Director's Note 3/1/17
This will be a slightly telegraphic e-news, an emanation from the world of grant deadlines and plenty of time staring at a computer screen rather than the world outside. Still, it was enlivening to see the house filled with knitters of all ages (more than 100!) on Sunday, busily turning yarn into cowls for the trees. Our special thanks to Piper Melkonian and her staff at the Knitting Knook who, not content to make the event a big success, have signed on for more knitting in order to finish a few more branches. Pictures to follow!
Who doesn’t need a cowl or scarf or other mutable garment in these days of the weather roller coaster? The geese are back, enjoying the open water, and green shoots are visible in the dry lawn. None of which means you won’t come into the office in the morning to find that the internet has been knocked out by a raging wind, or be woken at night by thundering hail.
Though the knitathon was the official culmination of Fiber Fest, we have one last event: our friends at Jewish Museum Milwaukee are offering us a special tour of Fabric of Survival: The Art of Esther Nisenthal Krinitz, on March 2. We will remain for a panel discussion that focuses on the way fabric artists and everyday crafters have innovated to create expressions of resilience when confronted with traumatic experiences.
We’re jumping into the first weekend of March with two feet: we open Cecelia Condit’s exhibition, Tales of a Future Past on Saturday afternoon with a reception (free and open to the public), and we welcome Christina Baker Kline, author of Orphan Train, to the Women’s Speaker Series on Sunday for an uncharacteristic afternoon event. Kline will be discussing A Piece of the World, her brand new novel about the woman depicted in Andrew Wyeth’s painting, Christina’s World.
As we ease out of fibers we head into a bookmaking series that begins with Max Yela’s workshop, Simple Stitching for Handmade Books and Zines (March 18). The series continues with Carolyn Suneja (Sewing on Tapes and Simple Case Binding, April 8), and Eddee Daniel (Using Online Self-Publishing Platforms, April 29) and a zine-making workshop with Colin Matthes on April 22. Though it feels unlucky to mention fire in the same paragraph with books, Lynden’s own Jeremy Stepien will take you through the process of making a candle from a mold on March 25.
For those who enjoyed our all-ages knitting, we have a full moon walk with naturalist Naomi Cobb on the 11th (you may want to don a cowl), and a drop-in family workshop—learn how to make gallery magnets—on the 12th.
Finally, we conclude the month with the first of two screenings we are co-presenting of Julie Dash’s seminal 1991 film, Daughters of the Dust--the first film directed by an African American woman to be widely distributed in the US--on March 31 and April 1 at the UWM Union Cinema. We see this screening as a bridge between two Lynden projects that investigate and celebrate the Black imagination: Fo Wilson’s Eliza’s Peculiar Cabinet of Curiosities and a residency with filmmaker Portia Cobb that commences this summer.
I won’t even mention ice skating.
