Partly Sunny
by Barbara Matthews
Partly
Sunny at the Eastlake P-Patch Garden
An art piece designed for the Eastlake P-Patch in Seattle,
WA finally makes its debut in the garden over ten years after its creation. Its
genesis was a University of Washington art school project.
The community garden concept with cooperative growing by
neighbors was first documented in 1890 with immigrants growing potatoes for
sustenance. They continued on through the Great Depression and in the Victory gardens
of WWII. Seattle was one of the earliest cities to resurrect community gardens in
1974 with the purchase by the City of a 2 acre plot of the Picardo farm, which
lends name to the P in P-Patch.1
Laying a transition from a lifelong analytical career into
an artistic one, I decided to take the year-long Fiber Certificate program at
the University of Washington. The coursework was delightfully all-consuming. The
assignment for the final project entailed creating a site-specific
installation. I had studied the P-Patch community for a prior epidemiology course
by gathering data and interviewing gardeners. (At the time there were 46
P-Patches in Seattle, now that number has doubled.) I had grown to appreciate the P-Patch concept,
community, and creativity of the members. Picking a P-Patch for this installation
seemed natural.
I visited the Eastlake P-Patch that is situated on the East
side of Lake Union on a sunny slope. Scoping
it for potential, I saw an arbor placed on the hillside facing the afternoon
sun. The concept of ‘Partly Sunny’ was born, a positive spin on the cloudy/rainy
meme that typically labels Seattle.
I used an outdoor nylon fabric and scraps of an analogous
color scheme of yellow-green to orange quilting and commercial fabrics to
depict the rays of the sun, all machine stitched to the base nylon. Once the 4 by
4 foot banner was complete, I then took a deep breath and cut the banner into
six strips. I wanted the piece to better catch the breeze from the water. I
designed the strips to hang on three cross bars to hang two strips per crossbar
and further add space to support the concept. The piece was temporarily
installed in the arbor for photos.
Because the installation was somewhat makeshift, I wanted to
leave the P-Patch with a more substantial way to hang the piece. Well life
intervened, my art endeavors moved in another direction and I was drawn away
from that project. Fast forward 10 years and a pandemic that afforded more free
time, and I was able to construct a better way to install Partly Sunny. Of
course throughout the 10 years what I did not expect was that nature did not
stand still and the wisteria vines grew over the arbor further complicating
installation. The garden community members being creative in their own right came
up with a solution. The piece on a
removable structure now will be brought out on special occasions for work
parties and socials at the P-Patch.
1 Matthews, Udo, and Kaseba-Sata, “Seattle
P-Patch Community Gardening”, June 8, 2003
