Checking in...

It has been over a month since I had a blog-post.

I have been working, just not at my computer much...

The Kentucky Artisan Center in Berea, KY sent a call to artists for pieces in their spring show, "About Face."

The art, not just quilts, was to be based on the human face. I chose to do a piece inspired by this painting "Senecio" (old man) by Paul Klee, whose work I love.

I have this print hanging in my house, and love it. So I did a small quilt, about 18" x 18" in cottons, some hand-dyed.

For my background, I stayed in the palette of the painting, but branched out with the colors in the face.

I was happy that it was chosen to be in the show. The show opened in March, and there was a reception in the gallery, at which many of the artists were present, and were given the opportunity to say something about their work.

I really liked the show, and will get to go back and see it again in a few weeks. It will be up until August 2012.

I also pulled this rooster out of my unfinished stack. I started it before Christmas, and my goal was to do a rooster using marbled fabrics. Even the "grass" area in the picture is an Indian fabric, lovely pastel colors on marbled fabric.

Something happened when I was finished with the rooster! A bunch of "Eggberts" showed up. I had some fabric with marbled eggs, and it came to the surface, and before I knew it, there were 9 little eggberts running around on the quilt.

So it became a sort of Easter quilt! Lots of fun for me.

This past Saturday, I invited several friends from my Thursday night group to my sewing room for a get-t0gether. It was a lot of fun. Not sure how much work we got done, but the conversation was good, and it was very inspiring and energizing.

A good side effect was the fact that I did some cleaning and organizing in my work area, so people would have room to spread their things out as we talked about them. The group will be coming back in a couple of weeks!

Quilt from a Sketch

Our Monday night art quilt group is now meeting on Thursday night at the neighborhood library since the fabric store has closed. We are hoping that the store will be bought soon , and will reopen; we are also hoping that the new owner will welcome our group to have our meetings there again.

There is certainly benefit for everyone... the shop provides good display space for our work, as well as a comfortable and attractive place to meet. And the people who attend the meetings inevitable buy fabric and books, so it is a win-win situation for everyone... The former owner of the shop is a member of our group, and now she will have the time and energy to join our challenges and activities...

This month, our challenge is based on the challenge in the current issue of the Quilting Arts magazine. We brought sketches in, and people drew a sketch at random. each person participating in the challenge will make a small quilt (around 8" x 10" ) based on the sketch.

the sketch I ended up with is a simple sketch of a tree, with circles, which could be fruit or flowers. I actually made three little quilts.

The first two were done with scraps of lime green and black fabric.

I love making things from scraps. I have a whole bag full of leftover fabric that hash been fused, and I used some of those scraps for the circles...

For the third one, I pulled some of my favorite fabrics from my drawer of polka-dot fabric, and had fun with the contrast in the background and design.

This was a lot of fun. From a simple drawing, I got a lot of entertainment, and the opportunity to complete some quick little projects.

Show and Tell is always fun when we have a challenge. The challenge here was working from a drawing by someone else. It will also be fun to see the pieces done from the sketches I took.

About Face

I haven't posted anything for two months. This time, I have been working, but can't post pictures yet. I am working on a quilt for the "Ultimate Guild Challenge", with the possibility that it could get accepted to the AQS show in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

"Challenge" is the right word for it! Against my better judgement, the group chose to have the finished quilts measure 36" x 48"

For a novice machine quilter without a longarm machine, that has turned out to be a real task for me to get quilted. I loved the design work, and loved choosing the fabrics, but now I am starting to quilt it, and that is when it stopped being fun!

Nevertheless, I did get an invitation a while back to submit a piece for the Kentucky Artisan Center's annual show. Each year, they announce a theme, and the show is open to all artists living in Kentucky. It is my favorite kind of show to be in - all media are invited, so the show is an interesting mix of pieces based on a theme.

Two years ago, the theme was "Black and White" and I had a piece in that - Japanese Snow Cranes in black and white silk. Last year, the theme was horses, in honor of the International Equestrian Games being held in Kentucky.

This year the theme is 'Faces" ; art based on the human face.

That is something I have avoided until now. In my house, I have a room with many images of faces - masks, woodcuts, prints, and photographs. In it, I have a print of one of my favorite paintings - "Senecio" by Paul Klee.

That is what I chose to base my quilt on.

It is an interpretation, does not violate any copyright laws...

First, here is a copy of the print. ("Senecio" means "old man")

Next, here is my quilt "Young Man." It is about 16" x 16", and is commercial cottons and batiks, and hand-dyed cottons. The background is pieced, and the head and face are fused...

The show starts in early March, and continues until August. The Artisan Center is just off of I-75, south of Richmond Kentucky at the first Berea exit. It is definitely worth a trip! I am looking forward to the show...