Creating the Color Yellow

When Spring arrives, my thoughts turn more and more to the colors outside, rather than the deep memory colors from midwinter. The sun, the spring flowers, the new growth, all call me.   The need to reproduce the color is visceral. I primarily work with acid dyes, because they give me the rich deep color in […]

Light in the Dark Moon

new moon in starry sky

Light. I have been doing a lot of thinking about light and darkness, contemplation, placements, and the moon, particularly in the closing of this balsamic Pisces moon and tomorrows dark moon, with the upcoming new moon cycle. I love the dark moon time. I do not think of light and darkness as opposites.  Rather, I […]

Into the Dyepot!!!

shows removing itajime clamp from acid dye pot

One of my favorite moments when I am creating is the point at which I prepare to lower the piece into the water. The clamps are all tightened. Dripping wet, the green seeping down into the white, the color in the pot waiting to infuse the next section. I look it over carefully. The edge […]

Have you ever heard of an underground forest?

Underground Forest. Photo credit Rachel Sussman Oldest Living Things. 13,000 year old. Dwarf mobola(and others) Latin parinari capensis These woody plants hide underground!!! This plant structure in South Africa has adapted to its fire prone environment in an amazing way. Many species that live in the bushveld ecoregion here have grown thick bark that will […]

Risk Boosts Creativity

Blank canvas, piles of colored cloth, stacks of brightly colored thread, a beautiful piece of 22×30 200 pound Arches paper—even a delectable pile of fresh vegetables and pristine fruit waiting to be cut up and cooked into a meal for loved ones—all of these can be terrifying obstacles. You might think its wonderful to have […]

Right Brain Left Brain

right brain left brain

Sometimes events are so simple that they become complicated.  It is the second day of the New Year. After a respite from all computer work, during which I concentrated on stitching my newest art work to the exclusion of all other tasks, I now sit at the computer surrounded by countless scraps of paper. I […]

Mending

The tasks in my life at this moment are multiple, disparate and immediate.  “Now! Now!! Me first!!!”  they all clamor. Last night I stepped over piles of designs, bills to pay, piles of beautiful dyed cloth begging to be sewn into art, scraps of art work waiting to be sandwiched into art blankets, sheets to […]

Plan:Antiplan

plan, antiplan, people's heads

Plan/Antiplan/unplan/Time I find myself, in this preholiday stillness, with large piles of unrelated projects.  Bills to pay, digital files, website planning, new workshops planned for 2023, Christmas decorations, bread recipe, ingredients for a turmeric-based cleansing drink—some are in my mind, some scattered around the house and studio.  I think it is because basic human needs […]

Figuring stuff out is Weird

So you might wonder why there’s a shovel here. Imagine if you had all this snow and you didn’t have a shovel. What if there was no such thing as a shovel? Well, then you would have to invent the shovel. This is how I feel as I learn how to make these blog posts […]

First day of November

First day of November — may seem as though it’s a time of ending as we see the leaves falling and the grass turning brown — but actually for me, it’s going to be a time of new beginnings.

New Beginnings

Sometimes you just have to step back and start small. Inch by inch, color changes are laid out on a grid. Precision stitching allows meditative healing. 

Solstice

Every year, I celebrate the winter Solstice by lighting a fire just before sunset and keeping it going throughout the long winters night until just after sunrise. Difficult as this year has been I have so much hope this year. I have many of the same obstacles that kept me from the productivity I hoped […]

Creative Color

Orange color creativity inspiration

I have not written for quite a while.  At the beginning of 2021, I was publishing on Medium.  I still plan to keep that up.  But, I need to figure out where my time is best spent. Right  now, I am focused on working with color.  It’s so exciting that I want to share my […]

Artist Struggles- Ken LeBaron

  This journal entry from my father is such a personal story of an artist’s discouragement; it is from the artist journal of my late father.   This is poignant for me as it echoes the places I enter in my own work; that struggle for vision.

Jacquard Textiles – Early MornSquam

This Jacquard fabrics was created from photographs of Great Island at Squam Lake in New Hampshirite in the early morning. First I photographed, then painted and drew.  I scanned the drawings into the computer and then created six end satin weaves from this.  It is an end on end warp and at that time, at […]

Time Scheduling Being in the World on a Spring Day

The water droplets  on this iris bud appeared at 5:30 last night.  I am certain that this bud existed precisely as this photo captured it for less time than it takes me to write this sentence.  There are so many things in the world.  In order to find my path, I need to schedule time […]

Watermelon video

I love molten aluminum, ever since I watched the aluminum pours at RISD as a graduate student.  So when I came across this video, I knew it would be a completely unexpected thing.  To melt aluminum in the back yard, to make such a discovery- would be a very fine thing.

Turtle Shell Symbolism

I  found this turtle shell sitting right on the tip of the hill waiting for me on a summer walk. Upon researching,  found turtle shells can signify protection, renewal and the old and wise, slow and steady. Thank you, Turtle.

Oh!!!

It is very interesting.  I have found, over the years, that I often find the most difficult way to do something, and then I do that. I had many talks with my father concerning this very thing.  This photo is during the last walk we had together.  We were discussing the merits of crossing a […]

Some of my father’s work waiting to be catalogued

My father, Ken LeBaron, created sculpture, direct carving in wood. My brother James LeBaron and I took on the project of cataloguing his work, and between 2013 and 2015 we catalogued it all. These are just a few of his works.

Mars lost ocean of water to space

Mars lost ocean of water to space About 4 billion years ago, a primitive ocean on Mars held more water than Earth’s Arctic Ocean, say researchers, but Mars has lost 87 percent of it to space.

Lichen color Wet Bark

It is rainy and snow just about gone. The world is brown and grey. Yet the subtleties of color in this bark stand out.

The shovel Dialogue

This is my driveway I have been shoveling this week. I put a picture of my shovel. Here is the conversation I had with Emily: Me: “It took me 6 Hours to shovel the Driveway which is .10 mile.”Emily: “You need a better shovel.”Me: “Here is a picture of my shovel.”Emily: “You mean you really […]

Moss

Horsetail moss I am pretty sure! Always so happy to see green this time of year.

A daughters love

It is clear to me that at the beginning of February I was busy! This is the only photo I took on February 3. It is a bracelet my Daughter Emily gave me. It is a symbol of a Mothers love, and it says Mom on it. I took this picture to show her how […]

Maybe Spring..?.

It always amazes me to see these on the last day of January. These brave daffodil shoots always come out at the end of January. It will be another six weeks or so before we see blossoms. Today it is snowing and I will photograph them when I go by them.

Vertical Frozen Mud

Who knew mud could freeze in a vertical configuration. I think it had to do with the way the water trickled down the hill. I looked at my feet when it began crunching

Cold Sunrise January 2015

The snow was piling up in New England. Here in Stoney Creek we had echoes, flurries, and cold sunshine.

Student Experiments: Dominant and Subordinate

So today was the first day of 3d Design Class. These students have never made anything three dimensional; all their art experience is drawing and painting. I tasked them with bringing in things from home and/or using what they found in the classroom and experimenting with what it was like to make three dimensional drawings; […]

Winter Pond

It doesn’t snow very often here and the water does not freeze over. I felt lucky to capture this pond. Luckily the bull has been taken away for the winter.

Secret Keeper

There is an ancient legend that trees are secret keepers. I wonder how many secrets this one has.

Another Sunrise

I do not ever get tired of the sunrise. It gives me hope and strength.

For Dad Finished

I had to commemorate this day. I began this piece in Summer of 2012 just before my father passed away. It was to be for him. It has taken me three years to finish. It has been a block in my work and now that it is finished I am able to move on. I […]

miracles in the small things

Today on my walk there were so many tiny miracles everywhere. Every juxtaposition of color, of texture, of light is a beautiful tapestry that is ever changing.

Magenta Hills

The mountains really are this color sometimes. When we first moved to Tennessee I used to call it the impossible colors.

Incoming Snowstorm

It never ceases to amaze me how you can see the weather change over the distant mountains. The sun was shining so brightly in one part of the sky, but there was a snowstorm in the distance.

temp still life

We have all sorts of strange stuff hanging all around. The metal is cold and the wall is cold and the light is cold.

The endless Cycle

So it seems to me that life is an endless cycle. Even the name on the bucket, bright start. All resources are renewable including creative energy

I love the use of useless objects for new uses.

We have one of those sink things that only screws into the sink so you have to use the drain piece that goes with it. The little nut on that broke yesterday so rather than buying a whole new piece Danny fixed this by using an old key that didn’t open anything. I love the […]

The Snake

I am pretty sure this is a copperhead. I was getting ready to do some dyeing and all my stove parts were piled on the stones. He struck at me Yikes! I ran. Hard to get a good picture with a phone from a distance…I am not sure how to get rid of him, so […]

Colourcharts

Nature has its own ways of displaying colour, and it does so with abandon; colours in their natural state are wild, uninhibited, free. They shift and vary, they grow and recede—always dynamic, always unpredictable. Colours like to mix it up, and they don’t sit still. These tendencies are inspiring, but not always practical—at least not […]