Leah Evans’ Map Quilts

Congregation

Leah Evans is a Wisconsin artist who works with textiles to create impressions of landscapes. She studies mapping conventions and then recreates imagined places in these beautiful wall hangings. She uses many techniques in each piece including appliqué, piecing, dying, needle-felting, and a number of embroidery stitches. I love the variety of the images she makes, even though they all still relate back to the same theme of the map.

Red Lock System

These images so inspiring—I love textiles, and use printed fabric in some of my own paintings. If you read my blog often you know I travel regularly, flying over the western states to Los Angeles for work. These textiles remind me of those aerial images I hold in mind when I’m working on some of my own paintings.

Pivotal Irrigation

Winter Isolation in Utah

Escalante National Monument from Hwy 12. Photo by Matt McGrath.

Southern Utah. Isolation. Silence. Primitive beauty. The experience of this place is simultaneously one of life and death. I lose my breath. A human life is so small, so insignificant, in a place like this. Yet somehow it is also larger than life, so connected, so at peace, so at one with all else that exists.

We stayed at the Boulder Mountain Lodge in a tiny enclave called Boulder, Utah. The road we took to reach the location was first paved as recently as 1985. We figured it is about a three hour drive from any busy town, and even these towns would be considered small by most: Moab, Cedar City, or Richfield. This is exactly the way we like to spend our holidays, enjoying each other’s company without the distractions and chaos of the season’s crowds.

Snowshoe tracks in Dixie National Forest. Photo by Matt McGrath.

This place is busier in the warmer months, when hoards (relatively speaking) of people drive with their families from one national park to the next: Zion, Bryce, Capitol Reef, and Arches. But here in December, perhaps two or three cars mosey down the road each hour, accompanied by wild turkeys and deer who look on indifferently. There are no restaurants open here at this time of year. We had to bring all our food with us for our week of solitary enjoyment in Escalante National Monument.

Boulder Creek Canyon. You can see about 90 miles off into the distance.

Calf Creek Canyon.

Two pine trees in Dixie National Forest.

I Dreamt of Things...

I dreamt that Matt and I were outrunning some gang-bangers in my dad’s light green 1974 Dodge Dart Swinger. For some reason the gas pedal was really far away and I had to streeeeeeeetch to reach it.

Paul Klee Paintings & Happy Birthday

Parnassum, detail.

I thought today would be a great day to celebrate the work of Paul Klee, since he was born on December 18, 1879, exactly 95 years before I was born. Happy Birthday!

Paul Klee was of German/Swiss descent. He is most known for his study and understanding of color theory, and he wrote extensively about it. He wrote, “Colour has taken possession of me; no longer do I have to chase after it, I know that it has hold of me forever... Colour and I are one. I am a painter.”

Garden.

Klee taught at the famous Bauhaus school of art and architecture, which has now evolved into the Institute of Design at Illinois Institute of Technology. The Bauhaus school originated in Germany and moved to Chicago in the 1930s to avoid Nazi disapproval. The school influenced developments in art and design throughout the first half of the 20th century.

He was deeply inspired by music, and reciprocally, his work has inspired musicians. Rainer Maria Rilke wrote about Klee in 1921, “Even if you hadn’t told me he plays the violin, I would have guessed that on many occasions his drawings were transcriptions of music.”

Ancient sound.

On a completely visceral level, Klee’s paintings are beautiful, spiritual compositions that leave my heart aflutter. But I’m also intrigued by his work as an academic student of design and color. I also live on that line between art and design, and appreciate the interrelationship of a variety of creative expressions.

Word of the Week — CUPOLA

Cupola by Piero Lissoni

Each week, I close my eyes and choose a random word from the dictionary. I then do an image search for that word online, and choose some of the most interesting, unusual, and unexpected results to share with you.

Cupola brooch by Sergey Jivetin
This design is created using nothing but hands from watches.

Judith Leiber Cupola Minaudiere. $2995 at Neiman Marcus.

I Dreamt of Things...

I dreamt that I was trying to speak with a couple people at a yoga studio. I had just eaten a piece of candy that one of them gave me. The candy kept getting bigger and stickier in my mouth, which caused quite a bit of difficulty as I tried to communicate.

Earlier Cranbrook Shows

Here are some images from Cranbrook Degree Shows of earlier years:

I think this was done using a laser cutter. I am determined to have access to a laser cutter at some point in the near future.

Was this also done using a laser cutter?

Cranbrook Graduate Show 2008

I love this... Pattern on pattern, repurposed and loud, yet somehow blending together homogeneously.

I can’t sleep tonight, so I’ve been looking around online. I found someone’s Flickr collection of images from the 2008 Cranbrook Degree Show. Since Cranbrook is my alma mater (MFA 2-d Design), I am always interested to see what’s going on up there. The Flickr images don’t have any credits for the work, which is kind-of a bummer.

I’m not sure why, but over the past months (years?), I’ve found more inspiration looking at the work coming out of disciplines other than design. That’s not to say there aren’t interesting things going on within my own discipline, but there’s something special about studying a variety of visual ideas.

As designers, perhaps it’s even more essential that we become curious about everything around us.

Is this some sort of representation of a 19th-Century massage table, or torture device? I can’t tell.

I’m not sure how I feel about this one. There’s something appealing about it (the colors? the repetition?), but yet somehow it's simultaneously off-putting.

I Dreamt of Things...

I dreamt that I was attacked by a big black raven in a small, dark, musty, old staircase with faded blue carpeting.

Perhaps this dream came to me because I mentioned to Matt last night as we watched the Baltimore Ravens in a football game, “They are called the Ravens because Edgar Allen Poe lived in Baltimore.” Matt replied, “Uh-huh.”

Word of the Week — HERALD

Each week, I close my eyes and choose a random word from the dictionary. I then do an image search for that word online, and choose some of the most interesting, unusual, and unexpected results to share with you.

My New Small Paintings

Wave. 5.5 x 4 inches. Ink and Acrylic on Paper.

I’ve been working on a variety of new projects, and (as promised) would like to share a few of my favorite recent small paintings with you. Please visit my Etsy site to purchase prints. I hope you like them.

Moon Light. 9.5 x 7 inches. Ink and Acrylic on Paper.

Bulb. 7 x 9.5 inches. Ink and Acrylic on Paper.