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Archive for the ‘Quilt Shows’ Category

Living Life in the Fast Lane

Thursday, September 24th, 2015

treequiltatexpo

It has been one of those weeks. I am working on a new landscape quilt whenever I can fit it in. I had a wellness check with my doctor on Monday and lunch with Lisa and Clay. On Tuesday, I had a meeting at Trinity to make plans for out multi-generational classes for this coming year. Yesterday, I spent the morning at the Expo Center hanging the new Oregon SAQA exhibit. That is Kristin LaFlamme in the first photo, hanging my Ode to a Tree Quilt.

Today, I spent most of the day at the show, looking at quilts, shopping and working at the guild booth. The guild has an exhibit titled a river runs through it. I have two quilts in the show. Here are a couple by Terry Grant and I, hanging together. These quilts have been out an about before, but fit the theme. I was disappointed with how this show was hung.

GECTGriverquilts

Here is my old friend, Meander, in the show.

meanderriverquilt

Here are the results of my retail therapy:

Some lovely hand dyed cottons from my friend Maureen from California. These will fill in some holes in my stash.

handdyesfromMaureen

 

This is a fat quarter bundle of Marcia Derse designed fabrics. She creates one of a kind prints and then they are reproduced as a fabric line by her. Love these colors.

marciadersebrownfabrics

This is a blurry photo of the landscape quilt I am working on.

landscape2015

Here is the zigzag free motion stitching that I have done.

freemotionzigzag

 

I think I will do some hand stitching. I found some perle cotton at the show and also some teal thread for the sky.

landscapethread

My Sky Blue Pink quilt made it to New York and has a spot on the exhibit postcard.

SPUN2015Postcard_Front_FINAL

SPUN2015 postcard back_FINALTomorrow, I will be hanging out at home, waiting for my new iPhone and quilting the landscape.

Quilt Knit Stitch- See the Quilts I Loved

Monday, August 17th, 2015

qksredapplequilt

I know I have been missing in action, but for a good cause. I helped to coordinate an information table at Quilt Knit Stitch 2015 for Surface Design Association. We set it up on Wednesday and the show ran Thursday – Saturday. We had a display of swatches of samples of surface design techniques by our members and lots of journals to peruse.

QKSSDAtable

 

The opening quilt up above was in the red quilt show that debuted in Houston. I liked the more modern versions of the red quilts. That one was made by Betty Hahn, an artist that I really admire.

qksredapplemaker

Here is another innovative red quilt.

qksredquilt

qksredquiltmaker

We were next to an exhibit of work by students in Jane Dunnewold’s master class. Some of these pieces were my favorites in the show. Here are some I especially liked.

qkspoppies

This piece was so gorgeous – hand dyed and discharged and some applique of poppy heads.

qkspoppymaker

qksstoryhasholes

The hand stitching on this is really lovely. It has sections of hand-dyed gauze laminated to the surface. It needs to be seen up close.

qksherstoryhasholessign

qksjanefeatherstudy

This is one of Jane’s pieces that is digitally manipulated and printed by Spoonflower and then quilted.

qksjaneduunewoldsign

qksuntitled3qksuntitled2qksuntitled1

These 3 pieces had such gorgeous surface design.

qksuntitledmaker

qksgraffiti

Another gorgeous piece with surface treatment.

qksgraffitimaker

Here are some other random pieces in the traveling special exhibits.

qksdennisleaf

Sue Dennis of Australia makes such lovely quilts using leaves. She does rubbings, printing and applique.

qksleafmaker

qkssafeharbor

Another fabulous quilt by Betty Hahn. It is painted!

qkssafeharbormaker

qksbigpink

This is a small modern quilt with Big Pink, our iconic building here in Portland.

qksbigpinkmaker

I always love a Betty Busby quilt. This one was in the SAQA Redirecting the Ordinary exhibit.

qksbusbycorrosionsigh

qksbusbycorrosion

My regular readers may recognize this as the big sister to a SAQA auction quilt that I purchased.

qksbeyondwords

qksbeyondwordsmaker

 

And here is the little sister.

 

 

Lombrozo

Hope you enjoyed this sampling of quilts from Quilt Knit Stitch.

Oops! I Forgot to Blog…

Sunday, January 25th, 2015

onefootfigure

It has been a busy week! I had a SAQA meeting on Wednesday and lots of SDA work. Here is an update on the drawing class. We had our last session this week and he showed us how to draw the whole body and show different postures. Drawing a skellie first can help you get the right angles on the body parts. For instance, the above drawing was taken from this skellie.

skellie

Did you know that the perfect proportioned body is 8 heads tall, but most of us are 7 – 7 1/2. The torso is two heads, the pelic area is one head and the legs are 4 heads. So you can take a piece of paper and divide it into 8 portions to draw your pefect human specimen. The photo’s perspective is off because the drawing was on the table.

8headfigure2

Another interesting fact is that an infant is 3 heads tall. Many paintings of babies have the head too small. As a child grows, the number of heads change. We also practiced other figure positions. This one is supposed to be standing on his right foot.

leaningfigure

Here is another figure that I did.

8headstall

I doubt that I will be doing a lot of figure drawing, but I so enjoyed this process.  It has made me look at figures in paintings with a whole new eye. Next week, we start reduction printing. I am going to assist the teacher. I hope I get to participate, too.

I was able to get to the studio one day and made a lot of progress getting the fabric stash under control. I also painted some silk samples. I think I am going to paint silk for my solo show instead of dyeing. I worry about the cool weather and getting the depth of color that I want. I used Jacquard’s Dynaflow paint on silk charmeuse and silk/cotton blend. I decided that I like the heavier weight charmeuse best. It is on the second fabric, below.

silkpainttest1

wilkpainttest2

So, today, I ordered 15 yards of silk charmeuse from Dharma and copious amounts of Dynaflow paint. I can’t wait until it gets here.

Thursday was Mr C’s 75th birthday. On Friday night we went out with Jack and Steph to a marvelous French restaurant in our neighborhood where we had a most excellent meal. Then we had birthday cheesecake back at The Congdo with M & M. It is always fun to catch up with these two and hear how well they are doing in school and life.

My new glasses came in early and I must say, they have really made a difference. So  happy to be done with the eye strain and headaches. Who knew?? LOL

Yesterday, Terry Grant and I drove south about an hour and so to see the Stitches in Bloom show at the Oregon Garden. We both had work in the show. It was an interesting show with art quilts and traditional quilts sharing the same crowded space. There were quite a few vendors selling quilt fabric and notions. We had a nice lunch at the resort restaurant and then listened to a lecture by Cynthia Corbin from the Seattle area. I so love her work. Click here for a look at her website, if you are not familiar with her work. She has great sense of humor, too. I am looking forward to her workshop with the guild in March.

Here is a blurry photo of my leaf quilt at the show.

blurryleafphoto

It was a beautiful day to drive through the bucolic Oregon countryside. We saw Mt. Hood showing itself in all different directions.

mtHoodjan15

My goal for tomorrow is to do some more work in the studio and quilt my January EB piece.

 

No Rest for the Weary

Saturday, September 27th, 2014

GECatNWExpo

Well, I am not that weary, but fortunately, I recovered from my sinus infection and taking care of M & M so that I could keep up with my busy schedule this past week. On Tuesday, I went out to the Expo Center to help hang the SAQA Oregon Show, Exploring Layers. On Wednesday, I was busy, busy doing my left brain SDA work. On Thursday, I went back out to the opening of NW Quilt Expo. I spent a couple of hours at the Columbia FiberArts Guild table, showing some member’s work and promoting the guild. Then, I gave a docent talk for the SAQA show. That is me with my quilt, Walking With Scooter and Mr. C. That quilt has really been getting around.

On Friday, I finally got to my studio to start some clean up and to work on my latest Printed Fabric Bee piece. The queen this month is Leslie Jennison who has asked for Urban Surfaces -think about layered textures of old walls, peeling paint, graffiti, etc., on building walls. I was trying to decide what piece of fabric to use as my base for printing and had an epiphany as I was falling asleep or waking up. (Always get my best ideas, then.) I had done some shibori folds on some cotton scarves that I bought from Darma. They looked horrible – what was I thinking horrible. Here is one of them, dampened and ready to be tortured some more. I will only say that my first step was to paint over the whole thing with diluted black Jacquard DynaFlow paint. I will show the final result in a few days.

 

whatwasithinkingscarf

Intermission: Time to stop, make dinner and go to the symphony.

Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg played a violin concerto by Shostakovich. Fantastic concert.

And, I am back!

While at the quilt show, I found my favorite booth with hand-dyes from Maureen Schmidt – a friend from Sonoma County. I bought two packs of neutrals – one, warm and one, cool. High Fiber Diet has neutral as the theme for next year.

neutralfabrics1

neutralfabrics2

And I also found some Radiance (cotton/silk blend) in colors that will be perfect for the commission I am working on.

 

radiancefabrics

This is the gorgeous nuno felted backdrop that my friend, Maris Cavanaugh, made for the guild fashion show.

marisfeltedbackgroundLast, but not least, I finally got to use my new studio tool – an Oliso Smart Iron.

olisoiron

When it is plugged in, it pops up on it’s legs. When you hold it to iron, the legs disappear, but as soon as you let go of it, up it pops. It has a long cord and it goes off after 30 minutes when not in use, unlike most irons, which last for only 7 -8 minutes. I love its bright sunny color.

Quilt Knit Stitch and More

Sunday, August 17th, 2014

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This was a happy week here in Portlandia. My art quilt daughter, Kristin La Flamme, was in town and stayed with us for a few days and it was the debut of Quilt Knit Stitch in Portland. It is the latest Quilts, Inc show which included more than quilts — knitting, crocheting, fashion shows, etc. It really was a good show, but the attendance was not what was expected. The quilts part of it was much smaller than you see at Houston and there were some exhibits just for this show. One was with a theme of roses since this is the City of Roses. The show will be back next year and I hope it gets more publicity going and the attendance improves.

On Tuesday, I had volunteered to help set up the SAQA exhibit and Kristin came along to help. You can see us hanging a sampling of this year’s auction quilts that were on display. SAQA had two of their special exhibits there: Metaphors of Aging and Text Messages. Many people who had not seen art quilts like this before and they were quite taken with the stories that accompanied them.

On Thursday, we had STASH at Gale’s house and we helped Reva get started tying her huge t-shirt quilt. Here we are, stitching away. It was meditative, but hard on the back.

 

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On Friday, we were off to QKS. Kristin was doing docenting in the SAQA exhibits and I was  intermittently schmoozing at the SAQA table, checking out exhibits and shopping in the vendor area.

It was fun to see our fellow Twelve by 12 member, Terri Stegmiller, who was visiting her aunt who lives here. We were able to get a selfie.

3twelvesselfie

I bought some dye-painted tencil yarn to knit a shrug for myself. I saw it hanging in my friend, Teresa Ruch’s booth and I had to make one too.

knittedshrug

Here is the yarn that I bought.

paintedtencelyarn

I also bought a set of celtic style alphabet woodblocks. I am going to use these in my next Printed Fabric Bee project.

 

 

print-alphabet-283x3001

 

 

It was fun to stop by Marcia Derse’s booth and look at her fabrics. She does printing and discharging on hand-dyed fabrics and then they are commercially printed. I don’t buy her fabric because I like to print my own, but I love to look at what she has done.She has wonderful colors and designs. She just moved from Ohio to Whidby Island and says that she loves it here in the North West.

marciadersefabrics

On Saturday, we jumped on the street car again and went back to the show to hear Marci Rae McDade, SDA Journal editor, talk about the exhibit she curated at the Hap Gallery, which includes one of Kristin’s Army Aprons. This is a synopsis of the show.

Hap Gallery is pleased to present Fail-Safe: Discomforts Close to Home, a group exhibition of contemporary textile and fiber-based artists curated by Marci Rae McDade. The show features a range of art forms made with seemingly safe and comforting materials from everyday life that are loaded with incendiary content. Each object reflects an aspect of anxiety, discontent, and longing in the 21st century, from poverty and racism to mortality and digital disconnect. These potent works compel viewers to take stock of the world today as we collectively contemplate our futures.

On Saturday night, Marci hosted a reception at the gallery so Mr C, Kristin and I went down on the street car. I really enjoyed seeing the show. Such a variety of work. I got a couple of photos. This is of Marci and Kristin, with her apron on a manikin in the back. It is knitted from undershirts that her husband wore during his deployments. You can see a better photo of this and more of her work in the Army Wife series, here.

marciandkristin

I loved this piece that was thread painted and the pieces were hung to give a 3-D effect.

theadpaintedchair

I also love an exhibit of miniature clothes hand sewn from clothing of deceased people. They are done as a memorial for loved ones to keep. They were exquisitely done.

And so that is what I have been up to. Kristin left at 3 am this morning and now it is quiet around here and I am trying to catch my breath before the next big event in my life.