Continuing the Boulder Drawings

I wonder if you remember the "Erratic Boulders" water color painting I did about six months ago. The idea of something heavy, yet transparent -- or heavy but pending or even falling -- needs to find new expression. I started with water color again.


   "Overturn" is not yet finished, the bright-colored stones might become darker and subdued, I'm not yet sure. The strings to hold the things (obviously dilettantic packing) cannot suspend the weight.



As I cannot paint water color in the living room, I got back to color pencil which I haven't applied for a longer time.  This results in tender pastel colors; I used a rather rough water color paper which has a visible structure. "Green Horizon" is a remake of the "Boulders" arrangement with a green line that separates earth and sky and penetrates or embraces the stone.


And again, there is the idea of heavyness, sinking down, following gravity, as time passes.

New Fabric on Spoonflower

New fabric available on Spoonflower. Water colors.

No Time for a Stitch

During the past weeks, I was very busy with a book project for the regional parlament. No time for quilting or embroidery. But now I'm almost thru with it, and we spent the weekend in Berlin, as we have done during the past years. There will not be many pictures of Berlin, because we met it either dark or in heavy snowfall, so taking pictures just wasn't possible. I just took a few on the ride and removed the strong green tint it got from the train window glass.

Starting out from Hamburg, well-prepared for the freezing temperatures.

 

The Train takes us through the suburbs of our town.

Then, we were heading for the capitol through the vast plain of Mecklenburg.

At last, Berlin's suburb Spandau.

Almost there.

My husband needed new boots! When the weather is so bad, he still wears his army boots, you can see one on his left foot. And they were way too small after 26 years! The new pair are waiting on the left of the picture. You can see the size difference. I warned him what would happen if he kept wearing the old ones, so he agreed to purchase a new pair.

We had lovely meetings with friends and relatives, although not everyone was able to join -- the cold demanded a victim who lay in bed, sneezing. We had meals with the rest of the bunch and a lot of fun.

Our host made some origami after the meal at an Italian's. She created a Santa's boot, and the host was enchanted and placed a cookie into it.
Next day, we went to the New National Galery, a Mies-van-der-Rohe-building. We fought our way through a blizzard! Near Potsdamer Platz, there were smooth metal covers on the ground, hidden by the snow (who was so foolish to design that??). An elderly lady fell down -- hope she did not get hurt! I was close to slipping, too. We reached the galery and saw an exhibition of post-war painters. There were some German painters, their work was related to American Abstract Expressionism. My favourite was HP Zimmer, "Gelbe Gefahr".
The personel of the galery did their best to represent the old spirit of dictatorship and literal obedience to prescriptions. The East is still too close! They should be prepared for democracy.

We went home by train through the pitch black night. Snow is melting again, we waded home through puddles.

How Far I Got with the Roadrunner Quilt

20 squares. The plan is to create a center of 10 blue-based squares, framed with red squares, followed by another blue-green frame around. Then, it should have reached bed-size.

Tiger Ready for a Walk

Mini quilt finished. 15,5x10 in.

Leaves are falling, some bright yellow is left.

The Skythian Tiger

Another mini quilt half-finished: a lino-print -- funny, the hue of printing ink comes out different, the sawtooth edge was done with rubber stamps. The lime material is a basic fabric which will be hidden in the end. Pretty skewed again, just can't help. The motif is an old one, some of my blog readers know it. It was taken from a wood carving in a grave mound in South Siberia, 2500 years old. -- On the upper edge, there are my templates, two of them connected by a scrap, so I keep the matching pair together. The board is my painting board, sorry for the messy look.

A Contrast

My own prints and industrial fabrics -- a big contrast. I'm not sure what I'm trying to say by that, but something makes me follow this trail. Another roadrunner, a lime and green one. They keep running.

Fall -- or: Need some Color?

Hard to believe that these colors haven't been electronically enhanced. Maybe it was the dim light of this drizzly day that gave some colors an extra uplift. It was quiet, no wind, and I was in a sleepy mood. My back was aching, but I just couldn't stop taking pictures of the amazing color combos that this fall -- and possibly the choices that the park gardeners had made -- provided to the view of the visitors.

I left the park with the feeling you get when you had some very delicious food. Indeed, color has something nourishing to me. We call them "saturated", for example. There are still blossoms, and combined with red or yellow leaves, the pink of the last roses adds an almost surrealistic or fauve taste that is amazing.

Art is Everywhere

Bring your own plants, there is
not much green stuff growing here

 Last weekend surprised us with warm temperature, almost like summer, possibly the last warm and sunny days of the year. So J and I took a walk around our "docklands", as such a renovated harbour landscape is called in Great Britain.

This is our most expensive building site where nothing really happens, and the delay counts in years. The reason is a quarrel between town administration and the company.

Expensive flats along old quays are popular living quarters now.

Lovers have their names engraved in locks and expose them on bridges. Don't know what this custom means exactly; our relationship works without it.

Flood protection doors are prescribed for some places.

 

 Going back to the old town

Traditional boat equipment shops offer ropes in new colors