A Little of This, A Little of That

A roofer came this morning to fix the damage done to Second Seating's roof during Hurricane Ike. Irma had a blue tarp over it, but it didn't do much for the leak. Today, they took care of it. I love the outside of this building and it will be such a surprise to see the installation. It is so going to work in that space.
Modelle and I are meeting tomorrow morning with a theater lighting person who'll advise on extra lighting we'll need for Second Seating. I know that with good lights playing on the tables and chandeliers, the whole place will become magic. This will be the first time I've worked with lights and I know that they will create the aura, the atmosphere. Will also meet with music and sound folks to create a tape that we can play, probably over and over, while Second Seating is open.
I went over to the Harrisburg studio mid-afternoon and stayed longer than I intended. Planned to be there just minutes in order to pick up one of the 'French' side chairs that I need to recover in some metallic faded, very messed up velvet from the cache of Hurricane Ike damaged fabrics.
I decided to set up the banquet table. The painted drop cloth and patchwork have been there on the floor for a week, so I gathered them up, pinned in a vertical and horizontal pleat on the drop cloth so it wouldn't be hanging all over the floor. Then put boxes on the table and covered the whole thing.
Added some of the stuff that will actually go on the table. I need to do something with the edges of the patchwork. In some places it looks unfinished. I may make some fabric knots or ruffles and tack on here and there.
Back at home, I decided to write and paint on the twenty pieces of beveled glass that make up a small chandelier. Gonzo247 is painting the base a bright sassy color. I wrote phrases and words on each piece of glass and drew floral sorts of things - all in metallic gold and pewter. They need to dry for 24 hours and then I'll bake and reassemble. I want to hang it in proximity to the big banquet chandelier that is covered with wrapped fabrics, ruffles and birds. I have got to finish that thing and get it off my dining room table. It needs a few more ruffles and two more light bulbs and then I'll take it over to Harrisburg and hang it up next to the Houston Dynamo soccer ball chandelier, the Clorox chandelier and the two smaller Valero chandeliers. The finished pieces are adding up, thank heaven.

Nine Women

Partnerships, collaborations and sharing are the things that make a project work. I don't think there is anyone who creates anything without lots of help and encouragement and the skills and talents of others. So it is with Second Seating. There are dozens of people who've gone out of their way to move this project forward. The list grows longer every single day.
I think of all the women who sewed on the very large 10 x 14 foot patchwork banquet tablecloth.
It's made from fabrics salvaged from Hurricane Ike flood waters. First, there was the lady who owned these fabrics and stored them in her garage where they flooded last fall during the hurricane. She hauled these sodden, mildewed fabrics out to the driveway and I walked past one day and asked about the mounds of velvets and brocades. "Take as much as you want," she said. "I can't look at them any more."

After washing and drying load after load, and ruining my dryer in the process, I arranged the fabrics on a big drop cloth in the Harrisburg studio, mixing and matching until it all looked like 'something'. Then we must have used a 1000 pins to hold it together.
Irina sewed with Catarina for several afternoons and then suggested that we move our work from drop cloth on the floor to a big table which made sense. we could sit in chairs.

Next, we scheduled sewing bees. Virginia came and so did Evelyn Pat joined us. Hedy took a turn in the early spring too. Each of these women arrived at a warehouse studio and together we pushed needles strung with embroidery floss through layers of velvet, brocade, silk and linen. It wasn't always easy going. We needed thimbles, so Evelyn brought a thimble or two with her. We ate strawberries and cookies too.

Catarina has given more hours to this sewing project than we can count. She spent almost every afternoon of her spring break sewing. She spent every afternoon last week working to complete this patchwork. Catarina was joined by Evelyn one afternoon, Irina another. Roanne was with us the last hour of the last afternoon. There were three of us sewing when the piece was finally finished. Roanne, Catarina and I put those final stitches in place. Perhaps a toast was in order?
Nine women stitched away until there we had one giant banquet table cloth. Thank you all for every single stitch.

Patchwork Done, 1000 More Things To Do

I sat down with my lap top this morning and resolved to update the Second Seating inventory of 'things to be done' for each dinner table and chandelier. Found that my original list made less than a month ago did not even include every table or chandelier. Opps! I now have five pages of notes that itemize each task that must be completed before a table or chandelier is ready for installation. I am sure there are things I've forgotten, even though my mind is very focused. Also wrote an email to all the artist participants, giving dates when things should be wrapping up, dates for photographing their work, invitation mailing times, on and on. At least, we will all be in the same loop. Note that these five pages do not include tasks to get the space ready, to catch up with media, to raise more funds, to keep up with correspondence. More lists to make and begin to check off and delegate.
Rewarded myself with a trip to Brothers Tacos for their Thursday special which is my absolute favorite rendition of green chicken enchiladas with Mexican creama and crumbled white cheese, mixed with their green salsa and refried beans and rice. It is a lunch special to savor and remember.
This afternoon I met Catarina over at the district board room where we've been sewing every afternoon this week. Yesterday she began at 11:30 a.m. and about 4:00 in the afternoon, she fell sound asleep right on the table where we sewed.

Every day someone comes to join us. Irina was there yesterday and Evelyn the day before that. We cover so much more ground with two or three sewers.

This afternoon Roanne came by and she put in some of the last stitches on this gigantic piece of patchwork. It is done. Unbelievable. And about time. I first pinned it all together on the floor of the Harrisburg studio on a large paint drop cloth in February. I think. I'd have to reread this blog to know just when. Then Catarina spent her spring break sewing on it. We had several sewing bees in early spring. Virginia came and Pat and Evelyn all came to sew. Irina came several times. I can tell where she sewed. The stitches are so evenly spaced. I remember the big piece of patchwork that Pat sewed. It's fun to see the different styles and ways of doing things.I'll tell you, I like managing the project more than some of the actual work. Those collages I'm assembling? I have always liked assembling them better than gluing the pieces down. I am not a great gluer and truly mess up many times and must cover one thing with another.
I don't mind sewing. And there is plenty of sewing in Second Seating. However, once I've thought something through, like the tablecloth, I'm ready to plan the next thing. It's more fun for me to imagine things, to gather ideas and to work things through in my head, to make the calls that move the project forward .
Actually, Irina and I had a really nice time last weekend sewing ruffles and scrunched silk fabrics on to the metal circles of that new chandelier that now needs drop crystals. We had a good visit that I wouldn't have missed. Perhaps Catarina can sew the crystals on while I write more commentary and text? So it goes, from day to day.

Lots Accomplished

Such a good day yesterday. Let me count the ways.

1. Found another underwriter for Second Seating who is passionate about recycling and cleaning up our bayous.
2. Approached an East End glass company and asked if they'd contribute a heavy glass table top for a sculptural table base that will mirror the steel arches on Post Oak Blvd. They said yes.
3. Drafted a follow-up email to the president of a Texas foundation and yes, she said, my proposal is on their May agenda. I am happy indeed. That ended fundraising for the day and I took myself to the studio.
4. Spent time there in the studio assembling fabrics that need to be cut into bias strips for a hoola-hooped shape chandelier that will also be encrusted with crystals and roses and a few birds. Parrots? Blue birds? I don't yet know. The frame is already made and and hangs from the frame that my garage door rolls up and down on. Hope it doesn't bend it with its weight.
5. Spent more quality time in the studio mixing and matching photos for a series of collages. Helps to work on many at once.
6.Bought some simple plates at Fiesta and some tubes of gilt paint at Texas Art Supply for making patterns on these plates which are intended for the table described above.

Today's not so bad either. Had the good or bad fortune to awake at 4:00 a.m. and so I reviewed the drafts of a generic press release, project overview and calendar listing that Kathy Easterly helped me with a couple of weeks ago and they are about ready to go into packets and on to www.mmhansen.com as soon as Cole and Daniel finish their part of getting a new page ready for uploading.
Laurie and I have scheduled another photo shoot for this Friday at my studio space on Harrisburg so we'll have several press prints for download and for the packets.
After Pilates I slipped into The Guild Shop and found a tray, a coffee pot, rooster salt and pepper shakers and a decorative plate - all for the banquet table. Enough already.
This afternoon I'll work on another application and get into the studio to take another look at yesterday's collages See if they're up to the mark.
The day is hot, almost 90 degrees, but breezy and flowers are blooming.

Spring Break Report Card: Progress & Synchronicity

Two very busy weeks with plenty of forward motion. I actually laid out some of my grant money on a deposit for two of Second Seating's chandeliers. That means that their basic structures are now being fabricated and electrified. Those filigreed Clorox bottles that the students made at Houston Community College Southeast just before spring break will have something from which to hang. The chandelier, when done, will be super-size, very white and very 'sparkling'.

The second chandelier-to-be is a series of three intertwined oval shaped hollow metal loops - the wiring will go through the loops and lights will shine upward through the loops, each of which I'll wrap in shiny bias cut strips of fabrics. Then, all of this loopy color will be ornamented with the crystal drops given me by a friend. The chandelier will be very textural and shiny at the same time. I'll probably funk it up with a few more additions. I haven't a clue yet what those additions will be.

Those pieces of metal pipe fittings (what to call them?) from Valero sure are versatile. I have a foot and a half tall piece of pipe with two faucet handles which I've decided works really well as a table candelabra. And the chandeliers and pipe fittings, while key, are the least of what's been happening. What is really exciting is the role that synchronicity is playing in Second Seating.

Last Monday, I visited a scrap metal plant I'd been eyeing for months and after chatting with a manager and measuring the dimensions of their compressed aluminum cans, I asked if I could 'borrow' one of those tons of soda and beer cans to use as a recycled table base. He was OK to my 'borrowing' one for the duration of the show.

Better yet, when I mentioned that I'd have to have Bobby Schlitzberger pick it up because his truck is outfitted with a crane for lifting the granite monuments he makes, the manager said, "That Bobby?" He just happened to go to high school in Texas City (long years ago) with our neighborhood's award winning monument maker (Note: Should a monument be needed after I die, I want Bobby Schlitzberger to make and engrave it.)

The very night after I visited the scrap metal business, there was more synchronicity. A friend and I went to Fiesta Loma Linda for supper and who walked in but Bobby and his wife. I told Bobby I'd just met one of his high school friends and then I told him about Second Seating and asked if he'd help me move a ton of compressed crushed cans. He said yes. What more could be asked? What this means is that I can borrow a compressed ton of crushed soda and beer cans and have it delivered to the installation site. And then returned. Unless Irma falls in love with the table, which she might.

So, it's a truly small interconnected world here in Houston's East End and wonderfully filled with synchronicity. Occurrences like these are terrific messages from the universe that we're on the right track here. Right track? Should I enlist Union Pacific's support?

This past week was spring break and so Catarina and I spent several afternoons stitching the pieces of a really giant patchwork table cloth together. With her art major instincts, she's going to be a terrific help this spring and summer. Already is.

Actually, she stitched and I spent the time placing fabrics together and then pinning them. Catarina and my friend Irina sewed, and then sewed some more. We've a long way to go and I suppose I could do much of this on a sewing machine. It may come to that. But I love the hand stitching with many colors of embroidery floss. Catarina also introduced me to an artist/teacher who can weld and I plan to meet with him to see if we can devise a couple more chandeliers with more of those pieces of Valero pipe fittings. and other things I've scavenged.

One thing that did not happen was Irma's and my planned trip to the valley last weekend. I need to find out if Jose and Ted got together with Jesse to talk about where each is headed with chandeliers and/or tables. Time to check in with them all.

What I did instead of the valley trip was piece together Ike-salvaged fabric for three wall hangings. As I've worked piecing fabrics together for the banquet table cloth over these last two weeks, I found myself holding back 'favorite' swatches to use for vesty garments for myself. I've actually pieced one together on a fleece lining. No sewing on it yet.

I've also thought a lot about fabric wall hangings. Actually, fabric wall hangings have been on my mind for years and I keep hearkening back to a piece by a Dutch artist that we bought in Curacao way early in my marriage. Finally, after so many years of thinking about fabric wall pieces, I've patched together three that will work in tandem with series of plates and platters.

This afternoon I visited Poe Elementary School where my kids went so long ago. Visited the librarian who's a friend of mine. She's collecting coffee mugs for Jesse's coffee mug mosaic table. I expect more will turn up at Poe as she's emailed a request. That's terrific.

After dutifully going to the dry cleaners and the bank, I slipped into The Guild Shop to forage. Always dangerous. I found some very interesting plates, a stove top coffee pot (the first I've run into in months of looking) and a hand plated tray/plate. Even though everything I bought today will go into Second Seating, I still look at The Guild Shop as an addictive sort of place, meaning that I'll spend money. Enough.
Text for the installation is beginning to run through my mind and I must put words on paper. Narratives, snippets of thought, desires, foods remembered. And then there are the East End parakeets that I am hearing more and more about, even reading about on my civic association Yahoo group. We may have to add parakeets to Second Seating as representative of things East End.
Finally, I mailed out two more packets to potential underwriters and am reviewing my entire list of potential donors and supporters to decide when to recall, to whom I'll send updates and whom to approach next. I'm not done fundraising. I've raised about half the funds needed for this project and must begin to round up the remainder, especially if I keep finding vintage plates at The Guild Shop. I'll not go there again until I've stitched all three wall hangings and wound yards and yards of bias strips of fabric around that chandelier base of three oval-shaped loops. And after I've added all the crystal drops. That chandelier is going to be gorgeous.

Table Cloth for Banquets In situ

Just came in from the studio after an hour or more of work assembling a layout of the Hurricane Ike fabrics for the fabled 'Banquets In Situ' table cloth. I say 'fabled' because it's been so much on my mind lately and when I go to the studio over on Harrisburg and see the potential size of the thing, I turn up the anxiety meter. Then I have to tell myself to 'trust in the universe' and just get busy with it.

A friend is coming to the Harrisburg studio mid-week and I'm making this visit a reason to have a section of this immense cloth stitched or at the very least pinned together, so that perhaps we can both envision how a finished crazy quilt of silks, brocades, chenilles and velvets look all torn and layered and encrusted with bias strips of ruffles and random pieces of silver plate flatwear.By the way, I keep siphoning off pieces of these Ike fabrics so I can make myself some floppy vests. I've already draped one and cut a lining on which to piece it together. I love it already. And I have to say, I'm liking some of these fabrics with my crochet work. So it's onward on two fronts with these salvaged fabrics that just got better after the storm and a stint in my washer and dryer.

I am remembering just how it is when I work on a collage or an sort of arrangement. I can stay with it for just over an hour and then I have to take a break. This morning, I've had an extended break, frying three breakfast sausages for a snack and then giving a call to my dad in Seattle who is celebrating his 92d birthday today. Will wonders ever cease? He says they tied a balloon on his walker and he'll have birthday cake at lunch. I said, "Dad, your birthday is a miracle." Last fall, he was on hospice and then as we were all holding our breaths and fearing the worst, he got stronger and stronger and called last night to ask me if I'd send him the tape of his tenor rendition of "Shine on Harvest Moon" which he sang in Aruba back in the 1950s.

OK, back to the mixing and matching of bits of fabric. We'll see how many square feet I can piece together today in one way or another.

New Studio Move In and A Lot of Old Stuff

It's not only warm today with brilliant blue skies, but with a friend, I moved a lot of the materials for 'Second Seating' into a wonderful new and BIG space where I can see everything all at once - and I'll know moment by moment just how 'Second Seating' is shaping up - or not shaping up.



I must remeasure the actual installation space at Irma's and then use masking tape on this studio floor to map out the area I'll need to fill with work.


Just by moving in some tables today, I can see that with dozens, make that hundreds, of folks looking at the installation, I'll need to have fewer 'Second Seating' table simply for traffic flow. That probably means more chandeliers and more montages on the walls and ceiling.

We moved eight small square tables from Irma's storage and put them all together to form the base for 'Banquet' which will become a massive table covered with all that fabulous fabric salvaged from Hurricane Ike and then piled high with vintage china, bowls, sugar cathedrals, flowers, candelabra, fruits, vegetables and lots of tshatshkes from the East End.

Also moved things from my home studio and more stuff that was originally stored in a POD after Queta and I cleaned out the garage last January. Has it been a full year? It has. A full year since we emptied that garage and packed so many 'things' away for this exhibition or for the girls or for giving away. I suspect all 'things' will eventually make their way into 'Second Seating.'

Such a lot of stuff. The hope is that I'll sell most of it during the exhibition. After all, this is all about vintage and recycled stuff from folk's trash, garage sales, resale shops, closets. Perhaps it will all turn into a personal purge of quite wonderful belongings.


It's hard for me not to dash into Value Village on Harrisburg - where yesterday I found an old hand painted souvenir tray with a view of Niagara Falls. Surely that tray will make its way onto the 'Banquet' table.

And I've decided to buy odd silver plate spoons and forks because I am beginning to think that they will make a wonderful mobile-like chandelier. Hope the other artists involved in this effort will think so too. Irma and I are off in two weeks to deliver crushed beer cans and white plastic Clorox bottles as inspiration and a first step toward a couple of magnificent lighting fixtures.

What Inspires?

Well, very simply, quite a lot inspires. Each day, every moment there seems to be a surfeit of receptors inside of me that gather colors and shapes and objects - images, images coming from all directions - and continuously juxtapose them side by side, layer after layer. It's quite a show.

Add ideas for 'Second Seating' that zing in from god knows where - I filled six notebook pages with them on my trip to Portland a day ago. And they are good ideas too, many of which I'll incorporate into the whole. Maybe I was inspired because I was upgraded to first class and was served an omelet, decent coffee, yogurt and fresh fruit on real plates and bowls? As the plane landed, I agreed with the man who sat beside me (and who looked like Kevin Bacon, maybe), that the trip was good and as he added, uneventful. But was it really NOT uneventful for me. Instead, I sat in that first class seat brimming with ideas and possibilities, covering pages and pages of my old fashioned school notebook.


Two afternoons ago, I was inspired when I looked out my dining room windows and saw my screen porch and studio awash in that golden low late afternoon autumn sunlight. What a glorious place to work, listen to urban sounds and to contemplate.

Actually, I had a wonderful week, each day moved the production of this new exhibition forward. I found a second large studio space in the East End where I can put all the tables and accoutrements for this show and be able to develop each in relationship to all the rest. What a gift. A huge thank you to the person who made this space available. Having it feels like a green light to go. Next week, I'll have another friend with a truck and trailer help me move all the stuff I've collected thus far into the space. I can hardly wait to have it all in one place - and out where I can see it all - because it will really help move the design process forward. And I'll probably have a horrible sinking spell because it may look as if it makes no sense and I'll just have to keep adding until it does make sense.

I continue to take 'food photos' that I'll project on those billowing scrims. Have no idea what order they'll all take. Mary says I should put a series on You Tube or flickr and I think we'll try to do that this Thanksgiving weekend. Here is some of the food that's made its way to a table where I've eaten.

We ate sushi in the neighborhood just after I arrived, kind of an afternoon lunch of yellow tail and albacore tuna, unagi or eel and Sunny Special #1 Salmon. I think my favorite was the eel. Am remembering the eel at the Stockholm Restaurant next to the Abbey Hotel in New York where we always stayed as we travelled to and from Aruba. The restaurant had a Swedish smorgasbord and there was hardly a fish on the table that I didn't try. I was a very adventurous child when it came to eating and look where it's taking me now.

This morning we three at a late breakfast at the The Little Red Bike Cafe. I am not remembering the name of the egg sandwiches that we enjoyed, but they were good. Loved the patterns on the lattes.


We decided to visit Portland's new Museum of Contemporary Craft which has a show titled "Manuf®actured: The Conspicuous Transformation of Everyday Objects" that is very similar to the exhibition at the new Museum of Arts and Design on Columbus Circle in New York. Artists are using everyday packaging and recycled materials in fascinating ways. After the museum visit, we went to The Meadow on Mississippi Street for black Turkish salt. How about those blocks of quarried pink salt in their window? The afternoon light just lit them up.


Later, we landed at Flutter, recommended by Caroline, where we pondered well edited vintage satiny clothes, toys, books, feathered glass bird ornaments and chandeliers. Flutter was fairly wonderful. The owner really has a nice touch and edits well.

Earlier, we'd stopped at a tea shop where I ordered powdered green tea and was served what looked like a soup bowl of wheat grass. I have the feeling it was so loaded with goodness that I'll be alert and awake until well after Thanksgiving dinner, a full day and a half from now.


And what, you ask, has all of this activity today to do with developing 'Second Seating'? Everything. Because everything I see these days seems to relate to this emerging series of dining tables. I see 'Second Seating' everywhere. The 'seeing' inspires and when combined with this ever flowing river of ideas, the making 'Second Seating' is propelled forward. Someday other folks will 'see' what's in my head and on my mind.
Take a look at these images again. Perhaps they'll appear in some form or fashion on a strange and wonderful dinner table or as a scrap in a collage or as part of a fantasy chandelier. I even bought a LED light bulb today at Sunland, a more-than-amazing store on Mississippi Street, that changes colors from moment to moment. How would a dozen of such lights behave when paired with a bevy of tin cans encrusted with marbles?

What a week. Inspiration is good.

Foray Into The Studio

Foolishly, or not, I've been writing about 'Second Seating' on Rockbridge Times instead of saving all progress reports and forays into the studio for posting right here. From this day forward, I'll simply includes links between the two blogs, beginning with a link to a post I wrote a couple of days ago that contained images of a collage or two now underway.
Feels really good to begin the work, though right now it's like splashing a foot in water at the beach. Have barely begun.