Winter Twill

​It first occurred to me to combine weaving with watercolor while doing this winter landscape.  I have come to see this piece as the first in a new season of my creative life.   Winter.  Not the last season, but a quiet, regenerative time born out of earlier work and pleasures. I remember my mom said February was always her favorite month.  After the holidays and before summer's bustle of gardening and summer vacation, winter provides that stretch of quiet productive days at home. As a New Year's resolution, I decided to set aside Monday's for art. It proved to be very helpful - a promise I made to myself and a way to keep at least that day's schedule open.
 
Ironically, this image came to me while soaking in the hot tub... a simple winter landscape with the texture of a snow-covered cornfield.  I sliced the vertical (warp) lines tapering toward the horizon.  Then I carefully wove narrow strips of watercolor paper in a twill pattern across the page.  By painting both sides of the strips, I could show the "stubble" of corn stalks sticking up out of the snow.  
 
It was the beginning of imagining how I could work the textures and patterns I see all around me into my painting.