breathe love, breathe light.
I’ve lived in this house for thirty years now. I sit within it and study it, inside and out. I love transforming it, as I love transforming spaces for installations. To create a vision of beauty. Sometimes I hear the house telling me things … that wainscoting is needed where the wallboard is that someone put up in the kitchen. I take off the wallboard and the wainscoting is already there, has been all along, waiting to breathe in the sunlight.
That a door needs to be between the two small bedrooms, I take off the fake wood paneling and there is a doorway already there.
For years I debated taking down two walls to make the house more open, but then I would lose my guest room. I finally decided to just widen the doorway in between the kitchen and the living room. I had taken the door off the hinges years ago anyway. When the doorway trim came off, there was a wadded-up piece of material jammed under it. I was afraid I would break it if I tried to unfold it, as it was stiff like newspaper. It was covered in dust and dried blood. I soaked it in oxygen bleach three times over and hung it outside on the clothesline.
It dried as you see it in the photo, holding that beautiful form. I knew that Volga Germans built this house in 1908, and I contacted Steven Schreiber, who has a site dedicated to their history. The story continues here.
kboo.fm/media/50048-vanessa-renwick-and-oregon-department-kick-ass
What an intriguing thread of history. And a lovely but mysterious blouse.
I love hearing stories about how objects connect people and culture. Thanks for sharing Lloyd!
When my very old Afganian pillow cases became too threat worn to continue life as such..there followed a whole year of considering a way to salvage them..for they had ‘woven’ a way into my life 🐦 They were the perfect size for taking on the roll of curtains in Tug my camper truck..this blouse too could be engineered onto a piece of complementary material.
Maybe lace..then placed in a window where only moderate sunlight strikes🎈