Art in the Dark

Music by candlelight. I encourage people to feel my work, but not usually to feel their way through the rooms displaying my work! The reception last night was a smashing success (if 3 cubes of cheese and a strawberry with a nibble out of it being the only leftovers is any guage) even without power. We had just gotten into the rhythm of things good when the lights went out. The power actually went out in the entire downtown area. They say this is only the second times that's happened in years. So of course it happens during the reception. Carmen and Ann calmly began passing out candles and people just chatted with whomever was standing next to them. I did my "elevator pitch" for the allotted 3 minutes then the party continued as usual. The surprising thing is that nobody left right away. And people continued to arrive. I'm not sure exactly what I expected from an artist reception (this is my first, remember) but if they're all like this one I think I'm going to become like those old ladies who show up at all the wakes. I'll just make the rounds every week to all the opening receptions for artists all over town. Carmen and Anne made things unbelivably easy and (other than the power) the evening went off without a hitch. As a testament to their calm approach and composure, I only worried about the whole open flame + melted wax + quilts thing for about 30 seconds.

For those of you without the inclination to buy a quilt, you should check out Carmen's new "Blues Tapestry" candle creation! I felt so honored by her doing that.

Many thanks to everyone who showed up, whether I knew you or not, and to Kenta for the incredible food, and most especially to Carmen and Anne.

Hollow cube quilt blocks

Speaking of copyright, I've noticed over the last year or so that one of the most common search strings that shows up on my site meter is for the hollow cube block. The actual pattern can be found in Sara Nephew's Big Book of Building Block Quilts. The pattern was designed by her and is still under copyright to her. The only way to legally get a copy is to buy the book (or draft your own pattern for it), so you won't be seeing the instructions on my blog. The books aren't really expensive (under $15) and, judging by the interest in the pattern, well worth the money if you want to use it in one of your own quilts. I found copies for sale on a bunch of different sites so it isn't hard to find.

The Natchez gathering

The meeting went well and I always love seeing the people I only get to see at the gatherings. Broach did a short segment on copyright (a subject near and dear to my heart as most of you know) and ironically, the pictures for the newspaper article in the Natchez Democrat were taken during that segment. I say ironically because, although NOBODY asked my permission, my picture is in there anyway. Complete with misspelled first AND last name. I can only recall one instance in my entire life when I was ASKED that I refused to allow a picture to be published and I had a very good reason that time. It's not whether you will or won't grant permission, it's the fact that you should be ASKED, especially by a supposedly professional media outlet. I'm still considering whether to write a letter to the editor or something about it because it really got under my skin. I know it sounds picky as hell, but I AM picky as hell about copyright and public domain and all that other stuff. Maybe it wouldn't matter to me as much if the piece they so thoughtfully published a picture of wasn't a potential competition entry (yeah, one that prohibits prior publication) that I'm also drafting a pattern of for sale. I had half a dozen quilts with me and if they had only asked I'd have been happy for them to take a picture....just not of THAT quilt. I have no idea how many shots the photographer took since I was sitting next to the door and he was shooting from the door into the room. It's not like he didn't get a chance to ask me either, since we spoke outside as he was leaving. He didn't mind telling me he was off to power lifting, but it was too much trouble to ask if he could use the photo?

OK. Rant over. Well, probably not, but at least on the blog for now.

Anyway, the article is at http://www.natchezdemocrat.com/news/2008/feb/17/quilters-gather-natchez/ along with the pictures. Did they ask any of the other quilters for permission? Bobbie? Dee? Anyone? I'd copy and paste the entire article but that would be violating their copyright, so you have to go look for yourself.

Y'all come!

I picked up the postcards for the show yesterday and I feel like a little kid at Christmas! What a rush to see a picture of one (actually, two) of my quilts with my name and "Artist Reception" right there on the card! Anne at ARTichoke did a beautiful job on getting the card laid out and I love the font she used. She watermarked the smaller quilt on the back so it is a shadow sort of effect of the actual quilt. I'm very happy with the look of it though. When she was working on it, she just started poking keys on the computer and all of a sudden, voila', there it was! I was soooo impressed. It puts my cut and paste skills to shame to see a true master at work with photoshop. Besides forcing me to actually finish the quilts I start, this project has made me get at least a little bit better at getting some pictures of my work. Tripod, high res shots, lighting, that sort of thing. I tend to take crappy pictures since I already know what the pieces look like. Maybe my brain extrapolates the intimate details onto the rudimentary photos so I "see" what I know is there. I need to pay more attention to getting pictures that let other people see it too. Well, for everything but the glitches. No close ups of the unmatched points or crossed stipple lines anyway.

Without further ado........

I hope to see everyone there! (Wine will be involved.)

Oxford Piecemakers and other stuff

What a great group of quilters! 17 students in the embellishment class Saturday and a big turn-out for the regular meeting following the class. I LOVE working with a group of people who are willing to just jump right in and go with the flow. I heard very few "that's not how it's done" comments and a lot of "what if" comments. My kind of class! The members came well-prepared with stuff to use, and open minds and curiosity. Can't ask for any better than that. Every time I leave after teaching I wonder if the students have gotten as much out of the class as I have. I often get follow-up emails with questions or comments and I love those since it gives me a little more direction for the next class I teach. Things that need to be expanded on or clarified.

An evening of visiting and playing and eating with my lovely hostess Jane, and Sonia, Linda and Dana as co-conspirators. (Hi, Butch!) I love the give and take and sharing when a group of quilters get together. And what was supposed to be a quick stop by the local bead shop turned into an hour of show and tell with the owner. A quick stop by the outlet mall in Batesville turned into a $100 shopping spree too, but I got some grown-up clothes so it wasn't wasted. The day was beautiful, the drive was nice, and it was good to get home. My hub says I need to charge enough to cover the cost of boarding my cat when I'm gone overnight since he (the cat, not the hub) wanders the house screaming the entire time I'm gone.

And news on the home front....my "spare" son, Nick, has joined the Marines! He leaves for boot camp on the 25th and graduates at the end of May. I WILL be at his graduation! My friend has just moved to SC so I will make a double-duty road trip out there. I'll cry at the graduation, but I'm so proud of him I could pop. As the hub said last night, I couldn't love him any more than I would if he was my own. There's just something very special about him and I want him to make the most of his gifts. And a week with Vicki, playing in her new studio is like heaven on earth. The timing is good too, since the arts festivals I'm lined up to do will be over (maybe I'll make enough to cover expenses for the trip) and so far, I have nothing else planned right away. It's also a great excuse to visit Fiber on a Whim on my way through Atlanta.

Still tired from the drive yesterday so I'm just rambling sort of scatter-shot, but I'm trying to post more often (for myself, not my visitors) and the best way to do that is just to sit down and do it.

If anyone knows a group that would be interested in a short presentation or workshop between here and S.C. during the last 2 weeks of May, let me know. I plan to take my time and do what I want on the trip. I've never actually planned a trip like that!

Lots of stuff to finish and details to tie up in the next week before the show hangs, so I better get at it.

Oh yeah, in case there is anyone who would like a postcard for the show, just email me your snail mail addy. They aren't worth anything, I'm just so excited to have them I'm willing to mail one to anybody who is interested!

I am the Taxman

Another one I just HAD to make, unsewn sleeves and labels be damned! The houndstooth check was the genesis for this one (spotted in the remnant bin while having the expensive stuff cut) and it just went from there. Figuring out how to do the continuous line treble clefs too longer than the pattern and appliqueing did! After MANY false starts (everything from Celtic bias to satin stitch) I finally landed on exactly what I wanted with machine cording. It's simply 1/4" bias strips run through the rolled hem foot with a medium zig zag, then stitched down with the same zig zag. Works like a charm and is just the look and size I was shooting for.

Travelin' Blues

This one is big enough to be an actual lap quilt! It started out with just playing with the combinations of fabrics from one step to the next, and this is what it turned into. I originally wanted a red-orange flange but the hot pink just spoke to me. I'll probably use it for the binding too and I'm going to play with a variegated pink thread to see if it works for the quilting.

Another one bites the dust!

This time, it was a heavy duty Sunbeam, auto shut off, stainless steel sole plate, burst of steam. I'm reduced to using the light weight Proctor Silex that barely gets hot enough to melt fusible, but it has a purdy purple water tank! Be grateful for the small things.

OK....Anne is working on the postcards for the show and I get so excited every time I think of it I giggle. The little bit of it that I've seen looks great, and I am in extremely capable hands with her doing the graphics for it. Snap, snap, snap. Just like that she slaps something together that would take me months (if ever!) to do and it looks great!

I'm posting a few of the new quilts, in various stages of completion, just because that's what bloggers do. We post pictures. I have pictures of my cats and dogs and a couple of the snow we got the other day, but I figure the quilts are more appropriate for a QUILT blog. But maybe that's just me.

No particular order, and I'm leaving off all the usual info (size, techniques, etc) that I usually include because I'm just flat-out lazy today and figure I'll come back and put all that stuff in after I get final pictures when they're completed.

Pinecone quilt

This is what I am doing, instead of what I should be doing. I'm using 4" squares for the prairie points, rather than the traditional 3" squares. I don't mind making a nod towards very traditional, but I'm not crazy! Well, other than stopping in the middle of some hellacious deadlines to do a pinecone quilt, I'm not crazy. Like I didn't have anything else to do today to get my stuff ready. It's sort of a reward for totally finishing a Charley Patton piece yesterday (except the label) and getting one of the shadow instrument pieces hand quilted. YES! I did say HAND QUILTED. Sort of. Small stitches that show through individually to the front in a gold metallic thread. And the same gold metallic for an outline around the black silhouette. You'll see it on the postcard! (The response when I emailed the image was "All I can say is ......WOW!" so I was happy about that.) I'll try to get the pic of "Patton's Pieces" up soon. Or maybe not.

So far, this one is 16" and will probably finish out around 24" if things go as planned. Commercial cotton Mardi Gras prints.

Hellzapoppin!

"Overwhelmed" is the word for the day (week, month, whatever.) I'm off to Greenwood Monday morning for the Grand Opening of Hoover's Kitchen, and a presentation of my work to Sylvester Hoover, for exhibit and possible purchase of some. Sylvester owns and runs DeltaBluesLegendsTours.com and is interested in putting some of my stuff in their gallery. I'll also get to see Dr. Marvin Haire again, which I'm looking forward to. I got invited to exhibit at the Brick Street Fine Arts Festival in Clinton (I think I already posted about that) and got another invitation yesterday to exhibit at the Crossties Art and Jazz Festival in Cleveland, MS in May. Teaching at the new quilt shop, quiltartsonline.com and a couple of presentations for local guilds. A workshop in Oxford in Feb, MQA meeting in Natchez and hanging the quilts at ARTichoke. The reception will be Feb 21, from 6-8 pm. I have a break for most of March and then the editor of the Japanese Quilting magazine will be here on April 15 to interview me and Gwen Magee and Dorinda Evans on her whirlwind tour through the state. We each have a different aspect of quilting that she's interested in.

I'm feeling sort of schizophrenic with the current work I'm producing, but it's been a kind of serendipity how it's working out. The show at ARTichoke is specifically Blues music-themed stuff, but I have to sort of switch back and forth between other things too so I don't get burned out. My switches have just happened to be towards jazz and some New Orleans stuff, and then the Art and Jazz festival invitation came so it works out that I won't have every single thing that's finished all hanging in one place. I'm hoping to actually have enough finished that I have a choice of pieces to hang together. That whole "body of work" thing, donchaknow?

And totally off the subject, but on my mind, would those of you who show prefer being in an invitational show, or getting juried into a competition? Which one is more exciting to you?

Cover Girl!

This is my youngest daughter on the cover of a local business paper.

They don't even know how prophetic that headline is.

better late than never!

I know it's been a while since I posted but life happens! Not only do I have the show coming up in February, but I've just received the paperwork for an invitational show (Brick Street Fine Arts Festival) in March. Maybe I'll have some stuff left over from the show at ARTichoke to use. Either that, or I'll be sewing madly to get MORE stuff made for Clinton. Or I can use some of the non-musical pieces I have already. It seems like things are breaking loose all at once and it's sort of scary! I'm booked all the way into August (at least one a month) for workshops and presentations and classes and demonstrations. If I keep going at this rate I might actually MAKE more than I SPEND with my art.

Now on to the pictures.......

This is "Coltrane" and it's done on a piece of hand-painted fabric I did during Sonji Hunt's class this summer. It's actually the back of the fabric and it already had the Wonder Under on it. If you iron it long enough and hot enough with a non-stick sheet, the WU eventually loses it's sticky without losing the cloudy effect that I liked about it. The image of John Coltrane is a (copyright-free) picture that I adjusted the color on to be sort of a reddish pink. Printed off on 4 pages, assembled and then coated with several layers of gel medium. Paper removed and the resultant image is sort of translucent. Again, I wound up using the backside of the transfer because of the effect. Very minimal quilting around the image. 16x21, hand painted muslin, gel medium transfer.

And "The Jazzman Cometh"

Another hand-painted background from Sonji's class, and a painted image from some original artwork by Stephen Avgerinos in Bloomington, IL. Used with permission of the artist. Once more, the backside of the fabric was used and very minimal quilting. 24x34, hand painted muslin, stenciled Jazzman and lamppost.

some new stuff, in no particular order

All of these but the first one with the outline of the guitar player are ready to be quilted. He should be ready, but the fabric I had for the border (which is now the background for the horn players) was NOT the same color it looked like in the store. I got it home, pulled it out to do the borders and BLECCCHHHHH. Not even close to what I wanted. I'm sure some black will show up somewhere on either that one or the horns before all is said and done, either as a border or as binding. A little glitch in my plans for this week and it doesn't look like I'll be getting much done at all, so I'm glad to have these this far along. Takes a little of the pressure off for getting enough work done.

Panic sets in

I'm almost scared to publish it, but it looks like I'm lined up for a show for the entire month of February at ARTichoke. (http://artichokecottage.blogspot.com/) Of course, I don't have nearly enough finished work for the space they have so graciously allowed me to use, but that will be remedied in the next few weeks. Things just popped over a 24-hour period and I don't even know where to start. HUGE thanks to Gerard for taking me by the hand and making me follow though on pitching to them. Huge thanks to Anne and Carmen for not making me "pitch" a damn thing, since they pretty much started nodding shortly after I walked in the door. If things work as planned, they'll be borrowing the "Bird" Parker piece that Isaac Byrd bought at the Tougaloo auction too. That dovetails nicely since he also owns the 930 Blues Club and it will make a nice tie-in with the musical theme.

I've had more support and encouragement this year than I can even give credit for, starting with Dorinda and the local quilt guilds, the new shop and the owners of it, Gwen Magee, Sonji Hunt, my sweet hub who never complains about living in a 4 br/2 bath storage closet, and everyone else who has looked at (and bought) my work.

I'm also very excited to have met and gotten a chance to spend some time visiting with Dr. Marvin Haire, Assoc. Dir of the Delta Research and Cultural Institute and Chairman of the Mississippi Blues Commission. I was SO intimidated to find out who he was and that he's an absolute expert on Robert Johnson, and there I stood with 2 of my RJ quilts hanging. Maybe I'm doing something right though, since he liked them. He liked my other stuff too, but it really meant something to me to know I had "captured" RJ well enough to pass muster with Dr. Haire. It was also a treat to be able to discuss music, pretty much uninterrupted, with Gerard Howard, the other artist who was there. The seminar participants sort of came and went, so we had a lot of down time to just visit. He has a vast knowledge of music and it was great to be able to pick his brain. He's also an incredible photographer, and I want to buy one copy of everything he had on display!

Christmas is looking very good this year!

This one has everything!

Piecing! Applique! Drafted pattern! Matching points! Borders! Sashing! Cornerstones! The Grinch! Everything but Little Cindy Lou Who, that is.

I could get used to this insomnia stuff if it means I'm cranking out a quilt top a day. I love the Grinch and I've had this fabric hanging around for several years and never did anything with it. At 3:30 this morning I decided I needed to clear my brain by working on something traditional and mindless. Lots of straight stitching and nothing that stains clothes. I drafted out a quick pattern for the size of the Grinch motifs (they aren't exactly square so I had to do a pattern first) and started cutting. I also had to figure out how wide to make the borders and sashing since I had a limited amount of the green print. Thank heaven for the graph paper generator at http://incompetech.com/graphpaper/ or I'd have woken the hub up rooting around for my pad of pre-printed stuff. Some good murder mysteries on tv and zombie-like piecing and pressing, and voila! 6.5 hours later I had a finished quilt top. Now my brain and creativity has had a chance to rest and sort itself out so I can get back to doing the stuff I love to do. It seems like if I don't throw in some simple stuff once in a while my brain just gets heavier and heavier with ideas and they get all jumbled up together. I think the mindless sewing sort of lets the bad ones go and the good ones float to the top. I get my sewing fix in and I come out of it with clearer ideas of what I want to do for myself. Commercial cotton prints, 46"x54".

I'm thinking some more silk screening or gel printing is next in line this week.

Two down

This is the second one finished! The same black cotton fabric with the the gelatin prints, but this one has stamps, stencils, and hand painting. The same paints used for the other one plus some oil pastels and fabric paints. Commercial print piping and border. The bamboo on the sides really doesn't look that light in real life. It's stenciled in layers of 4 different colors and then hand detailed with an olive Lumiere metallic which is catching the light. The contrast in the picture is definitely starker than the contrast when it's hanging on the wall. The Chinese characters mean "Love" and "Energy" according to the stencil.

"Hey Miss Dragonfly"

One down, one to go. This one is finished and I'm happy with it. Black cotton fabric with acrylics. Gelatin plate monoprinted, stamped, hand painted with craft acrylics, Lumiere metallics and pearls, Jacquard StarBrite and Setacolor. Pieced and flanged with commercial print cottons, thread painted shading and details. 11"x17".

Insomnia

This is what happens when I can't sleep and need something quiet to do at 3 am. This is a little 8" strip of fabric that I bought sort of by accident and decided it wasn't big enough to do anything else with so I might as well play. Out comes the last gelatin plate from the refrigerator (maybe now we'll have room for actual food!) and the only chunky stamp I could lay my hands on in the dark (the hub was still sleeping like a normal person) and off I went! A few pulls on the gel plate with gold metallic and then some experimenting from then on. I used the bottom of the gel plate and accidentally got some really cool grooves from where the plastic wrap was wrinkled when I poured it and a very subtle concentric rectangle pattern from the shape of the disposable tin pan I poured it into. I cut about 1/3 of the thing off at the bottom to play with 2 different pieces that had the original gold prints. A couple of additional stamps and stencils on the long piece including over-stamping the dragonfly, stenciling the bamboo around the edges and the 2 Chinese characters. Those will be highlighted eventually. I'm thinking either a bamboo print fabric for the border or something metallic as a flange and then something else. It'll tell me what it needs.

The smaller piece has a bunch of direct printing with wadded up foil, a piece of drawer liner and some other stuff. I also used one of those campaign signs from the front yard as a monoprint surface for the vegetation at the bottom. Lots of hand-painting for the cattails and some other "experimentation" on the whole thing. It still needs some work, but I'm extremely happy with the progress so far. I have part of a bamboo placemat that I take apart to use the bamboo pieces and I think these might both be just the right width to use those for a hanging mechanism.

Queen of the unfinished "finished" quilts

I literally get down to attaching the label and tacking the bottom of the sleeve down and hit a wall. That's usually when my brain thinks "finished" and I start on a new piece. I have a stack of quilts to put labels on and a bunch that need the sleeve sewn down, so what do I do but drag out a piece of rust-stained fabric to make another whole quilt from. This crap has GOT to stop since they all have to be HANGING this coming Friday. No way I can charge big prices for them with the current safety pin hanging system I'm using to get the pictures. I also have several straps to attach to the beaded purses that have been just sitting there staring at me too. Oh yeah....and three 8x8 foot hanging systems to build by Friday. Nothing SuperWoman can't handle!



And a question for you quilt binders....just how the hell wide do you cut your binding strips anyway? I've always cut mine 2" because that's the number I've had in my head for however long. I also tend to cut borders and stuff either 2", 3" or 5" because I have rulers that wide, but I'm pretty sure at some point in the past someone said 2" for a binding strip. I know all the quilting books (and magazines too, probably) give the measurement but I don't ever read that section. I don't read the section on how to make the quilt sandwich or how to use a rotary cutter either. At any rate, what brought all that up is I was listening to another quilter the other day and she commented on "...and then cut your binding strip the standard 2.5" or whatever width you use." It never even OCCURRED to me to make the damn thing any wider. I like the narrow, tight look of the 2" strip but I spend as much time wrestling with turning the binding as I do on making some of my quilts! I could add 1/2 inch and have room room to maneuver without adding a whole lot of width to the finished thing. But that would mean actually using the ruler to measure with, and not just using the width of the ruler to go by.



So anyhow....we had a great holiday. All the kids were home and in and out with their friends. I got a little work done, but truly I'm looking forward to them all heading back to school so I can have some peace and get back to my routine. A couple of days of non-stop sleeve tacking and label applying and strap assembling staring me in the face. The cats will try to help, but at least they don't ask for money or call me on the phone.



So here's the piece I did yesterday and today. It's a piece of rust-stained muslin with Katrina treasures rusted onto it. They came from one of the first trips down there and I used a Fleur de Lis finial from a wrought iron fence, a railroad spike, nails, washers, a key and the crosses are formed with the little slats from an air conditioning vent cover (look up to your ceiling....see the little thin strips on the vent?) The cross is layers of silk fibers and the key (very bottom right corner) is tied with silk fibers. The dark edge between the blue border and the outer border is a 1/4" flange. The blue is a commercial batik. 25"x40" total size.

Final shots

"Flight" with the additional quilting and binding done, and a small one that as yet remains unnamed.