Fairy tales are one of my recurring fascinations, and I entertained myself recently by distilling many of the well-known tales into haiku glimpses. The result is 3 maxi mini-zines (page size is 7.5 x 10.5cm but each mini-zine contains 16 pages plus covers), featuring haiku alongside classic illustrations from artists including Arthur Rackham, Kay Nielsen, Walter Crane etc.
I had lots of fun writing the micro-poetry & hope you will enjoy the poems, too. 🙂 An ideal stocking stuffer for a fairy tale fan, the mini-zines are available individually, or in a money saving set from the TangleCrafts Etsy Store.
I’m not really into poetry (with the exception of the ‘found’ poetry, that I included in some of my recent posts!), but I love haiku – capturing fleeting glimpses of moments (like a photograph) in condensed, image-rich words. I have put together a 3-part mini-zine, with a booklet of Corey’s haiku, a collection of my haiku, printed on individual cards, and a little booklet of my thoughts about my own and traditional haiku. If you are intrigued, check out the full listing for ‘head-space’ in The Tangled Press Etsy Store.
I also received a wonderful bundle of zines myself this morning, from Kristin Roach of Craft Leftovers. I would love to add a photo, but my lack of home internet prohibits that, just now! The July issue of Craft Leftovers Monthly is a fantastic themed issue, which will give you lots of practical tips & resource ideas if you are thinking of making a zine of your own.
Also, arriving just at the right time for me, it includes a great relief printing tutorial. I’ve recently done some lino cut experiments, but made the best of what I had, materials-wise, and used stamping rather than printing inks. However, while I was bemoaning the lack of clean prints this resulted in, to a colleague at work, a customer who overheard offered to bring me printing in exchange for copies of the prints I had already done. I felt terrible accepting the offer, but at least it was a trade, and I’ve felt even more guilty since, as even though I bought a brayer to use the printing ins with, I still wasn’t brave enough to try it out. Well, with July CLM as my guide, I will definitely be trying it out this month. Honestly. Well, maybe…
In my hasty post the other day, I forgot to mention that I have listed some new zines in my Etsy stores. The culmination of my French knitting experiments can be found in ‘Make Your Own…D.I.Y. French Knitting‘, in the usual TangleCrafts store.
For something a little bit different to my usual offerings, please check out The Tangled Press Etsy Store. Yes, I have finally started adding some non-crafty zines to this store, and there are more to come. The first two listings are
‘The Beast: Requiem for a Vibraphone’ – the life story of Corey’s sadly deceased (well, definitively retired, at least!) vibraphone; a photo story featuring & with commentary by ‘The Beast’, and a collection of Corey’s haiku. ‘The Beast’ comes as a 3 part set, bound into a wallet, with 2 integral pockets.
‘On Flowers & Fairy Tales’ features the 3 lino cuts I mentioned doing recently, as illustrations to a collection of thoughts & poems on, well, flowers & fairy tales. There are also a couple of extracts from literature, a list of flowers & their meanings, and a bibliography. If you have a passing interest in fairy tales, I think you’ll find it interesting!
There are several more works in progress, but given my current lack of home internet access, these will have to tide you over for a little while…!
5. Haiku Tins (photo to follow). I found a good source for tins with aperture lids recently, and have woven several freeform pieces to fit the different sizes. For the smallest tin (pencil box-sized), I tried something a bit different. Using beautiful yarns in graduating variegated shades, I wrapped the yarn, rather than wove. This is a ridiculously simple thing to do, but because of the blending and shading in these particular yarns, really very effective in the end result. I think of them as meditations on colour, which led me circuitously round to haiku. After reading quite a lot of haiku, and being aware of them as a source of strong natural imagery, I decided that they suited these wrapped tins perfectly. So I have bought some recycled fibre paper, onto which I will print individual haiku, and a little collection of these printed slips of haiku will fill each tin. (Obviously if someone has an alternative use for the tin, they are welcome to remove the haiku, once they have bought it!) If you like haiku, can I strongly recommend ‘Clear Light’ by Alan Spence? The Haiku Tins will contain a mix of traditional and contemporary haiku.
Spring evening
6. Meditations. I’ve woven a few freeform pieces for the craft fair, and while they evolve quite naturally, I also find that after weaving one, I tend to want to go back to basics, back to the basic, essential flow of weaving. The wrapped Haiku Tins gave me the idea to just weave a very plain block, allowing the colours of the yarn to do all the work for me. This allows me to really get lost in the rhythmic, soothing process of weaving, and becomes a meditation on both the process and the random evolution of the colours. The pieces you see to left and right are examples, unframed thus far.
Muddy fields
My idea is to frame them, individually, in very plain, simple wooden frames. Within the frame will also be a handwrtten haiku, composed by me, relating to the images evoked by the weaving. I love the clarity and economy of haiku, the condensed images retaining a simple appreciation of the mysteries of the world around us. I think they work perfectly with the meditative process involved with the weaving of these pieces. I’m in no way claiming that my own haiku compare with the masters of the genre; but the pieces are personal to me, and using my own poetry makes them even more so. I guess it gives the viewer of the work an insight into my own perceptions, whether they agree or not.
Fading autumn sunlight, glowing over muddy fields
Night swallows spring evening, casting shadows that will pass
Fairy tales are one of my recurring fascinations, and I entertained myself recently by distilling many of the well-known tales into haiku glimpses. The result is 3 maxi mini-zines (page size is 7.5 x 10.5cm but each mini-zine contains 16 pages plus covers), featuring haiku alongside classic illustrations from artists including Arthur Rackham, Kay Nielsen, Walter Crane etc. 
tanglecrafts.wordpress.com 