My quilt is finished!

I have finished both my quilts with 2 days to spare for our Auckland city exhibition.  It is so nice to have them finished. 

The first one is a quilt to fit in with the theme Retro.  I was inspired by Vector flowers on the Internet.  I quilted this piece first and then coloured it with shiva paint sticks.

Retro lime sorbet

I will put my finished mother and child quilt on the next blog.



Quilting critique

How do we deal with quilting critique? Friends and family's comments on our work tend to be very 'nice' as most people will find something nice to say rather than pick something that needs improving.  Even if we ask for constructive criticism most people will not have the skills to critique or choose not to because of  fear.....fear of saying the wrong thing,  fear of getting it wrong,  fear of hurting our feelings,  fear of damaging a friendship. 

Critique is an important part of the quilting process.  In Lyric Kinard's new book Art + Quilt found at http://www.lyrickinard.com/ a whole section is devoted to critiquing art work.  This is an excellent resource which can really assisted us in looking more closely at quilt art.  But like anything in art practice is the key.  Practice at looking at all art with a critical eye.   Sometimes though we need another persons opinion as they can look at our work with a fresh and clear perspective.  

Lets take a look at a recent critiquing experience of mine

"I have just received back the judges sheets from a recent judged quilt exhibition.  I had very mixed comments.  Some very justified  i.e. Finishing needs more attention (I always rush this bit to get on with next idea I have buzzing around my head)  and raw edged binding needs to be even and straight.  I am the first to admit that I need to work on this part of my work. 

 I felt some parts of the comments were definitely just the judges opinion and it is those comments that can sometime sting because they can seem unfair.  i.e. More quilting needed in bigger spaces/uneven amount of quilting.....I put no quilting there for effect and contrast,  Backing should compliment quilt top.....I was recycling fabric.  Next time I might over dye or paint the quilt backing to try and satisfy the judge and my need to be ecologically friendly and a 5 out of 10 for design and colour use, but wonderful comments about the design  in the comment section.....ummmm...  not sure on this one!!  This is were thick skin comes in.  take what I feel is justified and improve on it and let some of it bounce off my skin and try again.  "

We all need critique as without it we cannot improve or work as well or accurately.  How we choose to accept critique is key in using it to our best advantage.

Inspirational quilting

For a while I have been contemplating using people more in my quilts.  I felt inspired to capture the relationships between people and relationships between people and our planet.  It has taken a lot of courage to do this as I have always found painting people more of a challenge than any other subject.  There is something quite hard about capturing emotion and getting proportions right in the human form. 

So I have taken the plunge and jumped right in to paint my first "people" quilt.  The first part of the process was to find a photo of a woman and child interaction.  I found a picture of me and my brand new nephew that was just what I was after.  It tells a lovely story of the delight of my twin sister giving birth to such a lovely wee man and of the relief of her safety after a particularly difficult birth.

I put this photo onto adobe photoshop,  cropped the photo and then reduced the colours to 8 and converted the picture to black and white.  I have sketched for years so I found seeing the image in a less complex form far less intimidating. 

This picture gave me a better indication of where the highlighted areas are and the shading was.  I decided to base this work on a sketch I had done a while ago .  I began by doing a colour drawing in my sketchbook.  I tried to upload a photo of this but the computer would not let me do this.  The joys of technology!   I then transferred this on to cloth.  I chose to paint in sepia and do the pendant and skirt in colour. 

I left the hands till last as I think this is the trickiest part to do.  I was quite happy with the finished result.

Now for the quilting..........



Teaching quilting to kids

Our local school has a clubs programme they run once a year.  For one afternoon a week for five weeks the children can choose and elective to participate in.  I volunteered this year and took a fabric art class.  The design inspiration was cut fruit.  The 6 girls aged 10 and 11 made their own design,  pattern and constructed their own quilt right down to machine quilting and making labels for their art work.  Their finished pieces blew me away.  Once they knew they could do it, the creative juices just flowed.  Children are amazing creatures we do not always see what they are capable of  accomplishing.  We can miss an amazing opportunity to teach kids by thinking they can't do something when in reality they can. 

These photos are of their work that they did.

I had a wonderful experience with these children.  I can't wait to do it again next year.

My holiday

I went away for 3 1/2 days with my sister to place in New Zealand called Waihi.  I stayed at the beach which is miles of golden sand and beautiful views.   I had a wonderful break and I feel very refreshed.  It is music for the creative soul.

The town closest to the Beach is a gold mining town which is still in operation today.  Near by there is a gorge where all the old gold mining relics from the past are tucked away in beautiful bush and rock.  The contrast between nature and man made surfaces is beautiful.  These are some photos of that wonderful experience. 

Enjoy!

quilt challenge-52 cards in a year

week 16

I have a quilt sandwich I use for practicing my machine quilting before I quilt on the real thing.  I had finished a a practicing piece and was going to throw it out when I asked myself a question could I colour and cut this and make a card for this week?   Using non metallic paint sticks I started drawing over the patterns on the practice piece and then I cut out a few different pieces and played with them.  One of the pieces reminded me of a rose so I began to develop this idea.  The effect was very different but beautiful.  I will be keeping all my practice pieces in future and further developing them after this experimentation.

I love how the lines of quilting still come though under the added colour giving the feeling of movement and depth.

Now will I ever throw any scraps away again?   

I might need more storage.............

quilt challenge-52 cards in a year

Week 15

I'm just a wee bit behind on the last 2 weeks cards but for good reason. I have had a couple of quilt deadlines looming and I have been away on my own.  Childless for a few whole days.  Absolutely bliss!! 

I have created a card this week from a cut up mono print of an orange.  Mono printing is a technique of printing where paint is added to a glass surface and then a print is taken from it.  The original print was white,  orange and yellow.  I decided to over dye it in a deep pink then to add more stitching to it and shiva paint sticks (my favourite art supply if you haven't noticed yet  :)  )   

I was really pleased with how the over dying came out.  It changed the whole feel of the piece of work.  

The paint sticks have added a lovely shine to the card and given better depth.