HRUMPH

I am still feeling very put out about the new Terms and COnditions for uploading pictures. You may have noticed I go in cycles, all text, lots of pictures, all text… Well I’ve just reached the picture phase again. Including ones I promised to share as soon as I could. I’ve found out that ‘Under the Rainbow’ will be in next months Popular Patchwork, so I can put that up now. What I might try is getting another free site where I can put pictures then linking to them here. I know it isn’t ideal but it would make a decent temporary solution. At least Eurodragster shared my car cover with you, I wouldn’t have expected them to put it up

Tate Britain

I am stunned by how much inspiration i get from my trips to art galleries. I never expected this. I don’t like art. I don’t know why i know this but i do. So how come, i do like the art and i do get so many ideas when i in and look round galleries.
Yesterday started well. I am planning a couple of architectural quilts and there is nowhere better than London for finding architectural details. We barely cleared the tube station before i started finding buildings with the right details for one of the quilts and a sign to a museum with the design elements of the other one. I guess i will be going back with a camera in the very near future.

As usual the first stop was the national gallery. I was surprised how many pictures had moved. Even in their temporary exhibition some of the paintings are on longer on display. I guess i was lucky to see them in the first place. I am quite pleased that i remembered them well enough to know what was missing from where. I hope that means i am learning. I was very disappointed to find one of the pair of pictures of venice has gone. Still it is in my head and as i know it exists i can always look it up. These two pictures have convinced me that i want to visit Venice. I wonder if they have quilt shops there and he so would they like to hire an English quilt teacher.

From what i saw the Tate Britain is much more my line of gallery than the Tate Modern. I suppose that translates to they have art i get we managed to catch the Turner Prize show. They had work from the four finalists. For a change i thought two of them made realy interesting work. Mark was talking a lot about trying to get people to interact with art in his video interview. I understand what he means and i quite like the style of his work. He is also interested in the effect and power of words and uses them in all of his work. I have been trying to avoid that, but i think i will lighten up on it. If i think a piece offer text it will get it. One of his works has given me an idea for a dynamic quilt that changes design as you look at it. I have been thinking about quilts with changeable designs for a while but hadn’t come up with anything that would be good for a show environment but now i think i have cracked it.

Even more strange than there being a Turner Prize finalist i liked, i like the winner. She paints great quilt designs. More interestingly i felt like she was challenging me. I can do this in paint, could you do it in cloth? Some even had the impression of depth which seems like is should be easy to replicate, except it was so sharp with hard angles. Getting fabric to do that will be a challenge. A challenge i intend to meet.

We didn’t manage to see much of the rest of the gallery this time but i did see enough to get a better idea of what i don’t like about newer art. Well specifically recent paintings. I find them too naive and simple. Is there a reason for so many people to work in this way? There are still some very painterly painters but either there aren’t many or they aren’t successful at the moment and i would love to know why. I found it very interesting that some of the same artists doing there very simple painting were askn producing amazingly detailed works in other media. So it isn’t that they couldn’t be more painterly them dont want too. Or the galleries don’t want to show it. Any ideas why and what this is all about. I would love to plug a new to me artist but there seems to be very little about him. His name is Robin Ironside. I think he is worth having a look for have a look and let me know what you think.

Odd but good day.

So where to start. It has been a very odd day. The sort which keep threatening to go wrong but always comes out right. I quite like this kind of day. I started by trying to pay a bill in cash. Apparently this isn’t something people do anymore and the company I was paying had no idea what to do with someone handing them cash. I was starting to wonder what to do if they refused it. I mean, money is legal tender, and I think there is some law that say it has to be accepted? After 10 minutes it was decided they could accept the money as it was the exact amount. I am so glad I thought to take the right money. I wonder if they will now be thinking about what to do with customers with cash?

I then discovered that my favorite sushi place had closed. It might be gone of it might have moved. If it has moved I don’t understand where the sign said they have gone. Maybe I will find it again in the future. At least it beat being out in the rain. Boy did we have rain today. I kept finding flooded roads trying to get home. It isn’t ideal getting this much rain this fast. On the other hand the news is talking about people flooded out of their houses by a burst watermain. That is really horrible.

I had a productive sewing afternoon. I now have a test garment of the blouse I was drafting yesterday. It looks interesting in the shiny blue fabric, but shape wise I am quite pleased with it. I hope my customer will like it too. I then went to start sewing the skirt. Turns out I have never had a need for ivory thread! I do now so off for an emergency thread purchase. At school rush hour. Unfortunately I needed the thread so there was no way to avoid it. Also I was driving a Chevrolet Camaro, in England that is pretty unusual and the roads around here aren’t designed for cars this size, especially with double parked parents everywhere. Still like I said nothing for it but to go, so expecting the worse I did. Sure enough first set of lights a car tries to get through on my inside. Except as he pulls alongside he slows down and stops, he is just looking at the car! The lights change and he waves me on with a big grin. Cool! I should point out that there don’t seem to be that many people interested in cars anymore so this isn’t that common. I do however take great pleasure in stopping for zebra crossings. I can see the pedestrians don’t expect me to (the car is matt black with a Motorhead skull on the bonnet) so I do, for a man who also looks at the car, grins and waves. OK this is wired, but good. On to the next crossing (yes we have a lot) two young girls this time. Who are so busy staring the forget to cross for a while and try to put their heads on backwards as the stare at the car as they cross the road. When the reach the other side they stop to watch me drive away. Girls noticing a car is really bizarre, but very good. As you can imagine this really cheered me up. A far better journey than I could ever have hoped for.

Hobbycraft, my nearest thread store, has a sale on. I managed to get some more of the plastic boxes I use as palates. Four assorted boxes for four pounds. I was pretty pleased with that. I got my thread, the nice cashier remembered me and wished me a happy new year and they opened an extra till to server me. It had even stopped raining when I walked out of the shop. Perfect. Oh yes I also have two of their largest polystyrene spheres, they aren’t big by my standards but they might make nice cuddly globes.

Having got home the skirt has come together well. The fabrics are selected for a friends quilt, and tomorrow I have another gallery day. I think it’s all come out rather well. Even if we get seriously rained on tomorrow, I think I will still be ahead overall.

Oh yes one other thing. I was sent this link today, http://www.banksy.co.uk/indoors/01.html. It is another artwork inspired by a Monet bridge. I had a good look at the site and I rather like a lot of his work. There is a lot I don’t too. It is quite political and may cause offence to some. I especially liked his drawing of a rat with a paintbrush, and some of the concepts he is trying to show. I could see me making quilts inspired by this site.

Busy day

Well the entry forms are on their way and I am assured they will be there on time. They had better be given how much time and effort they cost to send. Still I have the account now so hopefully it will be easier next time. I can hope right. I suppose I aught to see what my package is doing really, do you suppose the online tracking will really work? Wow! It does, and apparently my letter is on a plane heading to Houston. Yay. I feel much better now I know it is on it’s way. I have been very disappointed with tracking recently, it just hasn’t worked. In some ways I think it is worth the extra cost just to have working tracking.

I’ve been stunned at the traffic here today. I am so sorry for anyone who was disappointed by not being the 10,000 visitor. I didn’t expect it to be so popular. I think I will probably do this for another milestone number. I’ll give it some thought and let you know.

Once I finally got the forms off and on their way, I got down to drafting a Gibson Girl blouse. It’s quite a nice design, lots of scope for fitting a large bust without having to worry about the shoulders being altered. There is a front and back yoke to keep the shoulder area a smaller size, then front and back panels are gathered onto the yoke. Adding or subtracting from here is relatively straightforward. Of course there are still sleeve, armhole and neck adjustments, but I really like this style. Of course the other advantage of this style is that it isn’t very fitted. Just what I need after dealing with couriers.

We have a winner

Well I have a winner, visitor 10,000 as judged by sitemeter. I now need them to get in touch with me. I suggest going here and it will email me.

The winner is in Switzerland. Apparently near Ecublens, Vaud. Their ISP is Swisscom Fixnet AG. I have a partial IP address, but given I only see a few visitors from Switzerland I think this should be enough to identify them.

However given there are a lot of regulars out there I thought I should give you a chance to get one as well. I’ve decided to take part in the Art Share Meme. I am hoping I got the last spot on Nellies Needles, so now it is my turn to pass it on.

Basically I have five pieces of art up for grabs. I don’t know quite what they will be but, if you’re reading here you have an idea what kind of work I do. I also make no promise as to when I will ship them, I will try and get them out sooner rather than later but as you now I am pretty busy and I have to do it when the muse takes me. If you want one you leave a comment on this post, and you then have to offer five pieces of art you have made to people on your blog. The first five to comment and put up their offer will get one each.

Not only does this let you get a piece of work you want, but it also lets you show off your work. Everyone wins. So who is up for giving it a go.

Couriers!

I just can’t believe the time and effort required to set up an account with a courier company. I spent most of the day yesterday dealing with them, and so far all of today. I can’t settle to do anything else (and I have a lot to do) while I keep getting phone calls. It is so frustrating. The fact that I am stressing about the forms going out today doesn’t help either. Argh! I know it will all be easy once it is collected but that may not be until 4.30pm so I may end up losing the whole day. I can’t even go out because I have to be here when they do send someone to collect the package. Still once it is done I should be able to book collections easily and it will mean I can get my quilts to America in a sensible time frame. I know how couriers keep their customers, it is just too painful to change.

Almost there

After having a fairly quiet day yesterday, I decided to make the little quilt for the 10,000 visitor last night. It isn’t bound yet, but the quilting phase is done. Hopefully it will be recognizable. It it a baby version of the nude in my triptych. Yes it is a mirror image, and no I didn’t mean to do it. If everything goes to plan in the future it should be unique I plan on making some more in this style, but this will be the only reversed image. It is about 11″x 9″. It is stitched in two shades of grey on a plain black background.
I am hoping it will be subtle enough to suit anyone.

Good luck, and I should be posting the winner later today.

Visitor Celebration

I have a sitemeter counter on this site and it will soon hit 10,000 visitors since July 2006. I know this isn’t an accurate count but it’s what I use so it is important to me. I would like to celebrate by giving a small piece of my work to that visitor. I will be able to tell roughly where in the world they are and what time they were here. When I know who it is I will post a description on here and I will then need you to get in touch to claim your prize. I think it will be sometime tomorrow when the 10,000 comes up.

I really love talking to you all, and I thought this would be a good way of saying thank you for all the support I get here.

In Full Bloom

Well it is finished, and we have a title. I even have a name for the technique, impressionist quilting, well the form asked so I had to put something. Now I just have to wait and see if the jurors think it looks like celebrate spring. It does to me, so hopefully that counts for something. It was also one of the easier artist statements to write. I guess being inspired by famous paintings and techniques has it’s uses. Of course I do have a few other inspiring works to draw on in the future as well, which will require variations in technique and thinking. Should be fun.

However don’t talk to me about courier companies. I am sure everyone who moves mail is just out to get me. I still haven’t managed to arrange a pick up for my entry and there is only so long I believe it will all be OK. It is looking like I will have to pay a premium for not having an account because they don’t have anyone to open an account for me! Not impressed. Still if I am going to be shipping quilts internationally I need a courier account so I guess I just have to keep trying.