(Press release from Harbor History Museum)
Intricately Woven Small Tapestries on Exhibit at Harbor History Museum in Gig Harbor

The Harbor History Museum’s newest temporary exhibit “NWxSE: A Collaborative Small Tapestry Project of Northwest and Southeast Weavers” opens on September 15, 2012. This cross-country exhibit showcases the works of weaving artists from Puget Sound (“NW”) and the southeast United States (“SE).  The exhibit runs through January 20, 2013.

More than 40 small tapestry pieces will be on display, showcasing the incredible talents of tapestry weavers from Tapestry Weavers South and Tapestry Artists of Puget Sound (TAPS). Internationally known weaver Cecilia Blomberg will be demonstrating tapestry weaving on the exhibit’s opening day, Saturday, September 15, from 1 to 2 pm.

The small tapestry format is conducive to experimentation for the contemporary weaver. Small tapestries tend to be of finer quality than large ones, and are more time consuming to weave. Smaller tapestries also provide the opportunity to appreciate the workmanship close-up while larger tapestries are observed from a farther distance in order to see the whole design. Smaller works also feel more intimate to the viewer.

The two tapestry groups joined forces to develop this collaborative project. The goal was to present a wide variety of work while restricting tapestry artists to the same format. The exhibit first opened at the Gaston County Museum of Art and History in Dallas, North Carolina on Feb.18, 2012.

In addition to the tapestries, museum visitors can watch videos showing the complex process involved and the skills needed by the weavers to create their woven works of art. Hands-on activities will provide an opportunity for exhibit visitors to try their hand at tapestry weaving.

In addition to the small tapestries in the Special Exhibitions Gallery, local weavers from TAPS will display larger tapestries in the museum lobby. The museum is open Tuesday through Sunday 10 am to 5 pm. Visit www.harborhistorymuseum.org for more information on this new exhibit and other exhibits in the museum.

The Gig Harbor Peninsula Historical Society, dba Harbor History Museum, was founded in 1963, and opened a museum in 1973. Our mission is to create opportunities to experience the heritage of the greater Gig Harbor communities. We do this by collecting, preserving, and sharing this area’s history. The museum is open April 16-January 31, Tues-Sun, 10am-5pm, except major holidays; winter hours are February 1-April 15, Weds-Sat 10am-4pm, Sundays 12pm-4pm.

The letters we wove to spell out our name has been assembled as a banner and is hanging in our space at the Fair.

All letters and bands were handwoven by members of the Olympia Weavers Guild.

Olympia Weavers Guild display at the 2012 Thurston County Fair.

I was just told of a great exhibit not too far from here…a great field trip. Sarah Swett, who does such great tapestries,  has her work on display at the Latimer Textile Museum in Tillamook OR but only until July 1! It’s summer; it is a great trip to the Oregon coastline with a super textile adventure added on, so if you can….take advantage!  Google Tillamook Textile Museum to get the details,

or click here->  http://www.latimerquiltandtextile.com

Several members have had trouble downloading PDFs from the web site–in particular, the newsletters, which are quite large and normally take a minute or so to download, depending on the internet connection speed. But, sometimes, the download does not complete no matter how long we wait.

This is a browser issue that may be caused by clicking on the link too many times without waiting for a big document to load completely, or an unreliable Internet connection. This causes a partial copy to be “stuck” in the browser cache (a disk folder where pages and files are saved so they are only downloaded once): if the copy is “broken,” clicking on the link again tries to read the broken copy from disk instead of trying to reload from the web site. To fix this, it is necessary to first clear the cache. This may make other pages you visit often load more slowly the next time you access them, especially if they have a lot of images on them, but it will also force reload of the broken files.

In Firefox, this can be corrected by selecting File->Preferences->Advanced and click on “Clear Now” next to the “Cached Content” label.

In Chromium, click on the wrench icon, select Settings->Under the Hood and click on “Clear Browsing Data”

In Safari, click on “Safari” in the tool bar, then select “Empty Cache” in the pull-down menu.

I don’t use Microsoft Internet Explorer, and don’t recommend it, but you can see a detailed procedure for your version of MSIE at http://www.wikihow.com/Clear-Your-Browser’s Cache”. The procedure varies depending on your version, which should be 7, 8, or 9.

If you have a DSL internet connection, clearing the cache does not work, and web sites in general are loading slowly, the problem could be caused by circuit overloads at your provider or noisy phone lines that cause transfers to be interrupted frequently. Wait until early morning, when there are fewer users on the network, then clear the cache and try again. If you have dialup, downloads will be much slower at all times and may take several minutes: be patient and do not click on the link multiple times while it is loading.

I have conducted some very interesting research into various aspects of weaving and textiles and fibers and all the attendant concepts that come along for the ride. I have become quite taken with the journal Textile: The Journal of Cloth and Culture. It offers strongly researched articles, from across the fiber spectrum, written with depth, making connections to many of the concerns of contemporary life. I have saved all the articles I have read and have gone back to reconsider more than once. As a student at Evergreen, I am able to access it easily as a digital archive. But it is rather obscure otherwise.

I just discovered that Textile is celebrating its 10th anniversary and are offering ten of their articles free to all to read, without need for subscription, so I can share that with you all.

The link to the articles: http://www.bergpublishers.com/Portals/0/journals/2012_10articles_TEXTILE_website.pdf

They selected one article from each year of publication and include the following topics:

Webs of Wrath: Terrible Textiles from the War of Troy, by Lois Martin
Wearing Propaganda: Textiles on the Home Front in Japan, Great Britain, and America during the Greater East Asian War, 1931-45, by Jacqueline M. Atkins
Collecting the Contemporary: “Love Will Decide What is Kept and Science Will
Decide How it is Kept”, by Sue Prichard
Hiding the (Fabric) Stash: Collecting, Hoarding, and Hiding Strategies of Contemporary US Quilters, by Marybeth C. Stalp
Needled Women: Representations of Male Conduct in Mapula Embroideries, by Brenda Schmahmann
Pecha Cucha: Lace, by Catherine Harper
The Interpretation of Surface: Boundaries, Systems and Their Transgression in Clothing and Domestic Textiles, c.1880-1939, by Victoria Kelly
Women, Cloth, Fluff and Dust in Elizabeth Gaskell’s North and South, by Elodie Neuville
Touching the Hem: The Thread between Garment and Blood in the Story of the Woman with the Haemorrhage, by Barbara Baert
White, the Color of Whispers: Concealing and Revealing Cloth, by Kathleen Connellan

I hope you all enjoy the articles as much as I have.
-Sarah

The list of the Instructors for the 2013 ANWG Conference is out and it is a great line up!

Here is the list directly from the website.

The following instructors will teach seminars and workshops at our 2013 conference. Click on the instructor’s name to jump to that instructor’s bio.

Instructors:

John Beard
Kay Faulkner
Laura Fry
Bonnie Inouye
Bobbie Irwin
Daryl Lancaster
John Marshall
Anita Luvera Mayer
Marilyn Moore
Rosalie Neilson
Terry Olson
Seiko A. Purdue
Marilyn Romatka
Pat Spark
Makiko Tada
Jannie Taylor
Madelyn van der Hoogt
Diane W. Villano
Laverne Waddington
Liz Walker
Heather Winslow
Rebecca Winter
Michele Wipplinger
Bhakti Ziek

I spent the morning at Fido’s Farms, not far from me…a place that trains herding dogs. Hansen School had organized a field trip to see the new lambs, watch herding and agility exhibitions and become herders themselves (of ducks). I demo’d spinning and weaving with a friend. For my efforts, besides lots of smiles, I received “as many fleeces as I want” – and came away with 2 coopworth fleeces. They have LOTS of white fleece, ewe and lamb hogget (first clip, usually considered the finest). It is long medium crimp, not exactly skirted to a spinners specification, but wonderful stuff as best I could quickly determine. Chris Sonderson runs the farm and always has fleece on offer to anyone that wants to use it. Such generosity needs to be taken seriously. I need more fiber like a hole in my head and I have 2? No control.

Google Fido’s Farms to see their website…

Lana