Woodcut Ancestors Continued

Last night I sent an e-mail to the office at Belmar, requesting clarification as to when they would be open, both to finally pay my entry fee, and also to get more information regarding the presentation of the artifact part of the show.  Finally received a response this morning from Diane, our new director, saying she'd be there until around 2 pm.

That freed up my morning for other purposes, including picking up my artifact from my parents' house.  I knew it would be one of the very old embroidered pieces of cloth that my grandmother had, and had now passed into my mother's possession.  When I filled out the application form, I just gave a vague description of hand embroidered cloth from an ancestor, not sure which one I'd be using.  My mother pushed me to go with the most elaborate one, lots of stitching, lots of fringe, and two big initials on it, those of the piece's creator.  Seems like the best choice.

Early this afternoon I made it to Belmar and found Diane there.  Paid my fee, got a receipt, so that's now all taken care of.  When I asked about rules and methods of presenting the artifacts, she told me to just bring it in on the day we deliver our artwork, and it would be up to show co-curator Louise to decide.  Said she has lots of ideas and plans, so I'll see what she comes up this weekend.  Diane also gave me a form that will eventually go to all the artists, with a space to fill out a description of the object and its relation ship to us and artwork.  There are stories to go with all this, so now they will be known to all who visit the show.

With all that taken care of, we had time to talk about my upcoming class.  First thing I wanted to thank her for the big press release/article, which I credit for at least some of the good response my class got.  Earlier I had no students, and after the article I had a full class.  I got the impression that the size of the article and the illustration was not her idea, so I guess it was the paper's doing (slow news week maybe.)  I looked over the list of signed up students, and none seemed to be names I knew, so I guess no previous students.  One story she shared was that it started filling so quickly, that when one person signed up she said she'd have to check to see if the limit had been reached yet; this new person got the last spot and was very excited, almost like she won some kind of prize.  No, just the prize of getting to make woodcuts, which anyone can do.  Diane has no problem with my 6 person cap, and even seemed surprised I could handle that many.  With a bigger room I could have more people working, but it's a little dangerous if the room is crowded with people and very sharp tools, and when everyone wants to print at once, there is your big challenge.  I have a few weeks left to get ready for it.