Yes, my article for April is not in its spot in the first half of the month. Yes, I admit to having been somewhat absent. Partially, this was due to ongoing physical difficulties, increasing with time. But, more importantly, it was due to the major distractions caused by a new love I found, strictly by chance - but isn't that the way most love happens?
Word gets around pretty fast in the small town I live in. But no one who knows me would know about this situation - only strangers found out. They were right there when the whole affair began. I am not ashamed, however. And now my husband knows the whole lurid story. My love affair is no longer a secret.
Last fall, I saw a woman on TV who was espousing a philosophy I felt immediately in tune with. Her approach toward her subject in the art field seemed to be just what I think is important. And then, shock of shocks, the next newsletter from my quilting guild told of a two-day workshop to be held locally that this very woman would be teaching! Printing on fabric. Coming to my town! Now, printing for me is usually done from a plate of some kind onto paper. The etchings, woodcuts, monotypes, linocuts that I have done - all onto paper. Some are run through my small press, and some are burnished by hand. I love the processes. This screen printing is done on cotton muslin. So I can make my own printed fabric for quilts or apparel.
Some years ago, I enrolled in a class at a nearby junior college to learn silkscreen printing, a method I had not yet learned. At the time, I was having some trouble with my shoulders. Well, the young people in there ran circles around me, and the instructor pretty much ignored me... and I couldn't maneuver the 16" squeegee to get the ink evenly through the screen I had to make. (This instructor insisted that we learn the process from the very beginning! We had to make our screens, and they were really big. Frames, stretching the fabric evenly and very taut, putting the cord around the screen to take up any remaining slack.) It was apparent after about the second class that the kids were there to print specific images or sayings on T-shirts. I didn't care about that stuff. I just wanted to learn the process, so I could make silkscreen (serigraph) prints - on paper. There are several images that I have retained mentally that just seem to need to be silkscreened! I quit that class. It just was not "it" for me. And I didn't like the solvents needed to clean out the screens.