2,000 Likes Giveaway!

Posted on August 14, 2013 by Salley Mavor

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As of today, 2,000 people have “Liked” my Facebook page! I’m flabbergasted by the how rapidly my audience has grown, since it took me so long to welcome Facebook into my life (8 months ago). It’s different from my blog, in that I post pictures just about every day and share images that I find inspirational. Thank you to all of you who follow my work, either on Facebook and/or this blog. To celebrate, I’m giving away 3 signed paperback copies of my 1995 picture book, Mary Had a Little Lamb. You can see all of my books listed here. Since more than half of you are from outside of the United States, the contest is open to everyone, worldwide. To enter, please leave a comment naming or describing your favorite stitch. The winners will be picked at random on Wednesday, August 21st, 2013.

Mary Had a Little Lamb 1995

Oak Bluffs cottages and The Moth

Posted on August 7, 2013 by Salley Mavor

Last Saturday, a friend and I took a boat over to Oak Bluffs. We had tickets to go to The Moth on Martha’s Vineyard, which I describe at the end of this post. Before the evening show, we walked around the Martha’s Vineyard Camp Meeting neighborhood and I took some photos of the perfectly charming little cottages. See a post about last year’s visit here. The purpose of our visit to Oak Bluffs was to attend an evening of storytelling presented by The Moth radio program. If your local NPR station airs The Moth, you know how inspiring and moving the stories can be. Last summer, Martha’s Vineyard writer, Cynthia Riggs told a most compelling story that has by now been heard all over the world. It is worth hearing her tale, so click the link on her name. She returned this year and gave an update of her adventure to a cheering crowd of 1700. Here’s the inside of the Tabernacle while we were waiting for the storytelling performances to begin. It was quite an evening!

my garden

Posted on August 2, 2013 by Salley Mavor

Yesterday, I picked the last of the blueberries and the first golden cherry tomatoes from our garden. We have a wire mesh cage to keep the birds away from the blueberry bushes. Still, chipmunks manage to get find a way in and fill their cheeks to capacity. Unlike the birds, they leave plenty of berries for us!

The lilies are just about gone, but the trumpet vine is flowering.

My husband Rob took the closeup photos of wildlife and flowers found in our garden this spring and summer. You can see more of his great pictures on Flickr here.

Close-ups (emotion)

Posted on July 23, 2013 by Salley Mavor

One of the fun and challenging parts about illustrating for children is showing emotion and action, especially in fiber art, which tends to be static. To counter-act the stiff blandness, I like to bring forth emotion by exaggerating the poses and facial expressions of my characters. But there’s a fine line between evoking believable feeling and creating a grotesque appearance, much like the difference between acting well and over acting. I’ve seen some doll faces that are downright scary and bizarre. My goal is to portray emotion with a subtle firmness, without being too disturbing.

Nursery Rhymes are full of emotional and physical activity, so I had lots of opportunities to experiment with poses and facial expressions in my book, Pocketful of Posies: A Treasury of Nursery Rhymes. Here are a selection of close-ups from the book.

Do you want to see the original embroidered illustrations from the book? There are still several locations scheduled for the Pocketful of Posies Traveling Exhibit, which has been touring the country since 2010.

Fairy House Raffle

Posted on July 19, 2013 by Salley Mavor

I want to let everyone know about the opportunity to win this fairy house. In conjunction with the Fairy Houses of Beebe Woods Exhibit (which ends on July 21, 2013), Highfield Hall is holding a raffle for my driftwood and felt covered wire hanging doorway. It’s intended for indoor display because the glue isn’t water proof.

We were lucky enough to snap a picture of this blue fairy as she was peaking out of the door.

Other Fairy House News
(added May 30, 2015)
The Fairy Houses of Highfield Hall outdoor exhibit will be held from June 28th to August 31, 2015 at Highfield Hall in Falmouth, MA. In addition to curating the exhibit, Salley Mavor has made a fairy family of 5, which is being raffled (3 tickets for $5.00). Tickets may be purchased online or at Highfield Hall, where the fairy family is on display. The raffle drawing will be August 30, 2015. The prize will be sent to the winner anywhere in the world! Good luck!rway, but she flew away, so she won’t be coming along with the house.

Jurors go for the Birds

Posted on July 16, 2013 by Salley Mavor

Poster – Birds of Beebe Woods

I am pleased to announce that Birds of Beebe Woods has received the Juror’s Choice Award in the New Legacies: Contemporary Art Quilt Exhibition! The show will be on display until August 31st at the Lincoln Center Art Gallery, Fort Collins, CO.

Posters (pictured above) are available from my Etsy Shop.

In the past year, the original “Birds” has been displayed in Falmouth, MA, Plymouth, MA and Paducah, KY. I’d like to have the piece shown in public in other locations around the country, so that more people can experience the embroidered details up close. I’ll continue to enter it into juried shows before it ages out, since most exhibits have a date of completion requirement. There’s always the question of which shows to enter. My work doesn’t easily fit into a category, so I usually broaden my search to include shows looking for fiber art, illustration, fine crafts, needlework, mixed media, collage and art quilts. I’ve found that a lot of quilt shows have narrow eligibility requirements, so I pass over most of them. I consider the venue, location, prestige and length of the exhibit to determine if it’s worth the expense of shipping a heavy crate. Then, I look at the jurors’ artwork and gauge if they might be receptive to my combination of techniques and style. So much of the selection process comes down to personal taste. To some, the narrative nature of my work comes across as sweet and precious and it doesn’t fit with the other more intellectual artistic explorations. My work is so outside of the abstract and edgy trends found in today’s art and fine craft world. I admit to being oblivious to what’s going on out there and find the art scene perplexing. Instead of trying to fit in, I will continue to do as I’ve always done; let my art lead the way. And as long as I keep making new pieces, I’ll find a way to have them seen in public!

that brocade peplum bodice

Posted on July 14, 2013 by Salley Mavor

A few weeks ago, I posted this picture of my hand painted with henna on this blog and my Facebook page. The photo was taken at the opening of The Fairy Houses of Beebe Woods exhibit. Questions were asked about the garment I’m wearing, so here are more pictures of “that brocade peplum bodice”. I made it in the mid 2000’s to wear at the Fairie Festival in Pennsylvania. Rob and I would tow a trailer loaded with a canvas tent, all kinds of odd pieces of wood, display racks, tables, cloths and garlands. The crowd at this event was a perfect match for my fairy kits and cards, as well as my books and we really enjoyed being a part of the festival scene.

It was quite a job setting up the tent and arched doorway. We went for a few years and then I stopped making the kits in order to have time to work on my book, Pocketful of Posies.

The bodice is made from a heavy brocade fabric and the lining is striped seersucker. For embellishment, I embroidered a wavy chain stitch and added red soutache braid by hand to the black piping. I hand stitched the artificial leaves around the neck and machine sewed leaves to the tabs or piccadils. I can’t remember where the metal rings came from, but they worked well for the laced up red cord in front. Don’t ask how it holds up in the laundry, because, as was common in the olden days, I’ve never washed it.

If you want to make one yourself, the pattern is the Easy Peasant Bodice – front laced sold by The Farthingale.

Fairy Houses of Beebe Woods #3

Posted on July 8, 2013 by Salley Mavor

“Home of the Tooth Fairy” by Sue Beardsley

People are still flocking to see The Fairy Houses of Beebe Woods exhibit, which will be in and around the grounds of Highfield Hall until July 21st. Stop by the building to get a tour map during their open hours (M – F, 10 – 4, S – S 10 – 2) or print out your own from this pdf file.

detail from “Home of the Tooth Fairy” by Sue Beardsley

My husband, Rob took these “house portraits” of the dwellings in the morning or evening light, depending on their orientation. As you can see, each artist has interpreted the Fairy House theme in a vastly different way. More photographs of other houses can be seen on posts #1 and #2.

“Beech House” by Bobbi Bailin

detail from “Beech House” by Bobbi Bailin

“Casa de Hadas” by Anne Halpin

“Low Living High Flying” by Molly Bang

“Fire Flye Hollow” by Amy Wilson Sanger

“The Ministry of Metamorphosis & Faerie Hatchery” by Angela Tanner

“Sea Shanty” by Rebecca Edwards

“Solvagen” by Jane Parhiala

“Wild Cherry Village” by Skee Houghton

“Sentinel” by Andrea Moore

“Chippikomuk” by Jenny Junker

Woods Hole July 4th parade

Posted on July 5, 2013 by Salley Mavor

The Woods Hole 4th of July parade is a reflection of our community, with its mix of tradition and a characteristically unconventional celebration of freedom.

A grandmother and her two grandsons were armed with suds for bubble blowing.

Graduate students from the Marine Biological Laboratory’s grass lab paraded down Water St.Our own burlesque troupe, the Brazen Belles donned swim suits and bathing caps for the occasion.

Assistants from the Children’s School of Science celebrated the school’s centennial by impersonating the the Class of 1913.

And we even had a classic car! It was wonderful to see everyone out and about.

Fairy Houses of Beebe Woods #2

Posted on July 1, 2013 by Salley Mavor

The Fairy Houses of Beebe Woods exhibit continues to draw visitors, rain or shine. One of the structures that has held up well through the thunder storms of the past week is Basia Goszczynska’s extraordinary “Golden Dwelling”. She constructed her cozy house out of saplings, moss and lichen on site, between the roots of a giant beech tree.

Take a look at Basia’s website and be wowed by her work in stop-motion animation.

Here’s a shot of the mossy living space far inside. One person commented that Basia’s house looked to be most comfortable and inviting.

Inspired by the wooden cut-out wings we saw at the Florence Griswold Museum last fall, Highfield’s Annie Dean painted some for our exhibit. I was hoping to find some children to pose in front, but they were all roaming the property, looking for fairy houses.

Sheila Payne was the first person I thought of when making a list of artists for the exhibit, way back in the winter. She has been making little abodes around her own house for decades and puts on the best fairy tea parties. When asked what she would make for this show, she replied, “Oh, just a standard fairy house.” I have known Sheila for 50 years and there is nothing standard about her!

Sheila Payne’s “Pipsissewa Place”.

And another remarkable miniature world made by Wendy Bagley. “Woodland House of Wonder” stretches along a stone wall on the edge of the path into Beebe Woods.

Here’s a photo from the opening reception on June 23rd. From left to right, my husband Rob Goldsborough (who look many of the photos), Wendy and Sheila. They’re wearing bead necklaces with leaf name tags that I made for the artists. The houses will be on display until July 21st at Highfield Hall and Gardens in Falmouth, MA. You can print out your own map from this PDF file. More pictures to come!