Reading-In a Design in Fabric

For years I have been "reading-in" a design in fabric.  I never really thought much about it...until I received a birthday postcard from my friend and fellow quilt artist, Liz Broussard.  I love it!  She took a piece of marbelized fabric she created on a play day at my beach cabin, read-in a design, bound it with her signature painted coffee filters and sent it to me.

"Flower Pops" 4" x 6"
Elizabeth Ann Broussard

I did much the same thing when I created what I thought to be an unsuccessful monoprint with weak stamp impressions.  When I finished it, it became this year's donation to Alzheimer's Art Quilt Initiative, representing the slow erosion and fading away of the mind that is the face of this terrible disease.

                                          "Shades of Gray" 8 1/2" x 9"

  


Staying Connected

"Staying Connected" began in 2008,  when I created an abstract painting on linen.  It was also the year my dad was battling stage 4 lung cancer (he never smoked a day in his life so go figure...).  I felt very depressed when I looked at the painted linen.  Dad would soon move on.  With this painting, it was also clear I was leaving piecing behind.  Actually, I had been consistently leaving piecing behind in my work for some time but it suddenly weighed heavy on my mind.  I missed it and my piecing friends.  On went the rectangular bits, a reference to piecing.  Thread trash went on to reflect the fluidity of our lives.  The addition of painted misty fuse and leaves composed of both painted dryer sheets and commercial painted fabric completed the composition.  In the end, it represented the life cycle and the fact that "we all leave behind, we all get left behind and in between we just try to stay connected".  It was indeed an honor when it was selected to appear in Lone Stars III:  A Legacy of Texas Quilts 1986-2011, by Karoline Patterson Bresenhan and Nancy O'Bryant Puentes.



                                                                   "Staying Connected"  18"x41"

The book was published and made its debut at International Quilt Festival, Houston, Tx., in October, 2011. 

Mad Happenings as Inspiration for Creation

Incoming 12x10

Natural disasters often seem to drive me into the studio.  I created my oil-slick-in-the-gulf piece, "Incoming", during the immediate after shock of the event before I saw newspaper images.  It is dyed cheesecloth, thread trash, beads and decorative threads on monoprinted cotton.

On the Move, 4x6

A fire moving uphill in thread trash and silk on dyed peltex. 

Fire and Smoke, 4x6

Abstract rendition of On the Move in thread trash...

                                                             

                        

One In, One Out

I am so excited that Zoo Inspirations: Fencework is named a finalist in A World of Beauty at the Houston International Quilt Festival October 31 - November 4, 2012. Since we are not supposed to post a photo of accepted entries, I am posting a photo of the one that didn't make it in.

Zoo Inspirations:  First Impressions

I love this little quilt, 12x26, but it was too big for the miniature category and most likely too small to compete anywhere else.  It reflected a sunny day, frantic effort on my part to capture 275 photos in two hours, the floral displays, the fantasy, the care and nurturing, and was based largely on a sign I saw at the Zoo which read:  "Be Kind to Animals and Bamboo, Too!"   Designs were taken from my own photos.  I used negative-image stamps and procion dyes on pfd cotton with pigment ink applied directly to the dyed fabric.  I love the contrast between the somewhat chaotic background, pieced using two different patterned fabrics, and the calmer, pastoral feeling of the inked images.