Random blog stories of her views, thoughts, ideas & vingettes of an artist who is an urban sketcher, creates fine art, plein air paintings, home decor, fabric & paper projects, gardens, authentic Italian, home style & healthy recipes, natural olive oil soaps & handcrafted items. Writings may relate to art history, visual arts, other artists, world culture & ancestry. Oh and BFF, Sandi, Soft Coated Wheaten Terrier & husband Ronald, retired Engineer.
Creativity abounds in producing new floor cloth designs using famous art themes.
Maria teaching a floorcloth workshop!
The textile concept of painting canvas floorcloths originated in France in the 1400’s. The cloths were small and only used on tabletops as decoration because they were considered too precious to place on the floor. In the 1700’s the American Colonists took the idea one step further and transformed old ship sails into floorcloths.They were durable; standing up to insects, heavy foot traffic, and muddy boots. They were easy to clean and blocked out cold drafts in winter and by staying cool to the feet in summer. They were used in every area of the home: in entryways, under dining tables, in kitchens, in bathrooms and bedrooms. They were also works of art.
The original floorcloths were designed to copy imported woven rugs as well as expensive marble and parquet floors. The Golden Age of the American Floorcloth covered the late 1700s to the mid 1860s when Sir Frederick Walton invented cheaper, mass-produced linoleum.
Todays homes are adaptive to traditional as well as artsy designer patterns. Durable non-toxic paints result in vibrant and none allergentic rugs or wall hangings. Keeping this artisan historic craft alive is a pleasure to my soul!!
So much fun to create my "Famous Artists Floorcloths."
The process is amazing and for me it is easier to produce at least 2 at a time.
Heavy canvas is sized, cut, machine hemmed, and painted with a special formula of gesso. Underlayers of acrylic laytex paint are applied after which a design is applied to the surface.
Finished with several coats of polyacrylic paint, these rugs are easily cleaned with a damp soapy sponge.
This item can also be used as a wall hanging from a decorative rod as rod pockets are part of the hem on the reverse side.
1 floor cloth almost done, with 3 coats of polyacrylic yet to appy.
Ikat, or Ikkat, is a dyeing technique used to pattern textiles that employs a resist dyeing process on the yarns prior to dyeing and weaving the fabric. In ikat the resist is formed by binding individual yarns or bundles of yarns with a tight wrapping applied in the desired pattern. The yarns are then dyed.
March is the month that is between Winter and Summer. Yes, spring starts in March, but not where I live in the Mid-Alantic.
The word 'March' comes from the Roman 'Martius'. This was originally the first month of the Roman calendar and was named after Mars, the god of war. March was the beginning of our calendar year. We changed to the 'New Style' or 'Gregorian calendar in 1752, and it is only since then when we the year began on 1st January.
I am about to share with you the month of March from an artist's point of view.
March 1: Augustus Saint-Gaudensborn 1848, Dublin, Ireland—died Aug. 3, 1907, Cornish, New Hampshire, U.S., generally acknowledged to be the foremost American sculptor of the late 19th century, noted for his evocative memorial statues and for the subtle modeling of his low reliefs.Saint-Gaudens also made many medallions, originally as a diversion from more serious tasks. These works show the influence of Renaissance medals as well as his early cameos. Among them are designs for U.S. coins.
March 6: Renaissance genius Michelangelo (1475- February 18, 1564) was born in Caprese, Italy. He was a painter, sculptor, architect, poet and visionary best known for his fresco on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel and his sculptures David and The Pieta. Michelangelo was considered the greatest living artist in his lifetime, and ever since then he has been held to be one of the greatest artists of all time. A number of his works in painting, sculpture, and architecture rank among the most famous in existence.
Sistine Chapel
Elizabeth Barrett Browning, English poet, (orn 1806 – 29 June 1861) was one of the most prominent poets of the Victorian era. Her poetry was widely popular in both England and the United States during her lifetime.[1] A collection of her last poems was published by her husband, Robert Browning, shortly after her death.
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. I love thee to the depth and breadth and height My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight For the ends of Being and ideal Grace. I love thee to the level of everyday's Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light. I love thee freely, as men strive for Right; I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise. I love thee with a passion put to use In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith. I love thee with a love I seemed to lose With my lost saints, --- I love thee with the breath, Smiles, tears, of all my life! --- and, if God choose,
March 14: Johann Strauss was born October 25, 1825, in Vienna, Austria. His father, Johann Strauss the Elder, was a self-taught musician who established a musical dynasty in Vienna, writing waltzes, galops, polkas, and quadrilles and publishing more than 250 works. Johann the Younger left his family in 1842 and surpassed his father's popularity and productivity, becoming known as the “Waltz King.”
March 21: Organist and composer Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) was born in Eissenach, Germany. His output included thousands of compositions, many used in churches. Among his best known works; The Brandenburg Concertos for orchestra, The Well-Tempered Clavier for keyboard, the St. John and St. Matthew passions, and the Mass in B Minor.
St. Matthews Passions, As sung by the Helsinki Boy's Choir
March 23: Roger Martin du Gard, French novelist and Nobel Prize-winner for literature, born 1881.
March 24: 1834 - Oct 3, 1896, William Morris was an English textile designer, artist, writer, and libertarian socialist associated with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood and English Arts and Crafts Movement. He founded a design firm in partnership with the artist Edward Burne-Jones, and the poet and artist Dante Gabriel Rossetti which profoundly influenced the decoration of churches and houses into the early 20th century.
March 26: American playwright Tennessee Williams (1911-1983) was born in Columbus, Mississippi. His works featured Southern settings and include; The Glass Menagerie, Night of the Iguana, and two Pulitzer Prize winning plays, A Streetcar Named Desire and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof .
March 30: Vincent Van Gogh(1853-1890) was born in Groot Zundert, Holland. He was a Postimpressionist painter, generally considered the greatest Dutch painter after Rembrandt. During his short (10-year) painting career he produced over 800 oil paintings and 700 drawings, but sold only one during his lifetime. In 1987, the sale of his painting Irises brought $53.9 million, the highest price ever paid for a work of art up to that time. During his life, Van Gogh suffered from despair and bouts of mental illness, at one point cutting off part of his own left ear. He committed suicide in 1890 by gunshot.
March 31: Franz Joseph Haydn (1732-1809) was born in Rohrau, Austria. Considered the father of the symphony and the string quartet, his works include 107 symphonies, 50 divertimenti, 84 string quartets, 58 piano sonatas, and 13 masses. Based in Vienna, Mozart was his friend and Beethoven was a pupil.
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March Poems:
"I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
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"March is the month of expectation,
The things we do not know,
The Persons of Prognostication
Are coming now.
We try to sham becoming firmness,
But pompous joy
Betrays us, as his first betrothal
Betrays a boy."
- Emily Dickinson, XLVIII
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"Oh, give us pleasure in the flowers in the flowers today;
And give us not to think so far away
As the uncertain harvest; keep us here
All simply in the springing of the year.
Oh, give us pleasure in the orchard white,
Like nothing else by day, like ghosts by night;
And make us happy in the happy bees,
The swarm dilating round the perfect trees."
- Robert Frost, A Prayer in Spring
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"The year's at the spring
And day's at the morn;
Morning's at seven;
The hillside's dew-pearled;
The lark's on the wing;
The snail's on the thorn;
God's in His heaven -
All's right with the world!" - Robert Browning
The "ides" of March is the fifteenth; which day of the month the ides is depends on a complicated system of calculation Caesar himself established when he instituted the Julian calendar. The importance of the ides of March for Caesar is that it is the day he will be assassinated by a group of conspirators. Shakespeare borrowed this scene, along with other details of Caesar's demise, from Plutarch's Life of Julius Caesar.
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Let us remember and salute what these great artists have given the world!
