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Have you ever heard the philosophical exercise of turtles all of the way down?
Two men are discussing the world. They propose that the world is a giant disc. After questioning what is under the disk the two men conclude that it is four elephants who hold up the world. What holds up the elephants? There must surely be something under the elephants! The men decide that a giant turtle must be holding up the elephants. What is under that turtle? Another turtle, of course.
Under the first turtle is always another turtle, and another, into oblivion. I don’t remember what the lesson is supposed to be. I take from it that sometimes the evidence underpinning your beliefs cannot be construed easily. Maybe you don’t have the skillset needed to understand why you were taught something, and you have to accept it in order to proceed with your tasks. Maybe turtles means that you’re required at some point to take a leap of faith, a willing suspension of disbelief, in order to accumulate enough experience and knowledge to later reassemble it into a coherent picture (how can you discover what is under the turtles if you are not sure that the earth is a disc?). That to understand a concept it is necessary to play devil’s advocate in order to truly comprehend something.
That’s how research feels sometimes. There are days where I casually look at a website or concept. An innocent query that then takes me on a ride. The persuit for an answer becomes a full blown hunt as my mind focuses on more and more aspects of that answer. I seek and follow link after link after link. The pages are read, assess for viable information, printed to PDF, organized in my folders, look for more interesting connections, look for useful resources, and more tabs are spawned in my browser. Then I emerge from a rabbit hole of information hours later, unintentionally disrupting my plans for the day.
I was supposed to be charting spiders using lace stitches today, le sigh. This may be a sign that the spiders are not ready to be charted yet.
Look at all those chickens. Look at them. This is a small fraction of what I was researching. Imagine that each website has 3-5 tabs that spawn from it by the time I finish reading it. Eliminating those tabs was difficult, and focusing on one particular topic is evenmore so. I went from reading about dyes to previewing a book about harvesting spidersilk.
What started this?
Liz Miller, the owner of a fibre store in St. John’s NB called Good Fibrations is having a fibre sale. It’s going on until January 31st, so check it out. Liz dyed a large amount of one of a kind top colourways and fibre mixtures. They have this way of being so… gorgeous. The colours are crisp and well definied. There is a clear line dividing the colours on each roving, as if it was a multicoloured skein twisted onto itself. Her finished product has luscious, smooth top, which is beautifully photographed in focus and even lighting.
I dislike when product lighting is obviously hot or cold. It means that there is more distortion to the true colour of the product than just my screen’s colour balance. On Liz’s photos you can see that she is striving for even lighting by the fact that one side is slightly blue (cold), and the other is slightly yellow (warm). Photos taken in the daylight are best, but if you cannot then make sure that your lighting has a daylight/full spectrum/even warm-cool set up!
I am a textile designer, fibre artist, etc. I love fibres, dying them, and creating colour compositions. Being an inquisitive dyer fascinated by Liz’s mastery of colour, I asked her about her crisp colours and how she achieves it.
Craftspeople, designers, and artisans are not required to tell you how they achieved success. Their proficiency with their skill is from years of hard work. It is their living and niche. Their proficiency is an investment of time, experience, and money that should be respected. If you are asking another person for advice, be respectful, specific with your questions, and thankful for the other person’s guidance. That’s how I do it, and it’s worked out well so far.
Liz gave me a hint, advising that I follow her research on a woman named Paula Burch. I found her website. Guess which link I clicked on first, and then promptly forgot that the others ones existed?
Paula Burch’s website is a grand resource of dying information. She seems to have a thurough knowledge of the chemical processes underpinning dying. Most novice dyers would have no interest in that information, or understand of how it applies to their work until they experiment. (Do you see how that applies to turtles?) Paula Burch is also kind enough to have previously answered a plethora of Q&As, has FAQs, and all sorts of references to other books which a dyer may find interesting. There are also several external links to other websites, which sends me down yet another rabbit hole.
I stumbled across a place called All Fibre Arts, and dug thorough their current and archived website for some information, and eventually found myself reading about silkworm husbandry. I stumbled across a museum that archives public domain art and lets you print it, so I found some images of women in kimono and saved them with the naming format “painting title - painter name - year made” for colour palette and negative space references. After that I followed up on some book recommendations from one of those first two websites. I don’t remember which led to what at that point.
Research like this could go on for ages. Hours could be spent diving into this rabbit hole and I could emerge from a rabbit warren of information without answers. Eventually I realized that to really understand my query “Why are these so gorgeous?!” I needed to study the wool top itself. The results will be the most informative part in helping my mind sort and reassemble everything that I just read and consumed. Hello there turtles.
This one web page from Good Fibrations is a top texture library. The images are evenly lit, and almost the entire subject is in focus. There are different blend proportions, types of wool (it’s not just merino wool!), types of silk, and colours. It’s delicious to stare at and would be scrumptious to hold. Guh. I have enough top! I don’t need anymore!
Liz is adding more of these to her website throughout the week.
Turtle turtle turtles.
All of the photos of wool top are snipped from Good Fibrations’ website.
Sources:
Good Fibrations website, social media page.
Paula Burch’s website.
All Fiber Arts website.
Boston Muesum and paintings.
Silkworm husbandry website.
Leslie Brunetta, Spider Silk: Evolution and 400 Million Years of Spinning, Waiting, Snagging, and Mating book.
Sara Lamb, The Practical Spinner's Guide - Silk book.