Welcome to Musings - The Loom Room Blog

I originally wrote this entry a year ago, and was thinking about this very subject this week when my son and I were having a philosophical discussion on “how do you know when you know yourself?”  In trying to put down in words what we were discussing, I got myself into knots, and deleted the whole thing, when I suddenly had the impulse to look at articles I’ve written but not yet published.  And there, right at the top, was this!  Serendipity at work!  Enjoy….

“Know Yourself”

This is a local secondary school’s motto near where I live, and it always gets me shaking my head.

I can’t say too much about this other than to say that the children really don’t get time to know themselves!  But what I wanted to think about today is how this short phrase applies to each of us individually.  Do we really know ourselves?

There are certain things I know about myself because of how I feel in certain situations.  For instance, I have an intense dislike of confrontation and will sometimes not stand up for myself or seek to turn a conversation to avoid confrontation although these days I would not go so far as to compromise myself or my principles.  But the flip side to this is that I have a very active (or overactive) sense of fair play.  If someone else is suffering an injustice, I leap in to defend them even at the risk of personal injury!  Now how does that equate??  In Homer SImpson’s immortal words – Doh!!

Why do I do that?  Is it a sensible thing to do?  No – usually not!  But somehow I can’t seem to help myself!  Choices.  No-one can say whether any choice is right or wrong.  We have laws and social codes but they are only guides, and they can change over a period of time as society itself changes.  We each live by our own personal codes, so we can only judge each other seen from our own standpoint.  Also our own perspective changes as we mature (age!) and we can choose (if we wish) how to react to any situation. When we are born we seem to be hard-wired with one disposition or another but as we get older we can sometimes develop into the opposite of that. 

So I’m back to where I started.  And how do we get to know ourselves? 

For me, it’s spending time on my own.  Lots of time.  Thinking.  Reading.  Weaving.  Thinking some more. 

Also it’s spending time with other people.  Lots of different people in different situations.  Watching. Listening.  Talking.  Listening some more. 

I’m not a social animal by nature.  However, give me a group of people with the same interests – weaving, philosophy, travel, readers, writers, music, theatre – and I’m as gregarious as anyone else.  It’s like heads and tails, chalk and cheese.  And I don’t think I’m alone in this.  I cultivate what I’d like to become – so I don’t watch violent movies.  I read to expand my mind and my soul.  I travel to learn more and experience more about the world.  I walk with my dog and examine closely the nature I see around me.  I weave because I love art, and weaving and experimenting fulfils my soul. 

I don’t know if what I do really helps me to know myself.  All I do know is that I like doing these things and I feel that I’m getting to know myself.  And perhaps that’s all any of us can aspire to. 

The words and music from The King & I, “Getting to Know You”, are running through my head now.  Perhaps it is more about getting to know others and finding through that that we get to know ourselves.  Hmmm.  I’d be interested in your thoughts…… 

Sorry to republish this, but I was asked by Dusan from Arahne to make it clear that Arahne did not charge for my phone calls, but that I was referring to my telecoms provider.  I am more than happy to clarify that, with my apologies if anyone read it that way.  I also forgot to put in the links for my weaving friends, so I’m pleased to have got the opportunity to update those. 

I missed last week’s blog as I was working away on a TC-1, a computer jacquard handloom.  What was even nicer was that I was visiting fellow Complex Weaver, Belinda Rose.  Belinda has a TC-1 set up at the moment for 60 epi and 14″ wide, with 4 modules deep.  She has a black/white warp so that was ideal for utilising double cloth structures.  I was exploring a number of images to create dimensional effects.  I don’t yet know the total outcome as I have still to repair the various ends that need mending and then to photograph the work before shoving it in the washing machine!! 

I’ve been using ArahPaint4 and ArahWeave, and after overcoming some teething problems with the Operating Software, and several expensive (but well worth it) phone calls to Dusan and Anton at Arahne, and a helpful email from fellow weaver and friend Sheila O’Hara, I was able to do what I wanted to do….  The weaving community is a wonderfully warm and helpful one! 

Since I’ve been back in my studio, I’ve mostly been tidying up and getting everything in order so as to de-clutter my mind before I fling myself back into the sample weaving on the AVL dobby loom.  I’ve been thinking how to translate some of my jacquard thinking into dobby weaving, and am looking forward to trying a few things out. 

I find December to be quite a strange month.  There’s the frenetic activity in schools and shops, compared with the quieter times in the studio with less teaching and fewer workshops and lectures.  I actually like this down time.  It’s a time for reflection, a time for planning, a time for re-evaluating priorities.  This economic downturn we’re all in has repercussions for most of us, and I am no exception.  It’s really easy to feel low when the money dries up and times are tough, but we have a choice in how we react to these circumstances.  Today I made my decision -  I’m going to relish the challenge of overcoming the difficulties.  So this winter, I am using my existing stash and not buying any more yarn.  I am selling off yarn I no longer require (such as a 6ply cotton rug warp!!) and some books that I have duplicated.  I am tidying up so that I know what I have, and I am using my book resources combined with my own weaving experience to develop my work.  Technology is wonderful, but I sometimes forget how resourceful we humans can be, and when pushed to it, it’s good to rediscover that side of us. 

One of the many sayings that sounds good to me is “Want what you have, not have what you want”.  Right now, that’s a good place to be!!

What does the name Prague conjure up in your mind?  I last visited Prague in 1996, with  60+ teenagers in tow, as part of a music centre tour of the Czech Republic when I was conductor of a wind band.  I remember the main historic sites, the Charles Bridge, and Prague Castle, which really disappointed my 7-year-old son at the time as it doesn’t look anything like a traditional castle as the Brits know it!  That trip is a bit of a blur to me, and it was wonderful to be able to revisit it for 3 days at the end of August this year and actually visit museums and take our time. 

It was surprising to me actually how much I remembered from that tour.  It’s an extremely busy city for tourists, with large numbers of visitors, but less than a mile out from the historic Old Town, on the other side of the Vlatava on very good tram and underground systems, the prices were almost half and the clientelle mostly Czech. 

The highlight for me was the visit to the Prague Museum.  We weren’t able to visit here in our last whistle-stop tour, so it was a new experience for me.  The whole museum was interesting, but for me the minerals are one of the highlights.  The lighting is none too good, but some of my images have turned out remarkably well.  Minerals, to me, are the world in microcosm.  The colours, the forms, the combination of textures and lines, geometries of stones and crystal growth are endlessly fascinating. 

My attention span in museums varies enormously.  Sometimes I get so absorbed that I can spend hours in one area, and other times I have to take a break to re-charge my batteries.  Being with my husband this time, I knew that I would have to move pretty fast (his attention span is way less than mine in museums) so I zoomed round.  If I had had more time, I would probably have spent more time with the minerals, but it was good also to get impressions of an area.  

One of the lovely surprises were the sudden modern exhibitions found in a corridor or in a corner of a room.  One featured photography by two makers, one of whom did traditional photographs, and the other, Ivan Wild, processes his images through Photoshop.  Some of the effects he achieved echoed the minerals.  Unfortunately, I can’t find anything about him online and there wasn’t any contact info with the exhibition (at least that I could find!)

On the third day we were there, the weather changed from cloudless hot sunny days to threatening storms.  The clouds were tremendous, and called to mind some more of the minerals I’d seen.  The more I travel, and the more I look around me, the more I am aware of how interconnected everything is, and if we think we are separate from everything, we are merely kidding ourselves. 

I am back rejuvenated, after a summer of travel, work, connecting with people and with nature.  What I must keep in mind is that everything I do, everything I see, whether I know it consciously or not, is connected to everything else.  I must be mindful of my impact on the world, as well as nature’s impact on me. 

Somehow a city seen from a few hundred yards up at night is more alive to me than one seen during the day.  During the day, the skyscrapers shout for attention, their static solidity commanding your gaze.  At night it is the movement of lights that gives the city its soul, the individual cars on their arterial paths, the twinkling pinpoints of street lights that shimmer, sparse in some areas, like clustered fairylights in others, garlanding areas of the city like a celebration.

Seen from above at night, human habitation looks like strands of neural viruses, creeping out, tendrils extending to unimaginable limits.  Of course, if it were a virus, a neural network of infection, we would seek to eradicate it as quickly as possible, using every means we knew how, including direct attack as well as more subtle and subversive methods such as changing its genetic makeup, turning it on itself.  Then, when we come to think about it, isn’t that what we do already?

We try to protect our own particular strain, but remove others that, to our minds, don’t develop in the same way.  Even our own strains seek to implode from within.  What’s more amazing perhaps is that, despite our best, or worst, intentions, the virus still seems to be thriving and growing, changing, adapting to new conditions. 

But maybe not forever.  Just like any parasite gone out of control, this one is destroying its own means of survival and it can only be a matter of time before its habitat is eaten from within and the virus is killed off by its own machinations. 

You can take this to mean whatever you wish – it applies equally to biology, man v nature, religion v religion, culture v culture, individual v individual. 

Nature contains innumerable examples of this process in action – in plants, animal behaviours, living bodies.  But are we inevitably ensnared within the repetitions of process?  Or do we have a choice to escape this behaviour?  Our bodies can’t escape, but our minds can.  But will we allow them to?  Can we see beyond the process to the possibilities that exist outside?    Can we kill off this parasite?  Do we really fundamentally, deep down, want to? 

Perhaps it’s only when we’re ‘versus’ each other that this happens.  When we’re ‘for’ each other, it doesn’t seem to have the same impact.  One of life’s lessons that as a species we keep failing to learn, now and throughout our history on this earth. 

I have no answers, only questions.  But maybe questions can help….  Let me know your thoughts? 

The first thing I need to do on this posting is to apologise to Jo Earl for giving her a new first name and mis-spelling her surname!!  My humble apologies, Jo. 

I’m still on US time at the moment, despite having arrived back in the UK on Saturday.  My flight was delayed by 6 hours which could have been a real hassle, but I spent some of the time thinking (!!) and some of the time sharing a bottle of red wine with a fellow passenger, so it went fairly quickly.

What I was thinking about was support systems and infrastructure.  In airports, you suddenly become aware of the huge infrastructure supporting this nest of ant planes, and the thousands of ant passengers.  The individual becomes important, but also loses individuality.  What I mean is that you can imagine that on this particular journey you suddenly realise that thousands of individuals are getting up early, out of their normal routine, and setting off on journeys.  They all converge on hubs of activity (the airport), their luggage is sorted, the logistics worked out, they depart in a myriad of directions for destinations all over the world, and along the way, some of those individuals touch strangers’ lives briefly before moving from their new hubs into other destinations.

It’s awe-inspiring really – all the support staff there in place who actually depend on all these individual travellers – the baggage handlers, ticketing staff, shop attendants, cleaners, pilots and air crew, cabin staff, kitchen services, and all the other ancillary staff, air traffic controllers, transfer bus drivers, tanker drivers and loaders.

And each person that you see or pass, or talk with, has their own history – their story of life, culture, geography.

The more I think about this, the more I am in awe.  The sheer logistics of moving disparate human beings around the world.  The sheer amount of individual life experiences walking around.  Wouldn’t it be amazing to glimpse each person’s experience?  What an insight into all sides of life!  To catch an understanding of another’s situation.

How best to put into words the sense of contradictions that travelling brings to my mind.  The insignificance of each individual and yet the total importance to each of those individuals.  Each separate strand seemingly random yet coming together, separating out into clumps that move for a while together, converge with more coming in from different directions, then separate out into other strands, some amalgamated, some individual, until finally each disperses.  Yet this is happening day after day in countless cities in all countries in our world – a continuum, never ending, always changing;  every day every place unique in its combinations yet seemingly the same.

I find this almost beyond words and yet I comprehend it perfectly, like so many things in our world and universe.  So trivial and yet so much an integral part of how the world works.  See it repeated in the beauty of an individual flower, and a field full of flowers; or an individual snowflake and a snow-covered tree or path; or an individual star in among the galaxies in our universe.

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I’m in the US to attend a conference on innovative textiles and digital technology in jacquard weaving. It was run by the Centre for Craft, Creativity & Design at Hendersonville, in south North Carolina and took place at the Blue Ridge Community College.

Inspired Design: Jacquard & Entrepreneurial Textiles featured speakers from the US, Canada, UK, Scandinavia and Australia and presented a wide range of fields across five design growth areas of Smart Textiles, Performance and Interactive Textiles, Textiles for Boutique Clothing, Interior Design Textiles and Corporate & Public Art Textile Commissions. The delegates were largely a mixture of educators, students and professional textile artists. It was an exhilarating and full-on conference with each speaker hard on the heels of the one before, interspersed with breakout sessions between each topic area, and a key-note speaker from different fields on each day. An exhibition including works from the speakers as well as other artists was held in conjunction with the conference, with its own comprehensive catalogue.

Conferences like this are essential, I think, as they pull us out of our daily routines and force us to connect intensively with other ideas, concepts and people in a flurry of activity and connections before depositing us once more in our normal environment but with a brain buzzing with juxtapositions, key phrases, ‘aha’ moments, and many new possibilities. It takes time to filter this intensive experience and to emerge with a path that may or may not incorporate some of the thoughts that arose from this communication with others.

Some of the key points to come across time and time again in this conference was communication, connection, collaboration and disruptive thinking (neat – cccd!) and that was also the essence of any meeting like this. New people to meet; faces to fit to names that you know, have corresponded with, have read articles by; conversations that lead you to wanting to work with someone and a whole host of new possibilities thrown into the arena by inspiring speakers. It’s like a smorgasbord for the brain!

Such over-stimulation leads to sleepless nights as your brain whirls and swirls, trying to make sense of what you’ve absorbed, but it also leads to new work, exciting research, and new partnerships.

To me, as important as the seminars are, the social interaction is as vital a part of the experience. The chance dinner partners, the discussions over coffee, the shared bus rides, even a random comment whilst washing hands in the rest room, can be pivotal in a change of course or the way you might think about something Serendipity plays a big part in these events and can lead to long-term friendship and collaborations.

So a huge debt of gratitude and thanks goes to everyone who comes forward to organise such events; in this case, Dian Magie, Katie Lee, Terri Gibson, Catharine Ellis, Bethanne Knudson, and all those wonderful assistants and drivers, all fellow artists, who made it happen, and to the speakers who gave us so much brain fodder!

The knock-on effect from events like these is incalculable! Wouldn’t it be fun to canvas delegates in 5 years time and see how this event changed lives – artistically or otherwise? Or even an exhibition of work stemming directly from attendance at this conference? I think the results would be fascinating!