cornell tel siesta

(unfortunately the reverse is just as true)

“Art is giving yourself permission to translate life. Exactly the way you feel. See. And hear it. Be the artist you are. Give yourself permission to speak your own language.”   - Nayyirah Waheed

Skip over this part if you're not interested in construction:  We met the builder at the site yesterday to talk about a few things, and with the sand all smoothed out and covered with plastic it was easy to see the actual sizes of the rooms.  TY has been very worried we are getting ourselves into something 'too small' at some points, and 'too big' at others.  Well finally he proclaimed it Mama Bear, 'just right'.  Whew.  Then I knew I had to do this-  haul him down to the tile store to review my picks for all the  floors and tiles.  The gal I spoke to Friday hadn't put away the samples yet so they were all ready for us.  The basic overall look is way too conservative, but I picked 'background' stuff, things I won't get tired of in time, things that can last, and colors (or more accurately, the LACK of colors) that will go with anything around them-  in other words, a lot of neutrals that don't make for excitement!  I've lived long enough to know that the bright green tiles will get really tacky looking when bright green is the 'out' color next year!

So, anyway, with me keeping budget in mind and common appeal as a guide, TY wanted stone in place of my more conservative choice of porcelain tiles so we reconfigured the bathroom picks.  I now have a dark WOVEN pattern that I really love as well as a stone floor in there.  I was afraid he would also go up on my small bathrooms choices, wanting stone in those too, but they are upstairs and I will never go up there so certainly don't want to break the budget up there when I have so many other places to spend the big bucks.  Sigh.  

When we got home the prices were in from the flooring company and the appliance company so I spent the rest of the day going down a notch or three in my kitchen appliances to get them in line.  Need the money to save for the oyster chandelier!  

I did manage to get to the studio, tidy up a bit, and do some internet work before some basic sewing on the ATCs.  I'm making a whole shitload of them, so I can take them to the SAQA Pod meeting as well as hand them out to whoever comes by.  But I'll tell you, I am spending WAY too much time on this when I could be working on my great American masterpiece.  Or watching tv...

Today I have an initial consultation with an interior designer so we'll see how that goes-  I need somebody to not have a dog in this fight and give me some nonobjective opinions as well as get me access to the good stuff luring just behind the blanked out windows and locked doors!  I am a little over sheepskins thrown over wobbly mid-century chairs, and cow skins on every floor.  Let alone the damn poufs everywhere.  I don't want a beach theme, certainly don't want a Florida/island theme-  well in fact don't want much of any theme!  We'll see how that goes...  I am thinking my 'style' is ethnic transitional boho with a textile thrust.  LOL

So today I DO have some textiles to show you, in the form of carpets and walls.  These are NOT when the new house will look like, I promise, but I love the exuberance of both artists:

From a young age Florian Pucher was always fascinated by landscapes underneath and how blissful and beautiful our world looks from above. “I have always loved to travel and tried to always get window seats on planes,” said the Beijing-based Austrian architect who even avoided travelling by night in order to see as many different landscapes as possible. Pucher is now turning his childhood obsession into LANDCARPET: a series of rugs modeled after birds-eye-view aerial photographs of land.

 New York-based German artist Markus Linnenbrink has created an enchanting installation which envelops visitors in a disorienting colorful pattern. Although not exactly in a ROYGBIV formation, this rainbow room, made of bold hues of acrylic paint covered in epoxy on resin, creates a unique experience for viewers. The piece above is named “WASSERSCHEIDE(DESIREALLPUTTOGETHER)” 

You gotta watch the first few minutes to see his investigating-squirrel dance!  Very cute.