Ichthyo

I finished paying for this book and brought it home yesterday. I don't know how to pronounce the title/technology, but it's a book of black and white photos of fish X-rays. Any photo in this book has the ability to shut out outside noise and transport me to the deep sea, though not all the fish are deep sea dwellers. It's a strange, magical book.

Meanwhile, I'm contemplating the aversion I've had towards weaving. This lifetime textile- (or more like fabric-) nut has felt no desire to weave in, like, forever, and I'm past disappointment with myself and have been slightly amused.

I've been obsessed with collages and drawing, and have been looking at painters' and sculptors' docos and books. My latest passion, in addition to fish X-rays, has been Ralph Hotere's figure drawings; I can't take my eyes off of them. When I close my eyes, I also see Rodin's Javanese dancers.

I've even been taking out my figure/life drawings and studying them, something I've never had the inclination to do before. I want to improve and I don't know how, so I stare and stare at them, hoping an idea will pop up. Then I look at other people's drawings and try to identify what I like about them. But everybody has different drawing habits/tendencies/skills/whims and I don't know where what I want to do converges with what I like in others' work.

Kind of like weaving.

I'm glad I found a hobby I can obsess about, particularly as drawing is less fattening than baking. I think this "I'm not weaving" phase is temporary. In fact, I have to get cracking today if I am to meet that commitment I talked about almost a week ago. And it may or may not be cyclical, but for me, this prolonged disinterest has definitely been a first.

I think I'm more attracted to drawing because once I get my material out, I can start drawing immediately. What I used to enjoy, the processes of weaving, has become a burden for now: the planning, the forecasting, the sampling. Goodness me, the drawing class is changing the way I prefer to work; it is having a profound effect on my personality!

Our drawing exhibition closed yesterday.

Funny how in my mind I weigh half as much, my hair and skin are perpetually impeccable, and my world is always color-coordinated. Reality; what a bother!

(Phew, that shadow is a reflection from the ceiling, not on the work.)