Alzheimer's Art Quilt Initiative

COON - 9" x 12"

FANTASY FLOWER - 9" x 12"

I made these two small quilts for the AAQI monthly auction.  If you are not familiar with AAQI, please visit the website at http://www.alzquilts.org.  The organization has raised a substantial amount of money for research on Alzheimer's disease primarily through the sale of small quilts.  The founder, Ami Simms, saw first-hand the devastating effects of this disease with her mother.  Although her mother has passed on, Ami has remained faithful to this cause.

My sister has this disease and I have watched it destroy her day by day.  I hope you will take a moment to look at the little quilts and consider making a bid or participating by making one of the auction quilts yourself.

Thanks for looking!

Textile Improvisation Team Challenge

A small group of women get together once a month to try new techniques, laugh and sample ice cream and cake.  Okay, occasionally we have pie.  We decided to make an art quilt sampler for the Ozark Piecemakers Quilt Guild's biennial quilt show.  The only rules were that each quilt had to be 14" square and each had to include a piece of a blue-green batik to give us a bit of continuity.  Other than those restrictions, we each could do whatever we wanted.  We are quite good at "whatever".

JoAnne Simonson made an abstract dragon.

Karen Carroll has just gotten into inchies and featured them in her quilt.

Vicki Strohm has two dragons - in the lower right corner you will find an observer.

Vivian Terbeek is making some large ocean-inspired pieces but scaled down for this one.

Norma Roberts made this jolly wonky log cabin inspired quiltlet.

And I made a little cabin in the fall woods.

I made a black quilt to tack the little quilts to for display at the quilt show. 

If you are in the Springfield, MO area September, 23, 24, or 25, please

come visit our quilt along with several hundred other fine quilts. 

Think Green at Waverly House

Waverly House Gifts and Gallery's spring juried show is on the theme "Think Green". I was happy to learn that my two entries were accepted. And I was really happy to learn that several of our local fiber artists also entered and had work accepted. There were more than a hundred entries with only half of that number accepted. Five of the artists with work juried in are fiber artists. Fiber arts are truly considered art in our small city - primarily thanks to Uncommon Threads, a spin-off from our quilt guild. This group paved the way over the past few years for recognition of quilts and fiber as art in our community.
This small piece (12" x 16.5") is BOB'S RAIN GARDEN. My husband has begun work on a rain garden in our back yard. The idea is to plant water-loving plants in a place in the yard that gets a lot of water and then to divert more water from your roof to sustain these plants. The water then doesn't run off but maintains plants that help improve the environment. I like the idea of root systems invading the layers of earth so that was part of my inspiration for this work.

LUNCH AT THE SUNSHINE CAFE (22" x 18") resulted after I spent an hour working on a more serious piece about global warming. I decided it was super boring so pitched it and decided I want to make a big green salad. I think this piece is funny but I believe I'm the only one! There's something humorous to me about that big fabric fork and the egg. Oh, well, you can't explain your own sense of the ridiculous to someone else.

Rayna Gillman Workshop

Rayna Gillman presented a two-day workshop for members of the Ozarks Piecemakers Quilt Guild in Springfield, Mo this week. The first day was spent carving stamps and creating our own fabric or improving fabric that needed help. We carved, we brayered, we talked, we made messes big and small and had a grand time.

The second day Rayna focused on a variety of methods for transferring images to fabric besides printing them directly from printers or copiers. We used transparencies, thermofax and silk screening, transferring with gel medium, clear tape and even using a cleaning product to transfer carbon-based prints. We also tried writing directly on fabric using fabric inks - most of us found that this is one of those skills that is perfected with lots of practice. We also learned that perfection is not what we needed to aim for. Rayna does a wonderful job of helping her students relax and enjoy the process of creating and to see the beauty in the imperfect organic result.

These are samples of our work over the two days. We were asked to show our favorite and least favorite of what we had produced.

I took these pictures after we were well into our first day of carving stamps and printing fabric:

Vivian started out with green and red-orange and kept going until she made another piece that reflected her recent experience with shingles. She's determined to get some art out of a difficult experience.

Sharon shows off the variety of stamping she did. I don't know how she produced the areas that look like writing but I'm going to find out!

Merrilee wears her stamped piece over her shoulder. She was too busy preparing her next piece to hold it up! She created a stamp that turned into a flower burst when stamped in different directions. Cool.

Maureen is holding a couple of the stamps she made. She had a happy accident when she spilled some gold paint on an edge of fabric and then proceeded to stamp bits of the paint all over the work - the bit of glitz livened it up nicely.

Karen is holding a piece that she chose as her "least liked" work over the two days. She was the only one who didn't like it. In person it sort of looks like a burst watermelon with seeds scattered. Other than this piece, Karen tried all the techniques on one piece of fabric using the same paints. That piece turned out exceptionally well.

If you have a chance to take any class with Rayna Gillman, do it! Rayna presented a program for our guild that was a delight - she is funny, does beautiful work, and doesn't take herself too seriously. That's an unbeatable combination. She is an excellent teacher and generously shared her extensive knowlege of surface design with her students.

New Work

PRICKLY PODS (26" x 36") I belong to an art quilt group through our local quilt guild. Last month we studied the work of ten fiber artists featured in The Masters. One of them is Caryl Bryer Fallert whose work I've admired for a long time. I enjoy the lovely curves she uses as well as the vibrant colors that appeal greatly to me. So this is my homage to her. I used some of my hand-dyed fabrics as well as some commercial batiks. When the top was done I had a wonderful time thread-painting on the "pods" and free-motion quilting the background. Note: Prickly Pods has been juried into In Full Bloom VI.

I hope this detail shot shows some of the quilting - it is very intense. I also added some golden spirals using 100 dernier silk thread.

DWELLINGS (16" x 20") This work was done for the Fast Friday Fabric Challenge a few months ago. The challenge was to use a monochromatic scheme. This was fun because I layered the front, batting and backing and quilted plain black fabric. Then I used Jacquard Discharge Paste to remove the color from selected areas and painted them various yellow tones. I've enjoyed Jean Auel's Earth Children's series and this piece makes me think of pre-historic peoples and the challenges they faced in finding shelter. Note: A second larger work, "Dwellings: Another Time, Another Place" was juried into the IQF special exhibit Tactile Architecture.

More Fast Friday Fabric Challenge Quilts

CROW TAKES A VACATION (14" x 21"). I posted earlier about the Fast Friday Fabric Challenge internet group. We have a monthly challenge to use a specific technique or color combination and create a quilt within a week. For this month, we were challenged to use complementary colors and begin working in a series.YOUR RHYTHM, MY BLUES (17" x 21"). This challenge was to use analogous colors and to show movement. This piece, along with BROKEN CONNECTIONS was made in an effort to express my feelings in helping a family member deal with the onset of Alzheimer's.

WIND (11.5" x 14"). This challenge was to show motion. I used a piece of "failed" hand-dyed fabric - meaning it didn't retain the vivid colors I prefer. But it created a nice background for this windy day piece.

ROANOKE COTTAGE (9" x 12"). Our challenge was to depict architecture in some fashion as well as to show depth. This was based on a picture of a home I used to own in Springfield, MO. It has a lot of thread-painting for the yard and flower beds.

BROKEN CONNECTIONS (14" x 18"). Our challenge was to use a zinger color and to express emotion.

FLOWERBURST (14" x 18"). We were challenged to make a monochromatic quilt . Mine turned into analogous colors. It had a bright yellow background and I had a suggestion to think about using purple if I made another similar quilt. I pulled out my fabric paints and painted the background with purple paint and it greatly improved the work.

BEACH FIRE (12" square). This month's goal was to use a surface design technique. My piece is painted with water colors, quilted and then I added some beading.

It is not Fast Friday - It is Christmas at the TITs. I am a member of a small art quilt group, the Textile Improvisation Team, aka TITs. We met at Christmas and played dirty Santa and Vivian ended up with my little ferns. This piece was quilted, then discharged with Jacquard Discharge Paste and painted.

Upcoming Gallery Show

The opening of my first ever gallery show is coming up October 3rd at Waverly House in Springfield, Missouri. The following works are a preview of what I will be showing.

COON (18.5" x 28.5") pictures a raccoon foraging in a dry creek bed. The beautiful background fabric in the upper half is a hand-dye I ordered from Dijanne Cevaal in Australia. It added just the right touch to this autumnal scene. The coon is thread-painted.

SAW WHET OWL (21" x 31") evolved after I did some research on owls and learned about this small bird. I thread-painted the owl. After placing the owl and the branches, I decided he should be in a fir tree and spent days free-motion stitching all those needles. I'm in no hurry to repeat this stitching adventure.

MATING SEASON (approx. 18" X 27") is a jolly quilt with lots of color. It was one of those pieces that come together rather quickly because of the joy of working with all the color and shapes. All the frogs are thread-painted.

GUSTAV'S GARDEN II (18" X 22") was inspired by a painting by Gustav Klimt. It was originally intended to be entered as my 2007 Journal Quilt but after I finished it I entered it into the juried section of the International Quilt Festival and it was accepted as a finalist.

STUDS TURTLE (approx. 18" x 26") is another jolly quilt with its turtle, lizard, dragonflies, leaves and flowers. Its background is a piece of my hand-dyed fabric.

SCENTUOUS (33" X 42.5") was inspired by a beautiful hand-dyed cotton sateen from Jeanettes Fabric To Dye For. I couldn't cut it up so used the whole piece as the background for some vines, irises, an out-size marigold and then a thread-painted skunk worked its way into the grass at the bottom.

RAIN FOREST FROLIC (34" X 39") is a piece I made a couple of years ago. I love its colorful dart frogs and the giant beetle. The border fabric is a hand-dye from Ellen Anne Eddy who is one of my quilt heroes.

SOLITUDE (approx. 18" x 24") was also made a couple of years ago using another of Ellen's hand-dyes as a background. It has a peaceful feeling I've enjoyed seeing on my wall.

LATE BLOOMER (49" x 64") has just returned from its journeys as part of the In Full Bloom IV Exhibit of the International Quilt Association. The blooms on the quilt are hand-painted and then thread-painted. I spent a long time working on this piece and had a wonderful critique from Cynthia Morgan that helped me improve the work.