Welcome to MissouriBendStudio!

This is an online journal of my artistic investigations and a way to communicate about my work, ideas, quandries and queries! I welcome comments and conversation and do hope you enjoy these musings. My artwork is available in my shop MissouriBendStudio on Etsy.com or on my website.

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Monday, April 23, 2012

Time Opens Up and Out

Greetings at the beginning of a new work week....well, as I have Monday off, my work week begins tomorrow, but I'm still hard at work in the studio. As I continue to adapt to my new life of work in the library, I am finding somehow that the hours of the day grow to accomadate my needs when I am at home. I somehow have time to put new plants in the ground and admire the way everything has grown so quickly this spring....I swear the plants grow by inches a day! The irises are already blooming and it seems things in the garden are about a month ahead of their normal routine. I hope this will be a nice, long summer. There is also time to read and be in the studio, not just making the daily drawings, but the other works I've had in progress.

I know there is a shift inside of me, because  today when I was working in the studio....doing the slow work of hand stitching a large wishbone on one of those pieces....the echos of my thinking bubbled up like they used to. It's hard to describe, but it's the thing that happens when I am relaxed and working that causes me to say that I think through my hands. It's how I understand myself and my place in the world. And here's what my innermost self said to me quietly today as I made stitch after stitch...."we are always on the inside looking out." It came as a whole sentence and I understood what that meant immediately. Those are the moments of connection....those moments of the nearly audible thoughts bubbling up, with the insights that help me know I am "in the moment" and in the flow....that's where I come to know what it is I know.

Let's see if I can elaborate on that thought...we are always on the inside looking out. We are our bodies....we cannot help but see the world through the filter of our own history, culture, and the sheer physicality of our being, which governs so much of how we move through the world. In a way, we are trapped here inside ourselves....and this is not a negative, it just is how it is. We can never be really walking in anyone else's shoes, not matter how much we empathize. We can love another person with all of our being and as close as we often are, think of it, the gaps between each of us is so vast....and yet, it's all part of our humanity....don't we do the best we can? It's just good to remember that the way we experience the world is just that, it's our take on things, and for someone else, it is entirely different. Knowing this....does it make it easier to be kind to one another....to know there are infinite ways of seeing and experiencing anything? I suppose it begins with accepting ourselves.



I realized after I wrote the last post on Friday that I'd mentioned the two new pieces in the MissouriBendStudio shop, but then I forgot to show you! They are shown above and were quite fun to make....all those little round bits on the lower one are the punched holes from an old map. Might as well get caught up with the dailies since Friday as well....they are all posted at MissouriBendMusings, but here's a view of each.
April 19 2012

April 20 2012

April 21 2012

April 22 2012

April 23 2012

So, the hour is late, but I'm off to do some reading before bed. Hope you have a great week!
Thank you once again for reading and sharing in my new adventures in the back-to-work world...such great friends I have here!



9 comments:

  1. Your work is brilliant. I'd like that statement to be all that I comment here but I have to add that the 'change' {I am thinking of the I Ching here} in your life has shifted something and you are loosened somehow. Have a glorious day filled with awe! *smiles* Norma

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    1. Norma...thank you so much for the fine compliments. I definitely feel a shift...sort of an alignment of things that didn't seem to be there before. I feel more relaxed, which probably allows life to flow more freely! Thank you again for your kind words!! Cheers to you!

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  2. This is such a thoughtful post Patti - it proves that your new routine suits you, that the hours really have somehow expanded to accommodate things - or maybe it's your creative spirit that did the expanding, as some things will do under pressure? I do hope you'll be able to find time in a few days to read a letter....?

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    1. G, who can explain the mysteries of time and the inner landscape! I do know life feels like it flows much more freely now and the hours in the day seem to expand to accommodate my needs....thankfully! Wishing you all the best on the parallel path, dear!

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  3. thank you for sharing your experience in flow in such vivid details. isn't it marvelous to distinguish that still small voice? i believe we are at an advantage, as artists, since we are quite intentional at taking being time and prone to staring into space for long periods of time.
    in love with 'journey trails' and 'april 22'!

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    1. Anca, so glad you like the works you mentioned. I was so pleased to hear the still small voice speaking so loudly....it probably had never left, but there were too many other competing voices for me to hear the important one! Thank you for the good wishes! Best to you, Anca!

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  4. gorgeous new work
    I love the pods especially...

    xox - eb.

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  5. It's fascinating as an a outsider to see how the 'loss' of time has actually led to an expansion of sorts! I loved the bit " echoes of my thinking bubbled up like they used to" - so apt for those moments when we are quietly away and then 'it' or 'they' appear inside our head, perfectly formed. I think I am inside myself, and think your thoughts re only ever knowing and seeing and being thru our own experience are so true. I can empathise and love, but never will I really know that of others...

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    1. Fiona....some of the mysteries of life, huh? Intimacy and separation all rolled into one. I feel your connections across the vast distances....that, too, is something to contemplate and cherish!

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I'm happy to hear from you...comments and questions are welcome!