June

The making of "Places of terrible beauty and layered earth and buried secrets." Suzane Simard (2022). Finding the Mother Tree: Uncovering the Wisdom and the Intelligence of the Forest. Photo by Monica Pinheiro CC BY-NC-SA (CC). June 9, 2024.

June

"(...) from wholeness as a living plant to fragment strands and back to wholeness again as a" tapestry. "The dual powers of destruction and creation that shape the world. Strands once separated are rewoven into a new hole." Grief can "be comforted by creation, by rebuilding the homeland that was taken. The fragments, like ash splints, can be rewoven into a new whole." Robin Wall Kimerer (2020). Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants.

Photo of «Shadow Worlds» tapestry (76 x 82 cm) by Monica Pinheiro CC BY-NC-SA (CC) June 20, 2024.

Solstice

I've been discovering more affordances for the materials that nature (and people) offer me. At this time of the year there is an abundance of colours, textures, forms, and smells to choose from. They open up many possibilities for creation. Marking the Solstice, I finished the weaving of the last tapestry, prepared the loom weft and started the initial selection of natural materials for the next work. 

Suzane Simard's book Finding the Mother Tree as been traveling with me. In it, I just discover that if you cut the leader shoot "the pines won't know how to grow toward the sky". 

Photo by Monica Pinheiro CC BY-NC-SA (CC) June 20,  2024.

June

"To let threads be articulate again and find a form for themselves to no other end than their own orchestration, not to be sat on, walked on, only to be looked at…" Anni Albers (1959). Pictorial Weaving. Wishlist book. Latest tapestry on the making detail photo by Monica Pinheiro CC BY-NC-SA (CC) April, 2024.

Biodiversity

«Biodiversity is the driver of the farm. If I'm asked "What do you grow?", I say "Biodiversity". The vegetables are a by-product. (...) What I'm trying to do here is to copy the forest." To make farming work, "we need to restore a forest soil ecology, aligning farming with the original ecosystem. (...) Small farmers around the world are seeking such solutions, and have come together to build a global agroecology movement." George Monbiot (2023). Regenesis: Feeding the World without devouring the Planet. Photo by Monica Pinheiro CC BY-NC-SA (CC) May 12, 2024.

May

"The most beautiful thing of all... is whatever you love best." Irene Vallejo (2022). Papyrus: the invention of books in the ancient world. Photo by Monica Pinheiro CC BY-NC-SA (CC) 2024.

creation at the core of art-I-fact

The beginning of a new tapestry starts long before I lay out the threads on the frame. Each tapestry starts as a synapse that survived in my brain. With time it weaves together with other synapses, creating a visual memory that grows and evolves, reinforcing some features and letting go others. This visual memory mixes with previous experiences, narratives of people, new and old books, and life’s events at the gestating stage. Then, the image of possibilities for the next work meets with the material affordances of all the resources collected. Materiality that will give substance to daydream explorations, until the dialogue between mind, hands, vision, and materials becomes irresistible and the fragrances fill the room with the materialization of a new art-I-fact. From stillness to flow. Hatched from a resilient synapse that joined with others. Creation at the core. Flourishing by coming into being. 

Photo of tapestry (83  x 78 cm) by Monica Pinheiro CC BY-NC-SA (CC) 2024.

April

Photo by Monica Pinheiro CC BY-NC-SA (CC) April 13, 2024.

April

 Photo by Monica Pinheiro CC BY-NC-SA (CC) April 13, 2024.

April

"When you tape into the arts to foster a meditative state, the places in your brain responsible for judgment and personal criticism are quieted in your prefrontal cortex, and you can assess a more generous, perspective-taking point of view." Susan Magsamen and Ivy Ross (2023). Your Brain on Art: How the Arts Transform Us. Obra de Cruz-Filipe. Exposição Modo de Ver na Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian. 

sugar and oxygen

"Carbon dioxide plus water combined in the presence of light and chlorophyl in the beautiful membrane-bound machinery of life yields sugar and oxygen." Robin Wall Kimerer (2020). Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants. Photo by Monica Pinheiro CC BY-NC-SA (CC) 2024.

March

O tempo oferece palcos onde vamos esculpindo vidas. A nossa e a de outros seres que se entrelaçam na nossa. O tempo, esse grande escultor, de Marguerite Yourcenar. No das plantas e no meu, recomeça um novo ciclo. Juntas, vamos esculpindo o tempo. Photo by Monica Pinheiro CC BY-NC-SA (CC) 2024.

March

How can we go on living our lives when people of war keep annihilating lives around the world? How can we devise a prosperous future for anyone or any country, when we can´t even guaranty the basic conditions of peace, shelter and food for life to happen? How can we allow that money and precious resources are allocated to destruction, instead of construction? What does our silence reveal in the face of all the monstrosities going on? How can we not enrage with the ineptitude of all the institutions that where supposed to avoid the suffering worldwide? When did we get so numbed that we can pretend that's not our problem? What does it take us to realize that if someone is left to destroy others they can destroy us? How can we keep on participating in the web of life if the ones in power are destroying our chances of future? When is enough enough? How much longer for the day when we all decide united, regardless of our nationalities and places of birth, that there is no place for war? No place for machines of war. No place for economies of war. No place for men of war. Maybe it's time. May we build a prosperous future for all and not for some, fostering prosperity for all and displacing greed. Rebuilding what was destroyed, healing wounded and land so we can heal ourselves. May the war be over! 

War is Over poster in English, image: CC BY-NC 2.0 by Yoko Ono official.

February

"What if we could fashion a restoration plan that grew from understanding multiple meanings of land? Land as sustainer. Land as identity. Land as grocery store and pharmacy. Land as connection to our ancestors. Land as moral obligation. Land as sacred. Land as self. (..) Land as home." Robin Wall Kimerer (2020). Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants. 

Photo of «Weaving roots to a better world» tapestry (86 x 78 cm) by Monica Pinheiro CC BY-NC-SA (CC) 2024.

February

"Beauty is not only formal, and lies not only in the superficial qualities that are appealing to the eye or ear, it lies in patterns of meaning, in evocations of values, and its connection to the life the reader is living and the world she wants to see." Rebecca Solnit (2022). Orwell's Roses. Photo by Monica Pinheiro CC BY-NC-SA (CC) 2024.

February

"We know that loving a person has agency and power - we know it can change everything. Yet we act as if loving the land is an internal affair that has no energy outside the confines of our head and heart." Robin Wall Kimerer (2020). Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants. Photo by Monica Pinheiro. Free to use if you respect the license CC BY-NC-SA (CC).