Playing with Fabric

I guess what I am doing is procratinating...I've checked out Rayna's blog and what Ted Orland has to say...I've read every Quiltart digest that has come my way. I have been doing the quilting on a piece but it is a lot of work since I heavily quilted the design area and now I get to fight with the pouffs all around it to get it smooth. Well, next time I will just fuse it down...thought I would do one without fusing. Oh well.

So, I have pictures of fabric to show you.


The first is a piece of cotton that I painted with blues and greens. It has a little sparkle to it and is really ummmmy. But my favorite is the painted purple and gold to which I added (why I don't know) silver metallic paint (should have been gold) but it is pretty thin so it adds an interesting shimmer to it all. Finally got them ironed after doing them about 3 weeks ago. They both keep the wrinkled look even tho' they are ironed well.

Then I did a little dyeing. Mixed up a bucket of purple and golden yellow and had at it.



The first piece went in to the purple mix...obviously I didn't mix it very well as the fushia struck immediately and gave me dapples...but then it did it on all three pieces so it looks like I sprinkled dye powder over a piece of wet fabric! It was intentional. That's what I love about dyeing, especially the way I do it. I am never quite sure what will come up and that is just fine...interesting things always happen.

The next piece is pole wrapping Liz style which means that it isn't like the way anyone else does it. I wrapped the fabric and then poured purple down one side and the golden yellow down the other.





The last picture is os a piece of yellow fabric that I had previously dyed but I then ironed it into squares, used a couple of large heavy metal washers and clamps and dumped it in to the dye. What fun! Now I have more things to do this way!





So now I am thinking about all the interesting ways I can use these last three fabrics...each of the yellows also has a lot of the purple but you just don't see it in the part I scanned.

I'm thinking/contemplating orbs...with fences marching past them?
Who knows.

A couple of new pieces

Well, besides taking pictures, I have finished a number of things. This first piece is Canyonlands. It includes pieces of lutradur that has been painted and heated. There are fine lines in the other areas, remeniscent of a topo map. It is mounted via satin stitching to stretched black cotton duck.

I am sorry that this second piece is so off color. The piece is mounted on to a natural color piece of decorator fabric with a great texture to it. The piece was created using transfer dyes and was then foiled via silk screen. I love the way I quilted it...minimally!

I have been working on a series of these pieces (like the last one), one of which will be mounted like a scroll.

Tomorrow I will start putting some of my thoughts about Ted Orland's book, View from the Studio Door. Rayna has started to comment on it so I thought I could add more of my thoughts about it here.

Pictures for inspiration

So we will start out today with a beautiful picture of one of the falls at Yosemite National Park. We went up on Friday with our daughter and her family. We stayed just overnight and went around taking pictures and having a nice break. Lots of clouds and lots of water.

I don't remember which falls is on the left but the one on the right is Yosemite Falls. Last week the flooding crested and the water was not coming down quite as much as previously but it was a beautiful spectacle!



And what would Yosemite be without a picture of Half Dome?
And a picture of El Capitan.


And Mother's Day pictures to boot! On Mother's Day we went with my daughter and her family to the beach in Alameda where Jacob had a great time playing in the sand and the water!

Long Arm Quilting Adventure

How many times have you looked at those huge quilting machines at the big shows....that is, unless you already have one of those $17,000 babies...I have tried them at Houston last fall and last year at our own quilt guild show, but always on muslin.

I happen to know a representative of American Professional Quilting Systems (APQS). Chery Uribe is a drop dead gorgeous woman who is voluptuous...you know, the kind of woman you like to hate because she is so lovely! Well, you would except that she is absolutely one of the nicest people around. She is the one who has been by my side telling me about the various machines...but without trying to sell me one (yeah, right, she knows when I make the decision I will go to her!). She had invited me out to her house to try her big machine anytime I wanted.

Well, this was the time. I had finished a 60 x 60" quilt which needed to be quilted. So, thought I, let's try the long arm machine and see what I can do with it on my own work and not just rambling around on a blank piece of muslin. Was I in for a learning curve! I have taught machine quilting for about 20 years but all of a sudden, moving the machine around was something different. Cheryl kept telling me I was doing really well for a first timer. I used the stitch regulator but didn't really like it so went to the non regulated stitching. The most important thing I learned was to shut off the machine when I needed to pause so it didn't keep on sewing!

What an adventure!

Cheryl has provided some pictures for your enjoyment! I'm surprised my tongue wasn't sticking out as it usually does when I am concerntrating. Anyway, I finished the quilting and then this evening, in front of the TV I did the unquilting so I can fix the major boo-boos on my machine.

Oh, and by the way, Cheryl quilts for other people, including Alex Anderson, so I know I have a good teacher!

time to blog again

I figured that I had better get on line with something or I will be kicked off the ring!

Have been really, really busy making some new art work. It is really different from what I have been doing but can't post a picture just yet since I haven't taken any. One piece is actually pieced!...silk...my hand dyed and black Thai silk. It is wonderful to touch! Another is a larger collaged piece. I have finished one Lutradur piece and have been doing a bunch of postcards. So, should get those posted in a day or two.

Just finished up an interview for Quilter's Newsletter...they will include it in the Meetin' Place section in the October issue.

Also received a wonderful bundle study from Sonji Hunt. It is part of an exchange we are doing...Now I just need to get hers off to her...told her I would today but it really looks like it will go tomorrow. I have been very guilty of fooling around today and not getting much done.

Thought I would give you something to ponder. This is from Matthew Fox in his book, Creativity.

"The liver cleanses and recyles. The artist, too, cleanses, and recycles the toxins in a culture. Artists turn pain into insight and struggle into triumph and darkness into light and ugliness into beauty and forgetfulness into remembering and grief into rejoicing. Artists add awe to awe and beauty to beauty and wonder to wonder. When the liver is healthy, the person is healthy. The artist is to the community or body politic what the liver is to the human body: a cleanser and reclyer of waste and toxins."

Now I thought this was very interesting in light of the conversation that has been ongoing on Art Quilter's Network...Joan Colvin once told me that she didn't think it was really necessary to put all of our angst out there for the public. She felt, and I agree, that we need more beauty in the world. Sometimes putting out public statements about inequities, or life's difficulties is really necessary but I don't know that I really want to share the angst that I have gone through.

Well, it's something to think about!

Interview Posted

Karen has finally finished with me...I can get really verbose!

The interview with the Center for the Quilt is in their Save Our Stories section.

Amazement

I am so absolutely amazed about how things are going with my art.

Karen Musgrave is almost finished with her on-line interview of me for the Quilt Alliance SOS. Why they chose to do me is beyond my comprehension but I sure am having fun doing it. I have a captive audience and she just keeps saying nice things about whatever it is that I dribble on with. Since I read Virginia's I feel like I am suffering from terminal diarrhea of the mouth. This goes along with the surprise when someone (a guild) is willing to pay me big dollars to talk about myself for an hour! Can life get any better?!!

Well, yes it can!


When I got home from taking my dad out and about, my husband indicated that the Textile Center in Minneapolis had called to tell me than they wouldn' t be able to return my quilt, Cross Roads 8, the Passion, to me. It took a minute for it to sink in. They sold it!

So much happening

Life has been so much fun! I'm not sure it can get any better!

The Alameda County Arts Commission has made the decision to purchase four of my works. On Good Friday, I went to the opening reception of the textile show at the Olive Hyde Gallery in Fremont, CA and met one of the commissioners from the Art commission. She said all sorts of positive things about my work. The curator of the show at the Gallery had recognized me and told me that the commissioner had wanted to talk to me. Boy, am I doing the schmoozing now!

The next week got the notification that they are purchasing the art. Trying to borrow Summer Fun from them for Quilter's Newsletter won't work. QNM said they would take slides of my work for publication...not sure if, when or where.

California Fiber Artists have been really busy getting shows together. One suddenly came up at a winery in the foothill country so had to get a piece off for them. There there are two more coming up very quickly, one in Half Moon Bay, and the other in Petaluma.

Then, of course, we had Holy Week. I was only able to get to a couple of the services but finished up with our Easter Vigil on Saturday night. The story of creation is told during that service and my six creation banners are taken off the wall and used to illustrate the story.

And then, I have just been working away...and away, and away. Can hardly find my studio and I had done some clean up before hand so I could do some work. I have the big quilt finished fusing but have decided that I want to add another 10 inches to it so it goes in the large art quilt category at shows where there is less competition (oh, did I let that secret out?) Have been working on post cards, some for my Art2Mail group and some for Virginia's Fiber Arts for a Cause. Virginia has also posted the pieces with prices for the reverse auction, also a fundraiser for the American Cancer Society.

I have spent all day (except for a trip out to the gym) in my studio...doing art? No way...doing email stuff, paying art bills, getting things promised off to people, and doing an interview with Karen Musgrave for the SOS (Save our Stories) with the Quilt Alliance. It is really an interesting project.


But I thought I would share some of my photos of my studio with piles of semi-finished things. Did get a lot of small pieces on to stretched black cotton on stretcher bars, now need to do the screw eyes and wiring. Have one piece that I am putting on to an off white heavy weave linen and need to stretch it and do the screw eyes, etc. And then there is a pile of pieces that have been finished except for sleaves and labels (nothing has labels right now!) And then there is the pile on the ironing board.

I Can't Believe It's Been Two Weeks

I have been sooooo busy I don't know which way is up! But a good busy!!

Went to ArtQuilt Claremont with Gerrie Congdon. Picked her up at the airport just after I dropped off my college roommate who visited for a couple of hours before having to leave.

Gerrie and I got settled in to our room.

You will notice that there are two laptops in this picture...woe be to us to not be connected. Of course, I didn't post anything while there but Gerrie was very good about letting every know what we were up to!

We were both in Jane Dunnewold's class. The entire floor was covered in blue tarp taped down with duct tape. The tables were covered in plastic. We each had our own eight foot table...didn't know what to do with so much room!

Jane had us up and running right away. Had to get fabrics ready for dying and seperated cotton from silk and rayon going in the cotton pots. It was so confusing...we were supposed to get at least all six colors but you can see that I didn't quite get there. There was so many people trying to get stuff in to the dye pots that I couldn't figure out which pots I had put mine in. Then it was time to start carving stamps out of plastic errasers...what fun...I did that everytime I had a few minutes. Then off to lunch, back to wash out our fabric and we just kept on going. Working on over dyeing, stamping with our stamps, re-folding the fabric for over dyeing, getting our silk screens taped and washed, creating stencils using fusible interfacing with netting in between which was all covered with latex house paint to make a stiff stencil. Then made a permanent screen design and got busy silk screening, stenciling and stamping everything under the sun!

Got home and had to just take a break for a day and then the next day I started making silk screens using my thermofax...boy have I made silk screens...I think about 25 different ones. Well, then I had to start using them and the next day was busy screening ink and the waiting until the next day to start on discharging, using Soft Scrub through the silk screen.

This is a piece of fabric that I did a discharge on just to check out the screens. One is a brush stroke that I had done on a screen and the other is one of several images from Dover of Greek women...I see a new series coming!

This leaf piece is a small piece of Thai silk that I dyed, folded, over-dyed, stamped, and then stamped with adhesive and foiled. I love the colors in this.

Got some interesting mail yesterday. A big envelope from Primedia Publishing came, asking for me to send my quilt, Summer Fun, to them for photography as they are considering using it in their publication. More than that, I don't know. (Primedia publishes Quilter's Newsletter Magazine, Quilt Maker, and McCall's Quilting, as well as Sew News) I have a problem though, the quilt is currently with the Alameda County Arts Commission for consideration for purchase. I should find out tomorrow if the Arts Commission is going to purchase it and several others they have or not. If they do, I will have to ask if I can borrow it for a month while it goes to Primedia. such problems...I know! LOL!

I am so happy that the Fiber Arts for a Cause that Virginia Spiegel has been doing as a fund raiser for the American Cancer Society had done so well at Chicago. She told me that mine sold pretty quickly.

I have just sent her the jpg of the quilt, Spring Day, which will be on the reverse auction on her website. I had told everyone that another quilt would be going but Virginia liked this one best. It is 16" by 19".

Meanwhile, I have had several contacts from various placing to see if I could come and give a lecture and/or a workshop. I would like to do about six or so a year which would help my income but not keep me out of the studio for too long.

I'm working on another fused piece which will be considerably larger than Spring Day. The title is really about what we haven't seen since December, except for one day increments every once in a while. Rain, rain, go away, come again another day. The deer bed down in the hills right close to the freeway because the grass is so tall you can't see them. Oh well...of to work I go again.

lots of pictures!

This is a photo of a joshua tree in the Tehachipi Mountains in southern California taken as we whizzed by on our way home.
And these are three pictures of the wind generators along the Altamont Pass about 20 miles from where we live, also on our way home. The sky was beautiful in its stormy state.

This is the piece I will be donating for the reverse auction at Fiber Art for a Cause to raise money for the American Cancer Society. You can find information about this at Virginia Spiegel's web site. It is 18" x 22".

It is a piece done with disperse dyes on to polyester...don't let poly fool you...it feels exactly like silk and acts just as slippery.

This is a piece that is really square and that I am in the process of quilting via small zig zag stitching around all of the shapes. This is also small....16" x 19"












And this is a piece in progress. I am using the fabrics I dyed a month ago. I also use Esterita Austin's Misty Fuse which I really like. I have ordered a large sheet of teflon that will be 72" x 36" so that I can iron the fusing on in large pieces and not have to pull off the teflon and then iron some more. I am having a lot of fun with this piece figuring out what to do next, cutting out little pieces, pulling out more colors and watching it grown. So far it is about 33" x 37"...if I give it water and food, I'm sure it will grow some more.

On Friday I will see my college room mate (another artist) when she flies in...I'll pick her up at the airport and we can visit for about three hours and then I return her to the airport so she can catch the van to her conference. But...I'm not done yet! I then pick up Gerrie Congdon who is flying in from Portland for Art Quilt Claremont where we are both taking a class from Jane Dunnewold. I had initially planned to be a day student since I live about 20 minutes from the Hotel Claremont. But then I started thinking about how tired I get and that I would be coming home after dinner and need to be there before breakfast...so I decided to get a room and asked for a room mate...Gerrie had also asked for a room mate and when I found out it was her I was very excited and emailed her right away.

I am very fond on Gerrie. Several years ago we were both in an Empty Spools seminar with Nikki Bonnet. When Nikki came in to the classroom, Gerrie asked to see the class list and then commented that "Liz Berg is in the class!" I didn't have a clue as to who she was and she obviously didn't know me in person, just my work. That was the first time someone had heard of me. So, being sly, I asked her how she knew Liz Berg and she replied that she was a great fiber artist whose work was just wonderful. Well, with my head in the clouds, I had to admit that I was she...what fun! She sure made my day!

Article finished

I got the second part of the Art of Abstraction finished today for Quilting Arts Magazine. What a relief! I did a number of small pieces to go with it to use to discuss the principles of design. I hope it is understandable.

I have been at work on this for the past three days solid. I had started the article while I was in Phoenix but was so sick the entire time that I couldn't get any of the work done and until I had, I couldn't finish the article. Got back and had to get everything together for the quilt show.

Now I feel like a big load is off my back!

Tonight is the opening of the Traditions Transformed Contemporary Quilt Exhibition at the Textile Center Joan Mondale Gallery in Minneapolis, MN. Jan Myers-Newberry was the juror and I feel so honored to be in that show. Work from only eleven artists was selected. Sure would have loved to have gone to the opening tonight!

But got another rejection for another show...you get accepted in some and some don't understand why they should have your work. Oh well, got to go through all those calls for entry to see what I should be entering in...such work!

Glory Daze

Well, I have finished vending at the East Bay Heritage Quilters Show in Oakland this week. I made major use of my quilt on the cover of Quilting Arts. My booth had hand dyed fat quarters, embellishing yarns and about ten of my quilts which were hanging on the walls, plus other small pieces matted and in the bin, framed or stitched on to cotton duck and stretched on stretcher bars.

One wall had my quilt from the cover hanging, the magazine up on the wall and the two small pieces, the mailboxes and the kelp, pieces on the same wall. Boy did that draw a crowd! I was just glowing in the positive thoughts and comments from everyone. Of course, I told everyone that that quilt on the cover was looking for a new home! Someone bought the kelp piece and hadn't seen the magazine so she was off to find a copy so she would have it to go with the mounted piece.

I must say, it was great fun! Both days! On Saturday, our list mom, Diane came by and said all sorts of good things and it just went on from there. And then people started telling me that Diane had written about the cover in her blog so last night I was reading everyone's blogs, starting with hers! That was so sweet of her to do! I haven't even gotten the cover up on my blog yet.

People would stop, look at the quilt, say they had seen it somewhere and then it would dawn on them when they saw the cover. I have received so many compliments on the quilt and the cover and even from the people who have read the article! Some have even said they can hardly wait to read the next one (guess I better get writting!)

Then this morning I did a demonstartion of surface design with found objects (yes, Rayna Gilman, I know that is your thing!) for a hour and a half. That was lots of fun. I had recently found a really neat drain trap to print from and of course everyone loved my plastic hot pad with the waves...they also come with bubbles/circles! Had lots of fun showing how to do the monoprints and pull off textures with all the items, too.

Didn't sell very much, did make my expenses but not alot more, but did make lots of contacts and had lots of people talking to me and wanting to know about classes. I was smart and brought my teaching brochures with me! Smart for once!

Gwen Marstan and Freddy Moran were both there doing a demonstration on their work and talked about their new book coming out. Gwen spent a lot of time looking at my work and talking with me...made me feel important!

Got my postcards off to Virginia yesterday.

After taking my dad around for his errands tomorrow, I start making art for the new article...have part of it written so the rest is about the art and how to use all those principles of design! I'll make artists out of everyone yet!

Here I Am!

Just got ten postcards finished for Virginia Spiegle's Art for a Cause for the American Cancer Society to sell at the Chicago show. They are all "Study in Orange" and were done with a monoprint, then rubbings, stamping, fused shiny organza and then satin stitched.

I've been in Phoenix for two weeks and have been really sick with a cold. So, things that I had planned to do while I was gone I wasn't able to do except to take new work to the Textures Gallery in Scottsdale.

The past two weeks

Spring has sprung but this is two weeks ago when we were having 70 degree weather. Now we are down in the 50's. I know that isn't very cold to those of you who are still in the snow but it is cold to us here in the San Francisco Bay Area!

Couldn't do any dyeing outside because it was too cold and I don't have the space inside to do flat dyeing so it was low water emersion dyeing...about 100 yards as I have a show where I am vending....why do I do this?

The dyeing part isn't so bad...just the wasing out and the ironing...oh the ironing!

Piles and piles of cotton, silk, rayon and linen. Love the textures and can hardlyl wait to play with them.


And then I have about twenty things I have been playing with with disperse dyes...these two are only 8 x 11 but I do have one that is about 30 x 40 that I still have to quilt, as well as a lot more that are all in-between sizes...just having fun with this. The photos are really bad and out of shape as I just took snapshots of them.

















But this is what I have really been doing...discharging various black fabrics and this is the first piece I have done with the discharged stuff. It is a piece of fabric with lutradur behind it which has become a support for the very heavy satin stitching. Then, I stitched cording with the same thread as the satin stitching and added it on after the entire piece was quilted. But it is sewn down in places so is three dimensional and is really cool! This has been so much fun to do! This piece is about 40 x 30 or so.

So, got to go pack and get ready for a trip to Phoenix...