Words, pattern, and moving pictures

In 2020, I was inspired to combine some of my pattern, writing, and textile projects into blended works. I contacted filmmaker, Tal Day, to see if he would be interested in collaborating on a short spoken word project. He chose one of my recent poems and began putting together found clips, sound, and original guitar for Never Arriving.

At about the same time, I developed a panel-based pattern that was perfect for a textile bandana project I had been considering for some time.

Digitizing a pattern like this is always a dance between natural gestures and refined forms to find something that feels energetic and authentic. Illustrator’s autotrace tool is sometimes a help, but I always end up manually adjusting nearly every anchor point.

Adding the poem and my photos to the project was a slow and natural progression.

I contacted Tal to see if the panel graphic would work within the developing video, and the project began to take on exciting dimension. Click play below to experience how the words and pictures come together.

If you’d rather read the poem, I’ve included it at the bottom of this post.

Another words+pictures bandana has been completed—the second of a planned series of three. I’ll share a process story for that one on the blog soon.

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Never Arriving

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It’s a hard habit to break, being
always on my way somewhere,
everything in motion
or just paused, waiting
for the next train
or the snow to melt
or the hill to wear away.

I’m fine with my itinerant life,
and I recommend it.
It’s just that I would sometimes like
this impatient tide to
slow long enough to soak the riverbed,
let some cattails grow, catch light,
and feel the tiny dragonflies whirring in my hair.

PSF