Tumbling Deltas

I wasn't able to get into my studio much for the last couple of days--I was busy preparing for vacation. I really miss the time spent there. In my very first post to this blog I spoke of the casita and of my just moving in to inhabit the place. That was the summer. Now we are well into another season and the situation in the casita has changed a bit.

I get more natural light this time of year. The sun is lower in the south and so my two south windows are bright most all of the day. But it is colder in there. The floors are all tile and painted cement and there is no central heat. I have no doubt that in deepest winter it will take at least half an hour to heat up the air to where I want to sit, take my mittens off, and work. But that is do-able.

In the main room I have tall steel shelves along the north wall bracing the north window. Taking up much of the center of the room are two large tables--my work top. I also have a beading desk and a small stand handy near where I normally sit that holds my cassette/CD player. The walls are hung with some unsold art. I am surrounded by my threads, papers, books, paint brushes, paints, dyes. I am very happy with that room.

A Fall Progression

I took this photo in November of 2004 outside the local library.

I have brought in the indoor plants and three of them sit on a small desk under one of the south windows. They should be plenty warm through all of winter unless we have a terrible cold snap. The plants which are in the second room give the place a nice homey feel and brighten up the white walls and floor. Also in the second room which is actually the dining room / kitchen of the casita, I have my sewing machine and ironing board out where I can reach then at all times. Very cool.

This is after several iterations or changes I made on the computer.

The red leaf on the left is essential to the design.

But speaking of the casita, I saw Viviano Herrera the other day. He was up from his son Juan's home in la ciudad de Chihuahua. Viviano is the man who moved into the casita in 2004 and transformed it from a half-garage into a whole little house. It still had a garage door on the north side, an industrial heater in the roof, and an oil smell deep in the floor. Viviano moved in and redid the garage door into a wall and window, he fixed the roof, he removed the car grease from the floor, and he painted the walls. Already there were the kitchen and bathroom in working order. Viviano lived in the casita until March of this year, exactly four years, before illness overtook him and he had to be cared for by his family. But when I saw him on Monday of this week, he was hale and well. He had come up to visit his friends here in ABQ and then to go up to Colorado to visit two more of his sons, Carlos and Indio. It was good to see him.

This is one of the final designs.

It looks like little fishes to me and diatoms in the sea.

Because of Viviano, I was able to realize my dream of a studio--a place of my own. And I am forever grateful. The studio means so much to me. I think it is a prize that I have finally won after years of service and study. It is a space deep inside me that I can go to when I tell my stories of life and dream. When I am working in the studio I lose track of time. Hours can pass so quickly that I can barely remember them. I go into another zone, another type of time. Is it the fugue of creativity? Meditation with Delta Waves tumbling around me?

This is Bouquet Salpicon from the same iteration.

The threads exactly match the red leaf.

This is a type of very modern blackwork.

I am on vacation for the next week. I will have my computer along and so will post when I can. I will also have along all my drawing stuff--pencils, paper, colored pencils, pens,--and I will draw. Drawing is another thing that puts me into my other zone. Don't bother wishing me a good time--I know I will have one.