Golden Storm – Finished

I must like stress and pressure. How else can I explain the fact that I always finish a piece just in time to get it to a show. Still it is done now, and I can post it tomorrow. I’ve been saving up packages for a mass posting tomorrow, when ‘Unraveling’ will be off as well. ‘Golden Storm’ is going to Hever Castle for a show organized by region 2 of the Quilters Guild of the British Isles. The theme is Autumn splendor. For me this is what autumn is all about. Leaves blowing around. The leaves are actually very three dimensional, they look like they are about to fall off the background. In fact they are very secure but I wanted to capture the feel of them blowing about. The narrow brown border is free as well, as it is an insert like piping in the binding.

I hope I am going to have time to go and see the show, and ideally pick the quilt up. I have been given number 36 for my quilt so hopefully there will be a good display there and I love castles. The show it on the 8th to the 10th of September. The ticket says it will admit one to the exhibition and the grounds of the castle, so I guess it is in some ancillary building rather than the castle itself. If anyone is planning on going and interested in meeting up, let me know.

‘Tread lightly’ flies the nest

Today I feel I can call myself an artist. A piece of work I designed and made with no new owner in mind has sold. For me that is the definition of an artist, someone who can make what pleases them and others will want to own it. It is a very odd feeling, the piece that sold wasn’t one I thought would be popular, and I expected to have it sitting here for a long time. I am thrilled it has gone to someone who will love it. The lady who bought the globe has a love of maps, and would have liked to have been a cartographer. Just perfect.

For those who have asked, yes I did take a lot of photos before it went. Yes I will be making more spherical quilts. Yes I will be preparing patterns and classes based on my spherical quilts. Yes I am an artist, can I still be a scientist too though.

Back in the Saddle

Today was my first proper day of work since the exhibition, and it felt good. I’ve got all the leaves sewn now, and most are pinned to the quilt. The quilt has borders/binding as well. I think of it as the borders but is really a very wide binding. I don’t think the technique actually scaled too well. The binding fabric tries very hard to distort as you sew down the second side. Still it looks OK and for a quilt put together in something of a hurry I am pleased with it.

I’ve also started on my art education. At the NEC I took a class with Michael James and he talked about a lot of artists we ‘should’ know about. I don’t, yet. I’ve been bidding on cheap art books on eBay and the first one arrives today. It is all about Victor Vasarely. I can see why I should know about him. I am really enjoying reading about how his art started and then evolved. I also love some of the designs he came up with. I didn’t realize how much I could learn from how someone else developed their style, but now I do you can be assured I will be reading more on this subject. I still haven’t dug out the notes to check the details of the things I am supposed to look up, but I think if I work from what I remember and then follow the leads those give me I will do pretty well. I already have a lost of half a dozen other artists I want to find out about.

todays lesson – sunday

I think i have learned something today. I should not announce to anyone, even myself, that I am planning a restful day. It is just asking for trouble. I am at Shakespeare County raceway theoretically watching Tet race and taking a few photos. No chance. The car Tet drives runs in two classes. Normally there is a reasonable gap between these classes so you have time to let the car cool down and refuel it. Today they chose to run them right after each other, so the car goes down the track and almost straight back to the start line. Well i an sure you have seen the pit stops done by circuit racers. I have spent today trying to do much the same thing. It was fun but not quite as relaxing as I had planned. On the way to dinner we spotted warwick cathedral. Given it was still light after we had eaten I got a chance to in and take some photographs. It is a great building with lots of architectural details. Even the wall around it is fantastic, with lots of different doorways in it. There was even a gateway into a garden. Lots more images to use in my work.

Inspiration in strange places

Today I took a friend on a mystery outing for her birthday. Being short of cash donating time seemed like the best option, and by luck I found out about a free event she would really like. A corvette Stingray cruise at the Ace Cafe. I know it’s a bit strange but she loves them, and would have the chance to take pictures so off we went. She was indeed very happy and took plenty of pictures. Strangely (given I have been looking at cars like these for years) inspiration struck. I’ve come away with not one but three quilt designs from various parts of the cars. I think they are going to be quite abstract but that seems to be something that is attracting me at the moment. I am looking forward to getting them drawn up tomorrow.

From there we went to our local quilt shop. It isn’t very local so she can only get there if I take her. It was a fun visit and for once she managed to spend more than me. Even better the support gloves I had been after were half price. What a result. I even managed to restrain my purchases, just what I needed for the next 2 quilts I am working on.

Finally as it was a bit early for dinner we took a quick trip to the RAF museum in Hendon. I love going there to visit the Vulcan, and again it is free. Surprising how much you can do for nothing if you look around. They have been moving things around since the last time I was there so we got to see a lot of things I didn’t expect as I hunted for the Vulcan. You wouldn’t think they could hide something that big but they had. I’ve spent a lot of time with this plane over the years, but suddenly it was inspiring. I can see how to render it in fabric. It is just such a fantastic shape, I know I can express it’s elegant design. I am hoping that with some thought I will come up with a second design that will capture the feeling I get sitting under it. I feel safe, like a huge bird is protecting me with it’s wings. I can’t see how to manage that yet and still have it be obvious what it is, but maybe it will come with time. Some kind of nesting Vulcan perhaps. At the museum they also have a Halifax, which has fantastic shapes in the internal structure of it’s tail. I’ve already drawn up the quilt it has given to me.

Wandering around aimlessly we came across a display about in air refueling. It is an interesting image, two planes joined together like that in mid air. For me though the really interesting part was the refueling rig itself. It has a delicate lacy funnel on the end. It reminded me of a chandelier. I am wondering if I could make a sculpture based on it. My final design for the day came from a Wellington, it has the most fantastic structure of spars in it, I can’t quite see how it will translate yet, but I know it will. All in all a very productive and enjoyable day. My friend enjoyed meeting the Vulcan and I suspect will now be paying it occasional visits too.

Golden Storm Progress

Given this quilt only existed in my head yesterday morning I am quite pleased with my progress. As you can see I have the quilting done for the background. It is a really nice pantograph by Sophie Collier, Sew-Phie Quilts. It is called ‘Falling Leaves’, and is described as a complex pattern. Never one to take advice I just had a go at it and if you take it slowly it is pretty straightforward. I think the way it is drawn really helps, the line is very clear to follow so you can’t really go wrong. I’ve quilted about twice the area I need to I can cut the piece I like most. Hopefully I won’t have too obvious a repeat once I have trimmed it.

I think I have most of the leaves made, they are still in need of some details but I think they look pretty leafy. The really surprising thing is that they feel like leaves. They are 2 layers of batik held together with Misty Fuse. I really like Misty Fuse, and suspect I will be needing a second roll sooner than I had expected. It is just so easy to use and Esterita is right, you can use all the little offcuts really easily. Some of these leaves have leftovers in them. I think I need to put these leaves on before I make any more so I can get an idea of how many more I will need. So for the rest of the night I think I will be sewing veins.

Comments welcome, nay encouraged

Apparently some people aren’t sure if you are supposed to comment on blogs. My view is yes, please do. I love hearing from people, it lets me know I am not completely mad and talking to myself if nothing else. When I get positive comments about my work, they make me feel good all day. When I get a negative response especially one where the person can tell me what they didn’t like and why, I get to learn something. I cannot get better at this without help from my audience. Your comments are, to me at least, very valuable. So go ahead and chat away.

Too busy for a quiet day

It was a fine plan, sleep late and do nothing much. The world had other ideas. I’ve made good progress with my entry for the Hever show. I should have started it before I went to the NEC but somehow it never quite happened. So now I need to make a quilt from scratch in less than a week. Whups. On the other hand I have done all the design and planning for it so it is just the making I need to worry about. The theme is autumn glory, and I am making a wave of leaves. It will be called ‘Golden Storm’. I plan to make it very backwards. I will start by quilting the quilt, then bind it. I am going to use a very wide piped binding, so it will have the look of a border and no binding. Finally I will add the leaves. I want to hold them down with the minimum stitching so they still move and are more three dimensional. I think I will need about 100 leaves. The quilt will be 1m square and I am making the leaves life size. I think I have cut about 60 leaves today, but they still need their details stitching onto them.

A great day to dye.

I can’t believe how lucky I was yesterday. I had planned it as a day to do a lot of dyeing, a couple of weeks ago, with the intention of moving it if the weather didn’t play ball. I have to do all my dyeing outside, there isn’t room in the kitchen. So we have had torrential rain for the last 4 days, it wasn’t looking hopeful, but then yesterday was a lovely warm dry day. Who would have thought it? Even more bizarre, it has gone back to pouring with rain today and will continue to do so until at least the weekend. I am very grateful for that one dry day.

I’ve managed to get all the fabric pressed and folded and I am fairly happy with it. It has all come out more muted than I expected, and I am not quite sure why. I suspect that I made some silly error in the maths. I also managed to dye two of my longarm test pieces. The larger one looks really good now it is all black and I think I will just finish it and use it. The other piece is smaller and I will save it to make a rag quilt. My plan is to use any and all leftover dye on test pieces so ultimately I can turn them into brightly coloured rag quilts. It is amazing what dye can do for all the odd colours of thread I use up when practicing.

In the process I also got to see how the alpaca wadding stood up to washing. I always wash freshly dyed fabrics at 50 degrees minimum to try and get rid of as much excess dye as possible. The alpaca went through fine. It did shrink a little but not significantly more than the cotton waddings. Also the exposed areas didn’t disintegrate. I should have tried running it through the tumble drier but I didn’t think of it. Next time. At least I now know I can put it in bed quilts and still wash them.

The quilt is the one I was talking about from the show. I would love to find out more about the artist. She is Russian and her name is Marina Mamonova. If anyone does know her, or any information about her work I would love to know. This was the first quilt to make me get my camera out and having seen all the competition entries it is by far my favorite.

Still catching up

I’ve realized that a quilt show followed by your partners birthday followed by a friend coming round for a dying session isn’t the best idea in the world. I am more tired than I was Sunday! I still haven’t quite caught up on email, or snail mail for that matter, but I will honest.

Anyway I keep thinking of things I had meant to post about the show. The juried competition Quilt 2006 apparently had in the region of 200 entries. Of which 7 were selected for the competition. I can see why mine didn’t get in. It was nothing like the ones that did. On the other hand, I obviously did have a better chance in the other class. I can’t believe that there were so few quilts good enough for Quilt 2006. I don’t know if I will enter next year. It costs an extra ten pounds to be considered for that class and if they are taking so few, I can’t see mine making it.

It was really good to get the judging sheet back with the quilts. I guess they have the rule that every judges has to put a comment on every sheet, which is really nice as well. It gives you a feel for what the judge was really thinking. Some judges really didn’t get ‘Union Jack’. One commented that there was no need for gimmicks, but to my mind there weren’t any. I just made my design which included aspects of punk clothing. Can I really expect the judges to know what punks wear? They all, quite correctly’ commented on the fact that the quilting didn’t go all the way through. This was because I had to put an extra backing on to cover the studs, they were too dangerous when exposed.

I just have to mention the best phone call I’ve had in a long time. The lady who has bought ‘Tread Lightly’ called to confirm early on Monday morning. It was lovely to hear someone so enthusiastic about one of my pieces. I can’t wait to see her and hand it over. I know it will be loved, I just wish I could see it in the middle of her dining table. It will be so imposing.

Now I have to sleep, hopefully there is still some hot water after washing all the fabric I have dyed today. Hopefully I will get unpacked tomorrow and be able to upload some pictures.