shopping

Come Saturday, November 27 & December 18, 10-4, to Susan Hensel Gallery, for wooly, silky, alpaca goodness!

•spinning

•weaving

•felting

•re-using!

Demos and shopping!

Fresh food!

You will find art dolls, handspun and hand dyed yarn, tote bags, tapestry, weaving, spinning materials. It is an ever changing roster of artists!

Almost all the artists will be demonstrating! Some teach, so talk to them. All invite you to sink your hands into the marvelous world of fine fiber.

WHERE? Susan Hensel Gallery, 3441 Cedar Ave S, Minneapolis, MN 55407

As the kettle simmers

As the kettle of cochineal simmers on one burner and the cutch on another, the study in red accumulates steam! Pictured above are most of the acid dye reds and red analogs that I have. I will be spinning singles soon to compare, combine and contrast! It should be a lot of fun!

The Zen of Alpaca Prep

My lovely creamy white alpaca fleece was riddled with VM! The day I washed it, the drain backed up so I was not able to get it as clean as normal. And, maybe you can see it..my alpaca rolled in hay, twigs, seeds...proving once again that we spinners deal with agricultural product!
So, I made peace with my 5-pitch English combs. I reminded myself that I do not have to comb the whole fleece at once, at all or in one day. So, each time I run a load of laundry, I comb a little more. I also tell myself that I have given myself the delightful opportunity to touch the fiber more. ( Actually, I learned this attitude from Rita Buccanhan.) I have gotten into the ZEN of it, It is now, finally, fun.
Little nests of lovely, silky, creamy, dreamy alpaca are nesting together in a basket.
Isn't it lovely?

Suddenly Autumn

There has been a sudden temperature change here in Minneapolis, so I am gratefully wearing my wool tights and thin merino hoodie bought in Christchurch, NZ!

The outback colors are deep, deep rust red, dusty green, some greys and blue, blue sky. I hope to combine these into a scrubby, expressive yarn. The locks are handsful of Romney, Border Leceister and Icelandic and maybe one mystery fleece. All various shades of beige and brown, overdyed in similar colors to the roving.

Madlyn, the joyfuling rolling alpaca, has soft, beautiful, hayfilled fiber.

Where has Sue been hiding?

I'll give you three guess...Australia? New Zealand? Fiji?

Yes, all three. I traveled from August 3-August 29. You can follow my trip on the Susan Hensel Art Blog. Slowly but surely I am posting the notes and the photos.

I saw lots of austere, beautiful red sand and mountains in the outback/Red Center of Australia. Fed wallabies, watched birds, looked at and bought Aboriginal art, visited a cattle station, swam the Great Barrier Reef, drank at pubs, motored Sydney Harbour at night, toured the Sydney Opera House before it opened to the public, met a woman who had woven the restoration upholstery and drapery for the restored Governor's House in Sydney Domain. Traveled to New Zealand through breathtaking mountain ranges, sailed on fjords, saw seals & penguins, petted a Koala, stayed in a home in Christchurch, attended evensong at the Christchurch Cathedral, visited Anne Field & Marilyn Rea-Menzies studios in Christchurch (I hope their work is OK. Their buildings were damaged in the earthquake.), saw lots of sheep, sailed in Aukland Harbour, met a Maori king. Walked the beach in Fiji, got sick from the heat, drank kava and ate a luxurious lunch in an impoverished village home, toasted astounding sunsets from my balcony.

So I show you cotton! I did come home with a tiny bit of fiber from New Zealand: and alpaca/polworth mix that is lovely.It has the lovely silkiness of the alpaca, but the addition of the polworth gives it a delightful bounce. I will photograph it soon.

I was on a great tour, and did not find materials easy to come by. The "new" big thing over there was merino mink. They are heavily marketing the combo of merino and possum. The possum forms a halo much like angora. It is lovely. I did not find and yarn until I was nearing departure and worried about paying duty! I did come home with fingerless gloves and a knit cap. They were invaluable keeping me warm in the fjord.

Before the main drain back up today, I washed up some white alpaca (Dang, she was a rolled in the hay! I'll have to comb more of it than I like!) and dyed various wools in Australian colors. Imagine that! The drain is fixed, now. Plumbers work on holidays and drains ONLY back up on weekends and holidays.

In May, I purchased this Tahkli, a tiny supported spindle. Finally, today was the day to play with it. I've been home for a week and the jet lag is just about gone and a few creative thoughts finally began flitting across my brain. Yeah! I tried it in a little bowl. Didn't like that. I then read that some people spin it on a piece of leather. I liked that! So while I half-watched the Anthony Bourdain marathon, I spun thick and thin cotton...trying for evenness, but achieving it only intermittently. I am pleased, though. Lots of progress was made toward mastery.

Battle scarf?

Battle yarns are being photographed and composed by my son, John Hensel, who is a profesional photographer. Stay tuned! The process is fascinating.

Meanwhile, I have chosen one hank to knit and that process is also fascinating.

The stich definition is good, it is easy to pull the added elements to the front. It looks normal and transgressive all at once. A very odd piece of fabric. A battle scarf?

Yarn joins the drawings

While I may be adjusting the blacks a bit, I think it is done. The addition of a lightweight handspun mohair took it where it needed to go. The sea creature aspect continues...these seem to be "jelly-fish of memory"? Who knows, it is still a mystery to me.

I do think of the threads as memory, connections to the past, to shared histories...

Rainbow relief

Sometimes camo just doesn't cut it. So, I made 3 rainbow batts and dized them off the carder, making fluffy, vertically striped roving...i.e. the bamboo is in long strips rather than clumps. Yummy to spin on the Aura. because I can go so slowly, I think it will make a usable single. If not? I'll ply it with something or other;-)

Meanwhile, in the woodshop, of all places!, I have been making more striped rovings using either the carder, the hackle or both! Too fun. I will be teaching a fiber prep class this fall that will cover this and all sorts of other cool ways to personalize your fibers before you spin them. It's called Into the Wild. Look for it on the Weaver's Guild website
Blue! At first it was Too Stripey! So, I carded it and rebuilt it on the hackle more ot my liking.
Still doing camo-colors. Upstairs, in the dye studio, camo-dyed merino yarn awaits the steamer.

Can Yarn Function as sculpture?

This yarn, COMBAT CHAOS, begins to achieve what I set out to do. Combining specially chosen colors and fibers to express the emotional turmoil of the battlefield, little army guys are pinioned in beehives, cocoons of black wool, felted camouflage felt flags, mounds of netting and desert camo. Both sides of the conflict climb around and shoot in the confusion. Small flashes of light, tiny sequins, reflect the flash of the guns or the twinkle in a mute night sky.

The wars rage on.Why shouldn't my yarn talk about it? The yarn's message is not yet clear. All war appalls me...it is a failure of human ingenuity, of human goodness. We fail in our ability to live in community and solve our disagreements with out drawing battle lines.

Tiny corkscrews enliven this tiny skein.

Larger, poofier corkscrews.

Neither of the corkscrews have been set. I hate to see them lose their perkiness.

Fleece installation

I have been playing with fiber today.

I like the relationships that are developing among the parts, although it is still too linear, simply curated objects rather than a full 3-d experience. I think the placenta dress needs to hang in space rather like the stuffed dress at the left.But with the wool market arriving in a couple of days, I will leave it as is for now.

Knitting with Roving

I started this many moons ago...lost interest along the way. But I needed to free up the needles for a class I was taking...so I finally finished knitting a ball of roving into a snuggly scarf. Of course, it was over 85 degrees today, with at least equal humidity. I really like the stitch definition that the roving lends the project. Very pretty.

Come see this piece at the South Minneapolis Wild Wool Market on Saturday, June 26, 10-4 at Susan Hensel Gallery, 3441 Cedar Ave S., Minneapolis