Wednesday: Tea, Preview Night and Dinner with Friends

On wednesday I taught Tea & Ephemera which is really a class about trying out lots of different techniques on one piece of colored fabric.

It's all very spontaneous, playing with various papers, printed paper imagery, drawing on tea bags, using printed abaca paper to emulate tea bags, stamping patterns and texture and using shiva paint sticks with freezer paper and stencils.

It's always fun to see everyone look at the work and see the different things other students did.

On preview night, the show opens to IQA members and then to the public. This is a great time to see the exhibits before the crowds roll in, catch up with friends and stop by the vendors.

 One of the exhibits I was anxious to see was the Artist Village as part of the Tactile Architecture exhibit. I was honored to see Kathy mentioned being inspired by me to start this project after I had made several houses a few years ago. Ironically, I entered my first structure, the Cicada house, in Tactile Architecture and it was rejected, so it's very nice to see a bigger and more elaborate project grow out of that initial art piece.

My house in this exhibit is one of the smaller ones in the center.

When I went by the Between the Spaces exhibit I ran into several friends

Kathy York, Andrea Brokenshire and Carol Soderlund

Jamie Fingal, Rachel Parris, Frances Alford, Me and Leslie Jenison

We have a similar photo of all of us sitting on the floor of the convention center from several years ago, it's nice to be consistent. At the time I didn't know why we were lifting our arms, but then I found out we were doing half of Rachels "too much information" signal she gives us at dinner sometimes. You see, Rachel is from the south and in her neck of the woods, I guess there are some things you don't discuss at the dinner table, lol.

After all the years I have gone to Houston for festival there aren't too many things I buy anymore, but these wood block stamps were one thing I had to get. They are from Coloricious. The owner Jamie Malden designs many of the stamps and has them carved in India. Use regular textile paint with them, just make sure you have a padded surface, like a foam mat, under the fabric when printing.

Me, Kathy and Frances

Jane LaFazio

One of the things I look forward to so much, is dinner at 8 each night of festival with my good friends. Indigo took all of these beautiful photos.

Jamie

One of the rituals at dinner is hanging spoons from our noses at some point during the evening.

Leslie, they both look so regal

Rachel is taking it quite seriously

Me, Kathy and Frances