The rhythmic use of hands, as in knitting and embroidering, leads to an altered psychological state that permits us, in a certain way, to transcend our physical surroundings. I am interested in collecting information regarding how such use of the hands affects different people. If anyone is interested in helping me out with this project, please respond to the following questions and email me the answers. I will then publish the results on this blog as well as making related observations on IKASTIKOS.
The Questions.
1. IN PRAISE OF HANDS, Octavio Paz says: "In the work of the handcraftsmen there is a constant shifting back and forth between usefulness and beauty. This continual interchange has a name: pleasure. Things are pleasing because they are useful and beautiful. This copulative conjunction defines craftwork, just as the disjunctive conjunction defines art and technology: usefulness or beauty."
If a ceramist makes a cup, it’s considered craft. If an artist lines the same cup with fur, it’s considered art. ....Should craft be considered art?
2. Dolores Krieger in THE THERAPEUTIC TOUCH claims that we can cure physical and spiritual pain via the use of hands. Whereas Chinese medicine holds that many health problems are caused when Qi energy is blocked. Qigong practice, with the help of our hands, can remove blocks and increase the flow of energy through your body. ….Can hands really heal?
3. Our brain produces waves of currents that flow throughout neural pathways. The type of brainwaves we produce determines our state of mind. These brainwaves can be altered via, for example, meditation. ….Is it possible that the repeated motion used when knitting induces a form of trance like state? Therefore could we say that knitting is a form of meditation.
4. Wassily Kandinsky, in Concerning the Spiritual in Art , wrote: The observer must learn to look at the picture as a graphic representation of a mood and not as a representation of objects. Ultimately divorcing himself entirely from subject matter, Kandinsky concentrated only on abstractions.....When knitting, what dominates: the desire to create a given object or the act of creating?
5. CLARA’S WINDOW declares: knitting is better than Prozak. ....Is it? Can knitting influence one’s sexual activity?
6. Women traditionally have used handwork and crafts as a means of expressing their creativity. Would you say that there’s a difference, biologically speaking, between male and female creativity?
7. Knitting, we could say, is a kind of Portable Art. Miss Marple could be on the scene of any crime and still continue to click. A painter, like Jackson Pollock, instead, is confined to his studio. Are the mental mechanisms different when working On The Road as opposed to In Situ?
8. To knit we must sit. What kind of dialated effect does A Sedentary Style have our our Body-Mind Combo?
links "
This list of links is in progess. If you have any to add, please email me.
knitters:
dangerous chunky--Spinning Ginn--dishcloth boutique---Knit-O-Rama! -- Ivete'sKnitting --The Magic of Finger Knitting--my life in stitches --target="_blank"yarn.fiend/---///orangemami///--clara's window --KnitWit--\Bag`a*tell"\--homemade.sliceofchaos--redlipstick--Sarah's Mostly Knitting Weblog --KnittingGeek.com--chicKnits--Yarnit--a desultory life--my blue house--squiblog--skinny rabbit--knitter's review--< in stitches >--String and Air--purseknickety--Fillyjonk's progress--Newbie to Knitting, knitalicious--amethyst muse--Journey into the Real World--yarnaholic confessions--SciFiVille --
stitchers:
ann the gran--sew wrong--SUBLIME STITCHING--Sunday Afternoon In The Park--sew geeky.co.--
textile:
Vita Marie Lovett--Maya's Fiber Art Gallery--dances with wool--rebecca's pocket textile links--robin cowley--
quilters:
Crossing Boundaries:Contemporary Art Quilts--lala' s land quilts--Chameleon Quilt Studio--- womanagerie--Zwack Art--david walker--Sylvia H. Einstein-- linda glass art quilts--joan shultz--arlinka!--my dog meg--The Aids Memorial Quilt--The Quilt National page --Women & Geometry-- quilt gallery--The College Quilt--helen's quilts--dear jane--Art Quilts in Perspective--Kate Adams Fine Miniature Quilts--amanda's commissioned art quilts--Clare Smith - Quilter and Fabric Artist --shawn quinlan quilted art--Joanie San Chirico--Pat White Studios--Rachel Roggel Conceptual Art Quilts With Buttons & Buttonholes Contemporary Art Quilts--Lisa Winlock --Priscilla Bianchi is a quilt artist who lives in Guatemala--Rakhel Biller Klinger's
Cloth Art site-- sandra townsend donabed--Jeanne Williamson Art Quilts and Web Design ---Quilt It Freehand--joethequilter.com/
crafts:
OISEAUX sisters--"crafty chica"--get crafty-- pillows--she made this--tacky living crafts--Get a Head Without Hunting--not martha--craftsman homes connection--readymade--hobby whore-craftopia--confessions of a craft-a-holic--glitter kitty--Project Annie --oatmeal--
collage assemblage and mixed media:
"Dear Robert, I'll See You at the Crossroads"--warped art collage gallery--moonshine lane--james michale starr--p a gibbons--lipstick ranch collage--István Horkay --claudine hellmuth--jane + wynn--relicmakers/keith e lo bue--Nek Chand's Rock Garden--objects of curiosity--The Book of Textures A Thirty Foot Dialogue--michael de meng assemblage art--
dolls:
Joy Allen--burnt offering--
paper paper related and/or alterbooks/journals:
jenny's art space--melissa mCcobb hubbell-->dilly dally designs-- summer place-- junque rubber stamps--teesha's art--zettiolgoy--adornedsurface--Nervous Industries---eric stamen notebooks--just genie's altered journals--
echo a mano:
good and sturdy art--queen bee creations--meli made--PunkRockPrincess.com--
folk naive outsider and brut art:
raw visions--Liz's Homepage--purvis young--Mark Beyer--Anne Grgich --hypnotico--Los Mestizos--bunnywax--Jan and Adrie Martens -- carol es--Faith Ringgold --- tibor jankay the art of survival--Howard Finster: Man of Visions--Intuit--The Art of Sam Doyle --The Outsider Pages --"If a man can’t find happiness on a little farm in Wisconsin, he hasn’t the makings of happiness in his soul." --David Zamoras Casas---Barney Smith's Toilet Seat Art Museum--folk art museum--NAHUM B. ZENIL --
pattern:
d&p, detail and pattern---
art therapy:
art therapy, when words are not enough--Cunningham Dax Collection of Psychiatric Art --
misc.
women's early art--
related research
A Natural History of the Senses by Diane Ackerman....Our senses define the edges of consciousness. How we delight our senses varies greatly from culture to culture, yet the ways in which we use our senses is exactly the same for all of us! "We take drugs, we go to circuses; we tramp through jungles; we listen to loud music; we purchase exotic fragrances & pay hugely for culinary novelties...What is most amazing is not how our senses span distance or cultures, but how they span time. Our senses connect us intimately to the past, connect us in ways that most of our cherished ideas never could.
