What's looming?

Here's what I'm working on these days:

On my 4-shaft floor loom, there's a set of 8 tea towels.  I'm using my favorite yarn for that purpose, American Maid sustainably grown and naturally colored cotton yarn.  I'm weaving a pattern that I think of as a huge gingham check, using three different twill patterns and five colors:  two shades of green and two shades of brown.  The yarns are pretty pale until they're washed, so it may be hard to tell the colors apart on your screen.

I've been blessed with a great response to these since my farming friend, Phil Busman of Cherith Farms, has allowed me to put them out at his CSA this summer.  The folks there really "get" the appeal of cotton grown without pesticides and colored without dyes.  Gotta keep those folks happy with more towels!  This bumper crop of heirloom tomatoes is keeping all of us happy. 

And, drum roll please, I have finally warped my big vertical tapestry loom.  As you can see I had to use a step-stool for part of the threading process.  Many thanks to Tommye Scanlin for her indispensable guide, complete with great photos, for how to dress a high-warp loom.  (See earlier post about "It Takes a Village. . . ").

You may recall that my plan was that I'd scale up this tiny abstract tapestry I'd done years ago for my first try at weaving at a larger size on this new-to-me loom.  This design was loosely inspired by the general layout of illuminated manuscripts.

But after my exposure to pattern upon pattern in Istanbul, the arabesque has crept into my original design, and this is the collage I am using as my design.  No doubt it will evolve during the weaving process, but I am pretty excited about it.  It'll be a challenge to weave those graceful curves!

Meanwhile I've been busy with all the preparing-to-weave tasks:  sampling colors and types of yarn and scaling up the design into a cartoon (line drawing) that will go behind the warp and guide me as I weave.  For the first time for a tapestry, I have to calculate the amount of yarn I'll need, especially for the large expanse of white, to make sure I have enough before I begin.  It would not do to run out of that particular white yarn 3" from the top of the tapestry and then discover I can't find the same yarn to finish with!  So this morning I wove a small section with the white, measured it, and then unwove that section and measured the yarn.  Once I've got a full-size cartoon, I can calculate the number of square inches of the white background and figure out how many square inches of tapestry I can weave with the yarn I have on hand. 

But first I have to scale up the design, using the good ol' grid method.  My 8" x 12" collage will become a 24" x 36" cartoon.  At least the math works out with whole numbers!

Pattern, again

Two weeks ago I shared some of the jaw-dropping (to me, anyway) tile patterns I enjoyed at Topkapi Palace in Istanbul.  I was amazed at how the artisans had piled pattern upon pattern upon pattern and managed to create a lively, graceful, enchanting environment rather than an overwhelmingly busy one.  Our trip took us to various cities on the eastern Mediterranean and Adriatic seas, and everywhere I looked I saw fascinating patterns.

In the ruins of the ancient Roman city at Ephesus, Turkey, we saw intricate patterns in the mosaic floors of the Terrace Houses, where the richest citizens lived.

Some patterns were so bold and geometric, they reminded me of quilt block patterns.

As you can see, excavation in the Terrace Houses is ongoing.  Some mosaic floors combined both figurative imagery and pattern:

Venice was another city where the profusion of pattern was striking.  I was struck by the rhythmic repetition of columns and windows in the Doge's Palace in St. Mark's Square.  Large arches on the bottom level are surmounted by smaller, more ornate arches on the second level which are punctuated by quatrefoils, and then the facade of the upper level is decorated in a diamond pattern, with more arched windows.  This architectural cake is frosted with a lacy edging along the top. 

The architect of this building used a similar strategy:

It would be hard to beat this building, the Procuratie Vecchio, also on St. Mark's, for the sheer power of the repetition of columns and windows on its long facade:

My favorite example of pattern on pattern was on a much smaller scale, and it occurred at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection in Venice.  This is an impressive assemblage of art by every modern master you've ever heard of, and many that were new to me, housed in the villa on the Grand Canal in which the heiress herself lived.  The windows are covered with decorative grates:

 
This is cool enough--to see the Grand Canal through this patterned grille.  But displayed in one window is a collection of blue glass sculptures (by Egidio Costantini, inspired by some sketches by Picasso), creating another layer:

The glass work, the grate, the facade across the canal--layer upon layer of  blue-inflected pattern.  I felt I had come full circle since Istanbul.

I'm still processing how this surfeit of pattern will influence my work.

Where do you enjoy pattern in your life? 

Pattern upon pattern upon pattern

I had the good fortune recently to visit Istanbul and other ports on the Adriatic.  I am still processing everything I saw (literally--I took hundreds of photos), but I wanted to share with you some of what made a huge impression on me.  We visited Topkapi Palace in Istanbul, the dwelling place of the Ottoman sultans from the 15th to the 19th centuries.  I knew nothing about Topkapi before, and I was blown away by the rich profusion of pattern in the ceramic tiles that cover the walls and ceilings throughout the palace.  These doorways give a hint of what's to come.

Inside, here is some of what we saw:

Do you detect in the focus of these photos the textile artist's obsession with pattern?  I have found it fun to randomly select one of my photographs and count the number of patterns in it.  Once I counted 18 patterns in close proximity. 

My snapshots do not do justice to the richness of the colors and the fine workmanship of these 6" ceramic tiles, all carefully fitted together to create these huge arab-esque designs (now I know were that word comes from!).  The stylized forms and lines are rooted in nature but do not depict it realistically.  For me the rich profusion of line and shape and the juxtaposition of scales and colors have an energy that bursts the bounds of the strict symmetry of the patterns.  To my eye this riot of rhythmic repetition conveys a real delight in creating and even, I think, a delight in the Creation, an impulse to praise the richness and beauty of the world.  (No doubt, there was also the impulse to display the richness and power of the Sultan himself.)

It will be interesting to see if and how exposure to this way of making pattern and natural imagery may affect my own work.  I had thought my next tapestry would be rather minimal, simplified and quiet in composition; now I just want to layer pattern upon pattern.  I have ordered several books from the library to learn more about Iznik tiles (Iznik is the Turkish city where these tiles were made) and Islamic design in general.  Stay tuned. . . .