more fiber art postcards

... and a few more ... soon to be sent off to Virginia's FFAC postcard sale at the Houston Quilt Festival.



"Doppelganger" above left, and "Gothic Redux" above right.



"New Growth" on the left, has a base of hand-painted fabric with copper, leather, and beads. "Liz's Gleanings" on the right, is made with goodies gleaned from my friend Liz's leftovers. (On second thought, I'm keeping that one!)

Fiber Art Postcards for FFAC

Virginia Spiegel ( http://www.virginiaspiegel.com/NewFiles/ACSFundraiser.html ) is sponsoring her last year of Fiber Arts for A Cause at Houston's International Quilt Festival in November, and I've been making postcards to be "sold" (actually, to be given for each $30 tax deductible donation made to the American Cancer Society) during Festival. Here are some of them:




The first one is called "Curiosity", and is hand-painted fabric with painted dryer-sheet overlay.
The second one is "Coffee by the Sea", with a coffee filter and painted/distressed Tyvek, both hand-stitched to the quilt sandwich.



Above are "Don't Even Think About It" and "Copper Bloom", each made with the same piece of hand-painted fabric as a background.



"Alice" is a photo transferred to fabric and mounted on velvet upholstery samples.

A Show of Hands

This little project was made to be a part of Karey Bresenhan's special exhibit at this year's Houston International Quilt Festival ... a three-dimensional hanging installation of "creative HANDS". She's planning for folks to walk through this magical "forest" of one-of-a-kind HANDmade art HANDS hanging from the ceiling--literally HANDS all around--to see the quilts. It sounds wonderful to me and I think visitors to the show will love experiencing it first-HAND! (Karey's puns, not mine, LOL!)

I made this quirky little hand from two things ... a piece of tanned deerhide from a deer that my grandmother had shot many years ago, and a piece of my own scanned and printed pineapple fabric. I wrote a little story about Mamaw on the deerskin side ... mainly about how she had strong hands and a strong heart and mind until the day she died. I still miss her.

Birthday Bracelets

Ohmigosh, the most wonderful birthday bracelets! Ann made this beautiful blue-green-purple "wooly worm" bracelet that goes with just about everything I own, and Patricia made the gorgeous brick-stitched bracelet with cube beads and a raku-bead closure. How lucky am I! Thank you, thank you, Annie and Tricia!

Mokume Gane

Patricia taught us a mokume gane technique (pronounced "mo-koo-may gah-nay") in polymer clay last week, and these copper-and-gold beads were my results. I finally combined them with some porcelain and silver beads, and strung them as a necklace, plus made a couple of pair of earrings. I love this technique, and can't wait to find the time to try it again.

Posies

Birthday Posies from my friend Mary Ann ... what a lovely fiber art card to receive in the mail! Silk flower petals, elegant fabrics, and imaginative stitching ... the Essence of Mary Ann! Here's a picture, but it's so much nicer to be able to pet it.

Monet Bracelet

Sweet Annie, one of the Art Girls, taught me the Square Stitch last week, and even gave me all the beads I needed from her own stash to help me make this Monet Bracelet. This was many, many hours in the making, but well worth the effort, I think. Thank you Annie!

Then I just had to make some little earrings to go with it ... a bit frustrating to work in such a small scale, as they have the same square-stitch base. But well worth it, I think.

(Click on the image to see an enlargement, then click again on the lower right-hand "arrow box" to enlarge it even further.)

Butterflies are free ...

Butterflies are free ... if you have a birthday, and have a talented friend like Susan! This gorgeous little gem of a fiber art postcard arrived in my mail today, but I only found it in the stack this evening. Thank you Susan!

A Birthday Postcard

I had a lovely surprise in the mail today ... a fiber art postcard from Hannah! Here's a picture of both the front and back ... for anyone not familiar with fiber art postcards, they are basically miniature art quilts. This one actually went through the postal system, stamp and all. Thank you so much, Hannah!

Wire-wrapped necklace & earrings

Mary Ellen and I took another class with Nancy Jones yesterday, and here is my result ... it was originally supposed to be a choker, but I added the drop since a choker isn't my best look. I really like the earrings best. The technique is fun and easy, but requires some hand strength. 22-ga. sterling silver wire with black glass beads.

Mary Ellen's necklace and earrings are really the ones I want ... she chose to use some frosty-blue stones with copper wire, and they turned out to be just stunning. Mary Ellen, wanna trade, LOL?

Make It Do or Do Without

After finally getting to see the Quilts of Gee's Bend exhibit at the Houston Museum of Fine Arts this past week (which was an amazing experience), I was inspired to make some sort of homage quilt. Then I remembered that I actually had already made one ...

In 2001 I took a class with Roberta Horton at the Houston International Quilt Festival, called something like "African American Quilts". The idea was to re-create a small quilt in the style of the slaves who had no choice in fabrics but what was thrown away or given to them, and of course no modern templates, rulers, or rotary cutters. We were to cut our pieces freehand, with nothing but scissors and our imaginations.

She gave us each a pice of "ugly" green fabric that we had to incorporate with the fabrics that we had brought to class, and we made some simple traditional blocks with scraps, 4 of one block and 5 of another. (The two blocks I chose, Log Cabin and Hole in the Barn Door, are barely recognizable.) On at least one of the blocks we were to alter something in the design – turn one of the elements backwards, for instance - to make it different. The strong vertical lines were important in the African influence of the design, as were the varying fabrics for the borders.

I never liked this quilt when I made it, and it has been sort of hidden away ever since. After seeing the Gee's Bend quilts, however, I've pulled it back out, and it now has a new kind of beauty for me.

Lapis Sunburst Collar

My Dad had this gorgeous necklace made for my Mom, quite a few years ago in Mexico ... he thinks it may have been in San Miguel de Allende. It has a wrap-around collar made to fit her neck, with a large (25x38mm) lapis lazuli cabochon in the center of the 4" x 5" hand-wrought starburst. (For some reason the beautiful veining and the shine of the lapis do not show up well in this photo.)

Both the collar and the starburst are signed (engraved) by the artist on the back. I had the metal tested by a jeweler, who proclaimed it a copper-heavy bronze. The whole piece is very heavy in weight.

I just spent almost an hour cleaning this piece, and want to preserve its beauty for as long as possible before having to clean it again. I've been advised that a lacquer coating is recommended for bronze, but my local jeweler doesn't do that type of work. I'm wondering if a couple of light coatings of a non-yellowing spray acrylic protectant would work, without harming the metal. Or an automotive spray protectant? Of course I would protect the lapis cab first. Any suggestions?

Ndebele Rope

I love this necklace! And I love the Ndebele technique (pronounced "in-de-belly"). It's done with a needle-and-thread, using triangle beads. From another class with Nancy Jones, it's very easy to learn, but extremely labor-intensive. This 42" rope took me about 12 hours to finish, and was a birthday present for my dear sister-in-law, Verda.

Be sure to click on the image for a closer view.

Beaded Net Bracelets

I took a class with Nancy Jones a couple of weeks ago, and have been making some beaded net bracelets. Here are two of them.

A Whole Lotta Love by Tom Russell

By chance I met Tom Russell at a local quilt show recently, and discovered that he doesn't maintain a website for his work. So I offered to post an image or two of this original piece, called "A Whole Lotta Love". It's 80" square, and although it's not a bed quilt, he had laid it out on a bed to photograph, as it has not been quilted and embellished yet. So you'll see two pictures of it, in order to see the edges as well as the center. Here's what he said to me about it ...

I started it when I started quilting 5 years ago. It started as part of a workshop given by my old high school art teacher and another quilter friend. My high school art teacher's quilt was pictured across from mine in Quilting Arts Magazine. He inadvertently got me started in quilting. I designed this quilt after that workshop and it took me this long to get it finished. The HGTV stuff kept me busy for a few years along with other quilts I needed to make. I made it my goal to finish this quilt when I moved to Houston. Now that it's pieced I have to quilt it and then it's almost finished. It'll take me a few months to embellish it, but it should be show ready by the end of the year.

I found this on Tom ... http://www.apqs.com/quiltertomrussell.htm , and I knew I had seen some of his work before too ... it was the 2004 Restore America quilt block of the month that he designed for HGTV ... http://hgtv.com/hgtv/pac_ctnt_nobanner/text/0,1783,HGTV_10680_24655,FF.html ... which is an incredibly artful project.

Here are the pictures of "A Whole Lotta Love" ... now I can't wait to see the quilt in person.

Frustrated Again

If anyone knows why my posted images will (only sometimes) refuse to enlarge, I would appreciate a hint! My original images are definitely not too large, the titles aren't too long, and there are no spaces in the titles. At one time I thought I had this figured out, but obviously not. Can anybody out there help? I have a "help" email posted to Blogger, but don't know when or if they will ever get back to me. I'd really appreciate any advice or suggestions! Thanks ...

Hands Across the Water

I've been corresponding a bit lately with a lovely fiber artist in Denmark named Inge Reinholdt, http://www.123hjemmeside.dk/ingesol. She surprised me with a wonderful gift of her artwork that I had admired, "Blomster":

and I was so excited that I had to make a special piece for her, "Texas 2-Step":

As it turned out, both pieces ended up being about the same size, but that was just coincidence ... they're both about 14" x 16".

Thank you, Inge, for being my artistic pen-pal, and for having such a generous nature. I hope that my lizards will remind you of your Texas friend whenever you see them.

Gloria's metal thing

At one of our art play-days, Gloria made this little metal "thing" ... could be a pendant or a brooch or an embellishment for an altered book? When Gloria "gets ahold" of an idea, it doesn't take her any time at all to make it her own.

Darleen's Digital Painting

My dear friend Darleen has been playing in Photoshop again, and has created a beautiful digital "painting" from a photograph of her sweet cocker spaniel, Suzi. I don't know how long it took her to "paint" the image with her computer mouse, but the result has a very impressionistic look to it, and I love it. Since I don't have anything of my own to post today, I thought I'd share a bit of beauty from Darleen's world.

First is the original photograph of Suzi lying on a stained concrete garage floor ...

And then the masterpiece ... an impressionist painting worthy of framing. In fact, I printed it on canvas in my Epson printer, and it now resides on my office wall. Be sure to click on the second image to get a better view of the "brush strokes".

Copper Pendants or ???

On our last day in Suzan Kraus's workshop, we made copper pendants by cutting out copper sheets, distressing them with hammers and heatguns, and weaving inserts to go behind their little "windows". These are some of my results. (The copper colors don't show well due to the scanner light.) They are about 1-1/2" square, excluding embellishments.

Be sure to click on the image for a larger view.

Feminine Memory Vessel

In Suzan Kraus's Signs & Symbols workshop, hand-writing with our off-hand, collage techniques, personal symbols and memories ... all were included in our Feminine Memory Vessels ... rather a high-falutin' appellation for my old cigar box, but a fun and interesting project. I wasn't totally pleased with my end-result, but it's worth presenting here, with all its flaws.

Signs & Symbols Collage Workshop

I recently took a 4-part collage workshop with Suzan Kraus at the Jung Center here in Houston. It was based on the 5 universal signs and symbols, and included inspirations and techniques for various collage projects. Suzan is a wonderful teacher, very kind and generous, and we all had a great time. I took pictures of some of the students on the last day, and got everyone except Anne, who must have been visiting the "necessary" while I was shooting! She's a lovely lady who also contributed a lot to the class ... sorry, Anne, I'll catch you next time!




Suzan Kraus, doing a demo.


Susie & Laura, heatin' & dancin'

Mary Ellen, weaving copper & paper

Suzan & Nancy collaborating



Patricia heating up the place.

Christy & her bright weavings.

Mothers and Daughters

I neglected to post this little encaustic (beeswax) collage I had done for my Mom for Mother's Day (which I guess is appropriate since she didn't receive it until Father's Day!)

Simple unbleached beeswax embedding collaged images; stretched canvas support. The coiled copper wires represent both the telephone lines that my maternal grandmother handled as an early telephone operator, and the ties that bind the female members of my family.

Father's Day Book

For Father's Day this year I wanted to make a little book for my Daddy. The book is made of brown paper lunch sacks, folded in half and stitched down the center, with a tanned deerskin binding. The deerskin was from a deer killed by my Dad's mother, Hallie, who was an avid hunter all her life. The cover is embellished with a vintage domino, wire-wrapped with copper wire (stitched through the cover of the book), and a beaded "bookmark".

The photo below (framed in the same deerskin) is of my Mom & Dad, years ago in London, on their way to a costume party.

Daddy always loves to make people laugh, even (or especially) at his own expense. It's one of his most endearing qualities.

All 4 of us (now grown) kids have always known we could turn to our parents in good times and bad, with never a fear of being turned away without a well-thought-out solution (or two) to our problems. We recognize that we are very lucky in our choice of parents!

Inspiration is the word ... to strive for quality over quantity, to treat others with respect, and most of all to respect ourselves and act accordingly.

My father has always been, and will always be, my favorite Life Teacher.

Credit the Quilter?

The semi-annual question of whether the quilt artist should necessarily credit the "hired hand" quilter who quilts his/her artwork has arisen again on the QuiltArt list. Being a professional quilter who prides herself on adding value to her customer's quilts, my opinion naturally falls on the side of acknowledging credit where credit is due.

If the quilt-top maker (or fiber artist) specifically instructs the quilter as to where to place each line of stitching, then the quilter is only following directions and is, indeed, simply a "hired hand". If, however, the quilter adds artistry through his or her own imagination, skill, and talent, then there is no question that the quilter has collaborated with the fiber artist in the creation of the work of art ... regardless of whether the quilter was paid or not.

If there is any doubt as to whether the quilting can "make" the quilt, compare these two detail images of a small section of an art quilt ... one with quilting and one without ... and make up your own mind.

No Reason