Celebrating Normalcy- debut

It's SOOO quiet!!!! This is the finished newest piece-- Celebrating Normalcy. If you scan down to some previous posts you'll get the concept in full detail. But the short version is this piece celebrates the return to the mundane after a period of crisis. It is the sigh, the exhale, the relief of not having to think in crisis mode. The image is a stylized version of a moonrise over a calm bay. The back is silk screened with examples of daily mundacity--walking the dog, feeding the cat, unloading the dishwasher, taking a luxurious bath, sleeping in your own bed--all activities that, when life is normal, have very little significance. But when they return following a crisis- medical or otherwise, they are worth a little celebratory jig.

This piece has just been juried into Celebrating Creativity at William Woods University which opens in late August. The happy/sad part is that I will not be able to enter it into Quilt National as it will have been posted to a website-- disqualifying it from entry. Unless something else majorly inspires me, I won't have an entry for it this year.

Nekkid yoga part 2

There was some clamouring going on for detail shots of my gals. So here you go. Sadly, I shot them in a hurry and they don't all look squared up or flat. They are. I didn't measure yet but I think they are about 9" x 12".

If you click on each image I think you can blow them up so you can see the stitching around the bodies. I wish I had a good visual reference to be able to name these poses.

When I redrew these poses from Aubrey Beardsley's versions I plumped them up about 30 pounds, removed the high heels, pearls and earrings.

Don't know what that dark cloud is in the lower left corner- photographer error-- not the work.

I am looking for pricing feedback as well as any critiqueing you wish.

This is the back printed with my silkscreen. I haven't signed them yet. Not sure where would be best-- back, front, on a label?

Nekkid yoga

This is a series I started based on Aubrey Beardsley's 1920s drawings. His yoga girls were all very very slender, often wearing high heels, pearls and earrings while posing. Sheesh! I have redrawn them much plumper and, hopefully, more realistic of today's female yoga participant.

Regarding their creation: the flesh tone fabric is hand-dyed silk. The major background fabric is a black linen to which I applied paint using a silk screen I created that is simply the text of many different yoga poses plus their Indian names. The polka dot fabric was purchased. The black edging is black linen. Actually the backs have been silk screened as well with a simple texture and the edges wrapped around to the front. Before the final wrap and application of fusible I trimmed the fabric using a wavy rotary tool. Then I went back and couched down a gray yarn to finish it. I am doing this in several color ways. I did hte black first simply because I used pigment instead of thicked dyes to print and it was therefore faster to get to a proto-type stage.

I am looking for feedback and pricing suggestions. They are each about 9" x 12".

I know that the detail is hard to see-- but each figure is outline stitched plus contour stitched to show som eof the plumpness. I'll shoot a detail shot later.

Federal Marbles

Another piece that had been hanging unfinished on the wall for quite some time. Kitty Chrysalis and I were experimenting with marbling about 4 years ago. We came up with enough small pieces to make the 6" circles for this piece. In a time when it seems that all sorts of distortion of the facts are happening in the federal debate over healthcare reform.. perhaps it should be "Federal Lost-its Marbles". The quilting originates on the back where I had printed some large stars and strips of marks that resemble stripes... could have named it stars and stripes, also... but boring and cliche'. I'm just pleased to finally have this piece done as it has been hanging on the design wall for over a year awaiting quilting and finishing.

This piece is mostly silk.

And now for something REALLY different...

This small piece is a playful approach to texture. All the silks are hand dyed. some I used potato dextrin to create and under-texture. Some parts I used copper leaf scraps sprinkled over the base with tuille on top to hold in place. The silver fish were created using my fish stamp made with a glue gun outline then silver leaf was attached using matte medium. Then lots of stitching. The "flies" are beads made from metallic painted tyvek rolled and wrapped using mettalic threads and blasted with a heat gun. I attached them using silver embroidery floss.

Next to color as my favorite aspect of creating art is texture. This is a fun way to capture and create it. I think I'll be playing with this some more. What do you think? Should I spend time on exploring this?

It may seem I am cranking out the work lickety split these days. Well yes and no. This piece hung on the wall for a few weeks while I figured out what to do to complete it. I have a deadline of October 3rd for a high volume art festival where I'll need lots of smaller works. Crank crank crank.

Neon Cha Cha

This is another piece in my series I've decided to call my Serendipity Series. Each piece in the series is made up, primarily, of pieces leftover from previous quilt projects. This time I gathered up all the really bright colored scraps from cutting my 8" blocks and interspered them with solid black homespun. It hung on the wall for several weeks while I tried to figure out the quilting. Once that was decided the piece flew together.

This detail shot shows the variety of stitches as well as the neon colors used in the stitching. Once again I forgot to photograph the back- argh! It has a wonderful floral design printed using stamps that have been repurposed to make flowers. I love the way the bright colors come forward and the cool colors recede.

Severe Clear

I vividly remember hearing a meteorologist in Austin explain about the intense blue sky we were experiencing following a big storm. It is an indication of low humidity and seldom seen in mid summer in the Ozarks. But THIS July has sported several days like that with temps that invite one outside. Another feature of July are Surprise Lillies that seem to pop up from nowhere following a drenching rain, in almost no time at all. The leaves came up with the daffodils and are long gone. Now, too, I see the Rubekias--Black-eyed Susans and the roadside chickory-- that like the specimens here, almost disappear into the landscape.

This happy little piece is another in my Serendipity series to use up scraps from other projects. I couched down a blue yarn onto each piece before assembling the background. The flowers are all hand-dyed silk.

The approximate dimensions are 28" x 40".

Red Rover, Red Rover!

I started this a few months ago utilizing leftover strips from my block building process. I had the columns built and they hung on the wall for a long time. I knew the concept of what I wanted to create. When I saw the the way the rows seems to be tied together with the couched yarn it reminded me of the school yard game. In planning my write up about this piece I decided to go to wikipedia to try to get more info. It seems that after the 70s the game lost its luster, replaced by more updated pursuits and because of its history of being relatively dangerous-- broken arms and "clotheslining" where your neck gets caught in the arms of the receiving team....for those of you who are very young, a clothesline is that outdoor device for drying ones clothes on a wire or cord stretched between 2 poles-- now often against the rules in deed restricted neighborhoods.

Here's a detail shot showing the couched yarn as well as the outlined figures in the quilting.

This is the back. If did the figures on silk organza. I made a stamp from plexiglas plus drawing using my glue gun. Each was cut out and fused to the foundation. Then I freemotion outline stitched from the back using the thicker metallic thread as bobbin work.

Sprung! finished

This is such a happy piece. It stayed on the design wall without being quilted for several weeks. Although I loved the color movement I couldn't seem to resolve the quilting. Then I realised I wanted a fairly realistic depiction of some flowers. I traced some clipart flowers onto tracing paper in a wreath design. Then laid the tracing paper on the quilt top and stitched through the tracing paper to get the detailed outlines. After doing the two inside wreaths I was again stuck and unable to resolve the outer corners nor the in-between sections. So again it hung on the design wall while I finished Sweeping Changes. Finally I had stared at it long enough that it started talking to me again. Another wreath of detailed flowers, this time apple blossoms, daffodils and daylily. Then I wanted to boost the visibility of the flowers I had made so much effort to create. So I got out my paints.

Here you can see the inner circle of daffodils as well as the in-between stitching and the apple blossoms and daylillies of the second wreath.

In addition to the flower detail, you can see where I switched to a metallic thread for the in-between quilting.

This was a sweet little piece to create. Its size is 35" x 35". I'll have it posted on my website shortly. I have entered it in Fiber Focus along with Slipstream Adventure and Freefall. Fiber Focus is a nine state textile exhibition presented by Art St. Louis. The competition is tough. I have only once been able to get my work in.

I was shooting it in my studio this morning. Completely forgot to shoot the back. I'll try to get at least a preview shot tomorrow so you can see the back. I had such fun creating it. I repurposed all sorts of stamps I had, to use them as elements in a big flower bouquet. You'll see..........

Sweeping changes--DONE!!!!

I am delighted to have finished this new piece. It is the first "social conscience" piece I have done in quite a while. My last one was "Oh Martha! How can this be a good thing?". I realised going into the project that it would be unlikely to be easily marketable. So this is done purely from the heart without an eye toward what might be publicly popular. The "Sweeping Changes" are those policy changes that have gone into effect or are being addressed since President Obama took office. The bright copper is what is revealed when all the old policies are swept away. The dust stirred up are the old policies and ways of operating.

The stitching is quite tight in the "dust" as elaborate feathers. I have also stitched around all of the text. The bright metallic is copper leaf. I used most of 2 packs of 25 sheets of copper leaf.
The lower portion has all the text outlined-stitched in metallic thread.

Here's a close-up of a dust swirl with its text and stitching. You can see parts of 2 different text messages-- NAFTA & Religion = politics--- BTW these are outgoing attitudes.

Here's a close-up of the lower copper- clad portion. The x's are in copper leaf. The text is in copper acrylic pigment. The stitching around the text and x's is metallic thread. At the top you can see a portion of the broom.

The overall size is 70" x 70" in 2 panels.

I just submitted it to the show I had planned on entering it in along with Live Water.

My fingers are crossed. I'll know in about 2 weeks whether my work made it. Don't worry-- I'll let you know.

In the mean time it is now "crank it out" time to get ready for my brother and SIL to arrive for my Mom's 80th birthday. Yikes! Time to do all those little things that kept being put off until I had a moment. That moment has arrived!

The Energy of Hope

I created this piece as a whole cloth quilt. It is actually 2 top layers-- silk broadcloth covered by silk organza. Some of the imagery is printed on the organza and some on the broadcloth. It is very intensively quilted. The images are created using a variety of my own stamps, silk screens, plus the spool ends of many of my threads. The gold is actual gold leaf using Jane Dunnewald's method of using matte medium as a bonding agent applied via silk screen.

Here you can see how tightly it is stitched. I forgot to measure this before posting but it is approximately 4ft x 3 ft.

The name comes from how I felt going into the election and aftermath. With the economy in the tank, it is amazing how one's outlook affects one's energy.

Lots of new work

This piece is entitled "Freefall" in recognition and/or celebration of both the craziness of the stock market and earmarking the season. These are gingko leaves in motion. The panels on the right have gingko leaves in gold leaf--not foil--leaf.

The leaves on the left side are done as thread lace. Except for some tuille, every bit of those leaves were done with freemotion stitching. Except for a couple of sashing pieces all was hand-dyed silk. I love the rich intensity of colors.

This piece is still in progress. There is more than one layer. The bottom later is noil that has been dyed and painted with stamps and silk screens. The top layer is divided into 2 main sections. The left is dyed and painted silk organza. In addition, I have used gold leaf to add the alchemy symbols and the woven patch. The right side is also silk organza. It is using more of the pieces I dyed last year when I dyed the fabric for the previous piece (Freefall). The sections have not been assembled with batting yet. I have no idea yet how I'll quilt it.

Here you can get a better idea of the layers. All those circles were printed using a few of my dozens of empty spools.

Another detail showing the right side. After last night's election and Obama's speech I am feeling more optimistic about life in general and especially our future as a country. By the way-- the name of this piece is "Energy of Hope".

I have no idea where this piece is going. It is made up of many of my scraps from previous circle quilts. I added a line of multi-colored couched yarn. This, so far, is just pinned to the wall in rows. I am not sure yet whether it'll be vertically oriented or horizonally. I, for sure, have no idea how to quilt it.

So, while I have been in my studio feeling somewhat aimless, I have found all sorts of directions to investigate. If has been fun.

I think I'll go back to celebrating and drinking in that warm glow of hope. I remember that feeling. It has been a while. I liked it a lot.

Jon will be home tomorrow with his CD completed and ready for publication. This is a landmark event in our lives and I expect that forever after our lives will reflect the changes this CD will have wrought.

New work--Reconcilable Differences

This piece was nearly self-created. By that I mean a piece that seemed to know what it wanted to be even before I began. It started several months ago when I was between projects. When I cut my blocks to build my circle blocks I almost always have anywhere from 1-5" strips that are 8" long as leftovers. Consequently I have drawers full of these mostly silk scraps. When I am in my studio without any perceivable direction I will grab these strips in similar colorations and just build long strips. In this case I had over 16 ft of these strips in various shades of brown.
I began by simply hanging four 4 ft strips near each other. Somewhere in there the concept of reconcilable differences popped into my head. ( I seem to have been surrounded lately by people who love each other but can't seem to get along)
The general layout is 4 vertical strips made up of the horizontal strips. Between them are vertical strips printed entirely in circular images. There is a diamond overlaying the whole thing. Inside of the diamond is a melding of imagery- strips and circles. Outside the diamond each vertical strip has quilting that is individual to the strip. Inside the diamond the quilting is an allover looping and semi- floral pattern. Outside the diamond the quilting is jagged straight lines for the odd strips and all circles for the even ones. Outside the diamond there are words--mine, I, me. Inside the diamond are the words our, us, we.

The concept is that when one goes beyond thinking only about oneself then differences begin to disappear and consensus and compromise can be found.

I would love to see this piece end up in a law office or perhaps the office of someone who works to mediate family relationships. The overall size is nearly 4 ft square. These are only my "blog quality" photos. I'll be shoot it again at higher resolution immediately. If you want to see higher res shots-- email me directly.

Photo at last--Slipstream Adventure

I'm happy to at last have a "finished" photo of this pieice that I can now use for promoting it. The finished size of the piece is 80" x 156". I'm working on getting the back view compiled. This is actually 4 separate photos which have been combined onto a single canvas. My friend Bruce Carr shot the work and my friend Jim Kraus did the Photoshop work. The only manipulation was to correct some keystoning and evening up the sizes. Great job, guys!!!

The next step is to find venues for exhibition and potential clients for purchase. You'll be seeing this piece in every exhibition that will accept a piece this large for the next 2 years... unless that wonderful client comes along who wants to purchase it early on.

Now on to the next piece-- which is well underway. I expect I'll be doing "Magic Time" for it later this week. There will be approx 150 blocks--smaller than the last one but still quite large. The colors are deep purples to rich blues to citreon green with a light source that brightens one section to light greens. Yum!