The Timer / Hanged One: Card #12 in the Kitchen Tarot

"The Timer / Hanged One: Card #12 in the Kitchen Tarot" by Susan Shie is part of her Tarot card series of quilts.

Artist Statement: "I had to go back and remake one of the 22 Major Arcana card quilts for my Kitchen Tarot, because I’d gotten stuck on the little piece I’d started for the Hanged One traditional card in 2002, when I made it as the Dish Towel. Because dish towels hang in the kitchen!  Somehow I’d moved on and left that piece stuck in limbo, partly hand sewn, very much a Hanged One situation.  The traditional card signifies a time when something has to wait for resolution, and you can’t push it.  As I was finishing my last Major Arcana card in the Kitchen Tarot, the Potluck / World, I was so surprised that the Democratic primary wasn’t resolved yet.  I thought how this would be a perfect time to redo my stuck Hanged One piece and continue to chronicle the primary’s events.  Only I soon realized that the Dish Towel wasn’t a good enough object in the kitchen to represent this waiting time.  I re-chose.  I decided to make my Hanged One be the Timer, signifying waiting for something to get done.

My kitchen goddess, St Quilta the Comforter, holds the mightly little kitchen timer in her arms, and she herself looks quite calm and ready to await the timer’s announcement that the waiting period is over. Above her right shoulder is a watched pot that never boils, and above her left shoulder hangs a dish towel, a nod to my earlier version of the Hanged One, that I haven’t finished. It just hangs there, in kind of the same silhouette as the actual hanged man has in the traditional card image.

There’s a big hanging upside-down me (or Eva?) on the painting’s left side, waiting patiently through whatever can’t be resolved yet, and two of my cats are climbing upside down all over the kitchen! They can wait, but they’re oh, so curious!

St Q sits Buddha style, as is her wont to do while meditating, and in front of her are: a big bowl of bread dough rising (you KNOW how long that takes!) and an old fashioned telephone … that someone’s waiting to hear it ring. You know how that goes!

I’ve painted my Peace Roses throughout the piece, and added my Peace Symbols, since one of the big things we’ve been waiting for, for many years now, is an end to the wars the US is involved in. Waiting doesn’t have to be passive. It can include prayers for a good, peaceful, and just resolution to the situation which one’s going through.

Two hourglasses are in the piece’s top corners, of course more ways to measure the time things take, forerunners of the sweet little wind-up kitchen timer. I didn’t include a digital timer, because it’s just not very inviting to look at.

Two hourglasses are in the piece’s top corners, of course more ways to measure the time things take, forerunners of the sweet little wind-up kitchen timer. I didn’t include a digital timer, because it’s just not very inviting to look at."

Techniques Used: Freehand drawing and painting made with airbrush and fabric paint. Small journal writing made with airpen and fabric paint. Machine quilting with Mettler cotton thread. Hand stitching (just on the border) with DMC perle cotton.

Materials Used: Whole cloth painting on white Kona cotton, fabric paint. Cotton machine thread, Nature-fil bamboo and organic cotton batting. Perle cotton embroidery thread. One flameworked pink girl Buddha bead and one green temple Buddha Boy bead

Main Quilt Photo and Detail Photo 2 from Susan Shie's Website (turtlemoon.com)