MMMM @ BAM until September 15th!

 

 

The largest installation of the Mater Matrix Mother and Medium project is currently up at The Bellevue Arts Museum in Bellevue, Washington, until September 15th.    Beginning at the colonnade of lampposts and trees in front of the museum, it continues west for another two city blocks, with some of the largest panels swirling around an old oak tree past 106th Ave.

For myself and creative partner Paul Margolis, installing the installation this time was one of the most enjoyable and interactive times we’ve done it.  The streets we were working on for about 100 hours, crocheting up on ladders, are major walking thoroughfares, and -once we began to count- we would get about 5 to 10 complements on the installation an hour.  It is a a very strenuous process, so this kept our morale high.

Immediately following the installation, I had to throw myself into completing another installation headed to Italy, so I don’t feel like I’ve had a chance to fully process what great feedback we got, all of the support from the museum and museum visitors, as well as people who have followed and contributed to the MMMM project since its beginning in 2009.  I am so grateful for the embracing experience!  For the time being, here are many images from the installation and the part of it that functioned as the opening to the BAM ARTSfair.

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MMMM on the move….first to Kent, Wa., then…..

boxed up, under 200 lbs.

I’ve really always wanted this for this project, and it’s beginning to happen.  MMMM is hooked up with 4Culture’s SITE SPECIFIC program, and is starting to travel.  Since the issues and questions behind this work aren’t really just bound to Seattle, it only makes sense for me to try to bind as many people together as possible, from art curators, administrators and artists  to a seniors knitting club from Georgia, to preschoolers to art bloggers .

at Agnes Scott College, Atlanta

Issues such as  what makes community happen, what has happened to the “sacredness” of water that ALL of our human ancestors felt, what happens when you sit and talk with people you don’t know, what happens when you try to do something you’ve never done before and what happens when you just go with the process rather than product….I’d like to see what happens when I put these questions to as many different people as choose to jump into this.

I also want to see what happens when the piece ages.  One of my main conceptual influences was, afterall, the Clootie Well, where the very magic was in the rotting of the cloth, the knot unbinding.   What will it look like when some parts of the river are a few years old while others are new?  The piece came back from Atlanta with a slight but beautiful sun-bleached feel (please someone help me find a way to put this up in the desert!).   It also had the invigorating smell of laundry dried on the line when it returned from Atlanta, while the Seattle woods left it with the musky smell of moss and fire.  What will it smell like after Issaquah, Wa. and NYC (it’s going to both places!)

But first it’s going to interact with another artwork bound to the earth, Herbert Bayer’s Earthworks in Mill Creek Canyon in Kent, Wa., and part of Kent Arts Commission’s Earth Day celebration.  I’ll be installing it in the park from April 17th until Earth Day.  But before that, on Sat. April 10th, the Kent Senior Center, across the street from Earthworks Park, will be hosting me for a community crochet event.

So, please Kentians, come add your knots and loops to this growing piece!!

–Workshop Date: April 10, 2010

–Workshop Location:

Senior Activity Center , ROOM 6

600 East Smith Street, Kent, WA 98031

253-856-5150

-Time:      12 noon – 4pm

As always, all skill levels welcome, all genders, all ages, all backgrounds!  If you take a few deep breaths with me, anyone can crochet.  And thank you Renaissance Yarns, in Kent,  for posting about the event!!