THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, October 9, 1994 TAG: 9410060233
SECTION: CAROLINA COAST PAGE: 24 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: Mary Ellen Riddle
LENGTH: Medium: 80 lines
A dusty rose and forest green afghan was the first thing Genevieve Clark Miles made after taking crochet lessons at a Chicago yarn store 20 years ago.
The unraveling of that first ball of yarn was the beginning of a long love affair with fiber. And consistent with affairs of the heart, the Manteo artist's work is both sensuous and nostalgic.
Miles crochets memories into the natural, wearable fiber art of her own design. Crocheted into hats, shawls, handbags, ceremonial headdresses and camisoles are trinkets found in thrift stores, at yard sales, auctions and flea markets. She has used old clothing to make quilts, embellished her great aunt Genevieve's hat with Mardi Gras medallions, and used an old lace window covering to trim a hand-spun wedding headpiece. Many a newborn's head has been graced with a Genevieve Miles all-cotton, rose-dotted bonnet.
``I was at loose ends at the time. I was looking for something to do,'' says Miles, 44, explaining how she started. And crochet fit in with her wanderlust. Miles loved the portability of a single hook and simple ball of yarn.
``You could carry it with you wherever you went,'' she says.
Perhaps what is most interesting about Miles' work is that she controls the process from spinning natural fibers, to dying, crocheting and decorating the finished product. Miles can spin fiber with her fingers, a drop spindle or a wheel. She prefers the speed of the wheel. She uses wool, camel hair, silk, cotton, mohair, alpaca, angora and dog hair. ``It's the long-haired dogs that have the down that comes from the undercoat of the dog, not the courser guard hairs on top,'' says Miles. Folks brush their dogs and save the down for the artist.
She spins the dog hair in with wool from black sheep in Wanchese, then washes it. Following a wash, the fibers can be dyed.
``Muted colors'' is how Miles describes her choice of hues, which also have an all-natural source. Yellow, golds and oranges come from marigolds she grows in her garden, local goldenrod, and onion skins. Walnuts are used to produce brown. Imported cochineal gives the fiber a red or purple cast. ``Each dye bath is unique,'' says Miles. ``It depends on what kind of mordant you use.''
The mordant is a vehicle, such as a combination of alum and cream of tarter, or iron, tin, or chrome, that allows the dye to adhere to the fiber.
A strong design is important to Miles, but she employs more spontaneity than planning in her work. ``It's such a flexible medium. You don't have to plan anything out. You can crochet with your fingers, you can increase or decrease. I use fine yarns and thick yarns . . . both together.''
What started out as a hat may end up as a handbag. A crocheted jute garden fence evolved into a porch shade. And Miles' creativity is spilling over to her two children, Maggie, 7, and Imogene, 5. In the front yard of their Manteo home, what used to function as a swing set is now a massive spider web of wrapped yarn.
Miles has exhibited her fiber art at craft fairs up and down the East Coast. She has spun on the Ashlawn grounds, home of James Monroe, and demonstrated her spinning at prestigious Artpark near Niagara Falls. Local and Virginia schoolchildren have benefited from her lessons. A hand-spun, crocheted hat adorned with buttons was recently accepted into the national juried crochet show ``Ancient Roots and New Beginnings'' in Chicago.
And her most industrious piece, an off-white canopy with 3,000 tassels, distinguishes her parents' bed. Miles had help with the tassels.
``My mother would go visit my grandfather in the hospital every day. He was on his death bed.'' Mrs. Clark attended to her father for a year and made the tassels during that period. Miles feels the handiwork helped her mother cope.
Miles has transformed crochet, sometimes referred to as the ``second-class citizen of fiber art,'' to a celebratory labor of love.
Her work will be on display at ``Autumnfest '94'' sponsored by the Outer Banks Chamber of Commerce, at Pirate's Cove on Oct. 22. ILLUSTRATION: Staff photo by DREW C. WILSON
Genevieve Clark Miles uses dog hair and sheep wool to produce yarn
that she will later crochet into one of her artistic - and usable -
creations.
by CNB