Working with Insects

This spring, while everyone was stuck at home, everything was canceled, and most things were closed due to the pandemic, I found myself learning all sorts of new things. Trying out new mediums & hobbies gave me something to look forward to when there wasn’t much else going on. I learned to make gourmet popsicles, got into ice dying on my back porch, and my favorite new thing: insect art.

I had been needle felting insects for years and launched several handmade bug collections in the spring and summer, and I suppose all that research, finding images of beautiful bugs to inspire my felted ones, led me to work with real specimens for the first time.

There’s a lot more to insect art than I expected. First off, you’d think you can just walk around outside and find specimens easily enough, but that wasn’t the case for me. I did find many (already dead) specimens on hikes and walks, but they were rarely in good condition. I did get lucky a few times and was able to find and preserve a found beetle, bee, or butterfly, but I quickly realized I would need to find another source for insects if I wanted to create the large display piece I had in my head.

I was pleasantly surprised to find several reputable bug websites online and the colors, shapes and sizes of insects available was far more interesting than what I would be able to get by happenstance. The bugs can be ordered mounted or unmounted, and so I opted for the unmounted version and learned to do the rehydration and positioning of the specimen myself. It’s definitely an art! I broke off my fair share of legs and antenna on some of my earlier attempts, but I eventually got the hang of things.

This short video shows the process of working with real insect specimens. Although I read my fair share of how-to articles on preserving and mounting insects and there are so many different tips and tricks out there if you’re interested in working with bugs. BIcsBugs.com is a great resource for buying specimens and InsectArt on Etsy is as well.

Wool Landscapes Inspired by Movies

Movies & needle felting - they’ve always gone hand in hand for me. I watch a lot of movies (and TV series, documentaries, etc.) while I work on my needle felting projects. The couch is really the most comfortable place to work in this particular media because I’m doing the felting in my lap rather than a table top. Recently I took this movie & felting combo one step further - I let the movies inspire the needle felting!

Many of my favorite movies have distinct visual styles and memorable color stories. For example, The Darjeeling Limited, one of my all time favorite Wes Anderson films, has a bright but tattered feel that is distinctly vintage India. The Fall is a movie with one of the most saturated and whimsical color palettes I’ve ever seen, and even though the landscapes are actual places and the characters are actors, nothing from the dream / story scenes looks like it could possibly be real. In stark contrast, the movie The Road, based on the apocalyptic novel by Cormac McCarthy, is so washed out and faded, there’s barely any color at all. I love how color and composition can be so much more than the background.

In addition to the way color, costume, and set design each have a tremendous impact on films, sometimes the physical location is enough to inspire awe, all on it’s own. Legends of the Fall is one of my all time favorite stories, regardless of the setting. However, the stunning mountains & scenery, certainly help solidify this one’s spot on my favorite’s list for 20+ years and counting. The same is true of the rugged Alaska wilderness setting in Into the Wild. Even though the true story is ultimately heartbreaking, it’s also beautiful.

Using my favorite movies as inspiration for wool landscapes was a great option for the cold and dreary winter months. I’d much rather hunker down and stay indoors when the weather is chilly like this! Some of the other movies that inspired these recent landscapes are The Village and E.T. (fun fact: E.T. was one of the very first & only VHS tapes my family owned in the mid 80’s!). I’ve seen these movies so many times, I knew exactly what scene I wanted to represent in my own work well before re-watching them for the umteenth time.

So what are some of your favorite movies? I would love your recommendations. Who knows - maybe they’ll inspire some future felted landscapes!

2019 Favorites

Every year I like to keep track of all of my favorite media from the last 12 months - books, music, movies, whatever. Here’s the rundown on what I consumed & loved this year (in no particular order). Please share your top picks in the comments - I would love recommendations!

MOVIES:

Leave No Trace

A Simple Favor

Light of My Life

Still

Ballad of Buster Scuggs

Triple Frontier

Sugar Mountain

MUSIC (ALBUMS):

“Lover” by Noah Gundersen

“New Age Heroine” by Ours

“From the Fires” by Greta Van Fleet

“Neptune” by Tall Heights

“Distortland” by The Dandy Warhols

“Spirit of the Abyss” by Amarante

“Family of the Year” by “Family of the Year

TV SHOWS:
Chernobyl

Marvelous Mrs. Maisel

Shameless

Fed Up

Glow

Handmaid’s Tale

Schitt’s Creek

Making It

(And I’m currently re-watching Sons of Anarchy and Downton Abbey, so those definitely count!)

BOOKS:

“The World Made Straight” by Ron Rash

“Where the Crawdads Sing” by Delia Owens

“The Happiness Project” by Gretchen Rubin

“How to be a Good Creature” by Sy Montgomery

“Gone Viking” by Helen Russell

“City of Girls” by Elizabeth Gilbert

PODCASTS:

Forever35

Ologies

Dressed

Creature Feature

This Podcast Will Kill You

Top Picks for 2018

I go through a ton of content when I’m in the studio. I’m rarely just sitting there working in silence (although on occasion it can be nice). I have absolutely no idea how many hours of audible books, podcasts, movies, or music I’ve consumed over the last year, but I do know what I keep coming back to. Here’s a look at my top picks for 2018.

Albums:

White Noise by Noah Gundersen

A Black Mile to the Surface by Manchester Orchestra

Nothing But Thieves by Nothing But Thieves

Sparrow by Jump Little Children

Loma Vista by Family of the Year

Movies:

A Quiet Place

Captain Fantastic

Bohemian Rhapsody

Leave No Trace

Wish I Was Here

Books:

A Year of Living Danishly by Helen Russell

Look Alive Out There by Sloane Crosley

The Immortalists by Chloe Benjamin

My Heart & Other Black Holes by Jasmine Warga

Get Well Soon: A History of Plagues and the Heroes who Fought Them by Jennifer Wright

Podcasts:

How I Built This with Guy Raz

Etsy Success Podcast

From the Front Porch

Creature Feature

The End of the World with Josh Clark

TV:

The Nineties Miniseries

Handmaid’s Tale

Queer Eye

Downton Abbey

Dark Tourist

Open Studios 2018

Metropolitan Arts Council in Greenville does a very cool thing every year called Open Studios, and it’s exactly what it sounds like. Artists all over the city open their studios and invite the community inside to see where they work. Every year, I end up scheduling a craft show that conflicts with Open Studios, so I never get to do it. This year, however, I was excited to have well-timed free weekend so I could experience the self-paced tour with my husband!

Here’s some of my favorite stops:

Sunny Mullarkey

Kate Furman

Joseph Bradley

Janina Tukarski Ellis

Paul Flint

Diane Kilgore

Annie Koelle

Kent Ambler

It’s so inspiring to see artists at work in their space. I love the piles of crusty paint tubes, the unfinished panels stacked in corners, the works in progress on the easel, and of course the final product matted and ready to hang. Buying work straight from the artist is also very rewarding because you’re making a connection with the actual person who created the piece you love, which isn’t always possible at a gallery. This weekend we added six new pieces to our collection. Can’t wait to hang them!

I would love to participate in Open Studios one day as an artist. It would be so much fun to welcome people into my workspace and share my process in person. However, our home is just not set up for that - the different workspaces are spread out all over our house - but we’re hoping to move sometime soon and set up our ideal workshop, so perhaps in the future this dream will be realized. Till then, here’s a short video tour of my studio.