This past week I was on Manitoulin Island to visit Judy Martin’s home with Penny Berens and Margi Hennen. Manitoulin is known as Spirit Island due to deep spiritual significance to the Indigenous People. What joy to be in this gentle landscape, to stitch and talk art with dear stitching friends.

I stitched beloved old scraps of South African indigo prints to a linen ground, in between writing notes about books to order, quotes and artists who inspired. Among the many artists we discussed, we were  especially taken with the embroidery of Junko Oki.

We helped Judy with her environmental installation documenting her daily walk in cloth for the 4e Elements Festival. It is a festival for poets and artists who respond specifically to the land around them.  It is held on Manitoulin Island each year. Judy’s wrapped bundles of sweet clover and chain stitched patches where strung out in a long line, measuring her gait and thoughts. You can read more about this work here.

Here Penny and Judy discuss circles of red embroideries on handkerchiefs from Judy’s recent London, Ontario workshop she gave. Do check out Penny’s blog about this visit as well. After such an enriching visit with inspiring women, I’m home and pumped to get into the studio and stitch and read.