From the Saturday, June 8, 1996 issue of the London Free Press Online

ARTS

GEORGE BLUMSON / The London Free Press

Textile artist Susan Jarmain of Port Bruce has opened a two-month show of 31 pieces of her work at the London Regional Art and Historical Museums. Her work, which includes pieces that are hand-painted and air-brushed, is influenced by her love of both butterflies and the Mexican culture.

Artist took a trip, then a chance and changed her life

Susan Jarmain was deeply moved -- and motivated -- by a visit to Mexico.

By Joe Matyas
Free Press Arts Reporter

It's about 12:15 p.m. on Wednesday and the lecture theatre at the London art and history museum has attracted one of the largest crowds ever for a mid-day, mid-week event. Most of the theatre's 175 seats are taken as textile artist Susan Jarmain opens a two-month exhibit with a noon-hour lecture. A few loyal lecture-series regulars have been joined by curious members of an embroidery and weaving guild who are meeting at the museum. They like what they see and hear and after Jarmain has revealed how extinct Aztec and Toltec civilizations have influenced her art, many of the guild members follow her into a museum gallery for a walking tour of her exhibited works. Because they understand weaving and dyes, they ask better questions than Jarmain usually fields and when they've departed, she's pleased. "It hasn't been a noon-hour nap," she says. Jarmain, 52, lives in Port Bruce on the Lake Erie north shore, where she works in a home studio. She loves the process of making her art so much that she says she'd do it even if she had no buyers and no one willing to exhibit her silks. She has both and the statement is only evidence of her determination. Jarmain is so adept at working with silk that she can win oohs and aahs even from an audience of women who know a thing or two about textiles. She is an artist and artisan, producing works that are hand-painted and air-brushed with dyes and wpven after hundreds or thousands of stretched silk strands have been precisely colored to produce images which she culls from the ancient Mexican cultures and colors derived from her study of butterflies. "There are 14,000 species of butterflies," she says. "They have an infinite range of color and design and I keep a catalogue of them to help me in my work." Jarmain's interest in butterflies and pre-conquest Mexican cultures started at age 13 when her parents took her on a trip to an abandoned Aztec city where 100,000 people once lived. AZTEC: She has made many trips to Mexico since then, studying native ceramics, pottery, sculptures, masks and murals. Both the Aztecs and Toltecs before them venerated butterflies and Jarmain's studies grew to include them when she became aware of that and the annual migration of birds and butterflies from Mexico to Canada and the northern United States. "The Aztecs regarded the butterfly as a symbol of the soul, as the light that emerges from the body as spiritual energy," says Jarmain. "Two goddesses are associated with butterflies -- one connected with love, fertility and art and another with war, death and the night sky. This goddess has talons for picking up sacrificial hearts. It's a different image of butterflies than what we put on our greeting cards." Jarmain's exposure to native weaving in Mexico seeded a desire to do it herself. She started by taking a night-school course in London and then five years of weekend workshops in Oakville. "I thought I was going to weave rugs, but then I started working with silk and a whole world opened up. I knew I needed special training to do what I wanted, so I went off to Dublin for two years and graduated from the National College of Art. "I don't think of myself as an adventurous person. But I packed up three suitcases and two children (ages six and 11) and went to study in Ireland without knowing whether I would be accepted into the program. It was completely out of character." It gave Jarmain the technical skills she needed to illuminate her imagination. When it comes to silk works, she's now a jazz artist, able to produce any image she wants the way she wants. Her images, designs, weaves and coloring vary widely, but she has developed a technical method which requires a specific weight of silk imported from Switzerland, fast-drying dyes which don't bleed too much and precise mixing and dying procedures.

IF YOU GO WHAT: Meridian Mythology, an exhibition of woven silk works by London area artist Susan Jarmain. WHERE: London Regional Art & Historical Museums, 421 Ridout St. N., London. WHEN: Until July 28, Tuesdays to Sundays, noon to 5 p.m., closed Mondays. ADMISSION: Free.