I'm a little late to catch on, but I worked on some poem bundle tags for the Disintegration Manifestation project instigated and monitored by the wonderful Seth Apter of the Altered Page. I made 5 hanging flag/tags to hang in the tree outside my studio window and one to wrap around the trunk. I love the idea of words on the wind in the Tibetan tradition, so I included a favorite poem by William Stafford. I used sumi ink (which will run in the snow and rain) with a variety of writing instruments, just playing with the shapes and rhythm of the letters. On May 1st all the artists participating in the project will post the results of the dis-integration.
I had never sewn paper before, so I took a stab at it by zipping up some collages using some copied images from my journal and cut up strips of a drawing and painting project I did last summer in Taos.
Out they went this morning to hang in the little Hawthorne tree. I tried to tie them close to the branches - it has been so dry and windy here and it's suppose to kick up to 50 miles an hour here today.
Hopefully, they'll delight the birds and I for a little while and not just blow away. I look forward to their slow dis-integration - pieces pulling apart from the whole with wind and snow or rain (I hope) and sunshine.
Here are the words on the wind I have sent out to be blown across this high Colorado prairie.
You and Art
Your exact errors make a music
that nobody hears.
Your straying feet find the great dance,
walking alone.
And you live on a world where stumbling
always leads home.
Year after year fits over your face-
when there was youth, your talent
was youth:
later, you find your way by touch
where moss redeems the stone;
And you discover where music begins
Before it makes any sound,
far in the mountains where canyons go
still as the always-falling, ever-new flakes of snow.
William Stafford
Fran, these are just beautiful, I LOVE that the ink will run into the snow (hoping hoping!) The images of them in the Hawthorne....ahhhh
x..x
steph
Posted by: stephanie | March 05, 2009 at 06:07 PM
Such special bundles. I love all that went into them and how they are blowing in the wind off that tree. So glad you decided to participate. Cannot wait for May 1!!
Posted by: Seth | March 05, 2009 at 08:53 PM
well, frannie.....just pop on out there with the salute to tibetan prayer flags blowin' in the wind...they'll be singing to you for the next two months.
Posted by: nevacoloma | March 06, 2009 at 03:31 PM
Rain this weekend!! Yahoo.
Posted by: sarah | March 06, 2009 at 04:52 PM
beautiful Frannie - beautiful...
xox - eb.
Posted by: eb | March 06, 2009 at 07:21 PM
Okay. Don't you people know that it's so dry here that you'll need to keep things hanging and "disintegrating" til 2015?......
I wanna see someone step up to the plate and dangle something into the gutter storm drain. How about laying them in the driveway so that people drive over them every day, twice a day?....now that's what I call disintegration dang it!......
that said, leave that stuff in the tree. It looks gorgeous and I hope that it doesn't disintegrate. There. I said it.
It looks beautiful, I have to agree.....
Posted by: Lisa Hoffman | March 10, 2009 at 03:48 PM
Your bundles remind me of prayer flags... I love them!
Posted by: rachel whetzel | April 22, 2009 at 12:50 PM