Deconstructing clothes, bleach discharge and wood carving

Well, joining SAQA has certainly made an impact in my life already. The unexpected invitation from Paula Swett....dinner with the PA SAQA members and the gallery exhibition's opening night...the meeting with the PA SAQA rep, Meredith Armstrong at her home in Danville last Sunday. All day Monday I reflected on the rapid changes overtaking my life. I realized that it was time to move to the next level of original creativity.

I started out the week with bleach discharge on my mind. A large piece of commercial fabric my mom gave me winked at me, and that always means something is coming. It immediately made me think of bleach discharge. Here is a picture of it:

I decided to carve a stamp resembling one of the flowers of the fabric:

I dug up a couple of existing retail stamps I had and used them plus the carved one to do this:

Using deconstructed cotton shirts from Salvation Army, I tried my new stamp and a couple of others on the smaller yoke pieces. Some is from the collar pieces that were just wide enough to accomodate the smaller stamp. I'm saving the bigger shirt piecs for less experimental work.

I started with Clorox cleanup, but of course it was too runny:

I ditched that, and because my Clorox gel pen was dried up I got some brand new Soft Scrub for the rest. The one above I re-discharged with the Soft Scrub, slightly offset to the original watery prints. It will be useful so I feel as though I saved a bad first job. Yay!

In each case, to stop the bleaching action I used Anti-chlor, or Bleach Stop, 2 TBSP to the gallon of water. Rinse the piece first to get all the bleach residue off, then plunge into the gallon of bleach stop and stir it around on and off for a while. From start to finish it was probably 4 days. I didn't think I had gotten as good results as even these, so when they came out of the laundy and each piece came through I was heartily encouraged.

Not sure which technique interfered to make this interesting blend, probably batik remains that are resisting, giving a cool smoky violet gray pairing with the pale sanguine color left behind after the bleach had its way. This is why I do it, this cool unexpected thing that might happen just makes my day.

The next few are from my hand carved stamp:

Tina Rey gave me the next store-bought stamp:

I took this piece and colored it in with fabric markers:

I trimmed it and we'll see what happens next! Is it whole in itself, or part of a larger whole? That is the question.


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Here is a couple shots of my Pennsylvania Dutch lap quilt that I'm handquilting.

 I got all the center rings done! Now just the borders to do. I hope a certain someone in my life will love it when its done. I'm going to be finishing up a lot of my patchwork in the hopes of branching into a different fiber art direction. I am feeling more encouraged than I've been in years.

I'm hooking up with Nina-Marie's Off the Wall Fridays...if you haven't visited her weekend blog, please do! Lots of people sharing there:

Nina Marie's Off The Wall Friday

Wishing you warm days and cool nights. And love.

Sue

Contemporary Fiber: Breaking Traditions

I had the privilege of seeing some cutting edge art quilts at the Lore Degenstein Gallery down in Selinsgrove, PA last evening. The opening reception, Contemporary Fiber: Breaking Traditions, was delightful! The gallery was filled almost to overflowing. Kate Themel spoke about 'Breaking Traditions', which is both the title of the exhibit, and the raison d'etre behind art quilts. They are made to hang on the wall and be experienced, lived with and loved. I didn't take my camera in because it seemed bad form, but I saw a few shots being taken with phones, so I guess maybe there is no fighting that former breach of etiquette. I'm going to search out photos that might be online of what I saw: breathtaking color, line, texture and composition from all the artists. They are: Paula Swett - Textile Paintings, Kate Themel, Mary Pals, Katie Pasquini-Masopust, Meredith Re' Grimsley, Linda Colsh, Valerie Goodwin, Beth Carney, and Susan Shie:

Beth Carney: http://bethcarneystudio.com/chasms9.htm?hc_location=ufi

Susan Shie: http://www.turtlemoon.com/gallery14/2014gallery.htm

Valerie Goodwin: http://www.quiltsbyvalerie.com/

 Paula Swett: http://magpienet.biz/commissioned-art/

 Linda Colsh: http://www.lindacolsh.com/

 Meredith Re' Grimsley: http://contemporarycraft.tumblr.com/post/73447580393/featured-artist-meredith-grimsley

Katie Pasquini-Masopust: http://www.katiepm.com/gallery.html

Mary Pals: http://marypaldesigns.com/

Kate Themel: http://www.katethemel.com/ 

I was asked to comment on the dinner I attended before the opening. The food was wonderful, I had lentil-walnut burger with a cranberry cashew balsamic salad. Meredith, the PA SAQA coordinator, sat me next to her and made me feel quite comfortable. She and I split spanokopita, which I can spell better than I can pronounce! Anyway, delicious! There were other SAQA members at dinner as well, though none of the artists that showed in the exhibit were with us. 

Later at the gallery it was Kate Themel that gave the talk about where quilts have come from and where they are going. The place was mobbed, and the opening of the exhibit a huge success! I am very glad I went and may get a second chance to go back this week while there are fewer people in attendance for further study.  

 
  
 

I am very excited to be attending Studio Art Quilter's Association's new exhibit, Contemporary Fiber: Breaking Tradition. It is opening tomorrow (Sat) evening. Somehow I was fortunate to be invited by one of the artists to join them all for dinner before the opening. Today is the first day I could wrap my head around it. Most of the artists are quite familiar to me, although I haven't met any of them personally. But I will be. And they will discuss their work. It is a heavenly anticipation for an extra special experience. Less than 24 hours to dinner. Butterflies.

We had a wonderful Easter, we had dinner at the rib joint with the family and most of our beloved. Good food and love and laughter! I came home refreshed and ready to continue quilting Cloister Garden:

Only the stained glass is quilted so far. Next up is to even out the black edges of the stained glass, then switch to jade green for the center quilting. I have decided on lines radiating from the center for the green.

 I found this watercolor hiding on the side porch and rescued it from certain death. I painted this about 1999, while I was still in MI.

 After my husband died, I first took an acrylic painting class, then moved to PA and taught myself a little watercolor and color theory. It was in 2000 that I realized painting wasn't satisfying me and I stumbled on the idea of miniature quilts. Bought a magazine, made a quilt for my Grammy all in purples ( I immediately colored out of the lines when I began, it was a traditional 2 color 9 patch and I bought 10 different purples to vary it). Then I started to learn about traditional quilts...and contemporary quilts...and art quilts....now 'modern' quilts. After 15 years I still can't get enough.

Here are some things I'm studying on the living room walls, etc, right now.

Fractured Iris, 2012. Hand pieced and machine quilted:

The small striped hexi centers (pupils) are from a thrift store shirt that was $3. The background is from a yard piece hand dyed by Katy Widger. Her hand dye method was one of the first I learned from, along with Ann Johnston and Paula Burch. The border and all triangle shapes are from Katy's fabric. I hoped to add a sense of the hexagons hovering by using it as bckgd/border fabric, purposefully using low contrast. All the other colors I used were chosen from that length of Katy's fabric. The fractured iris are all from my stash.


This is a doll bed quilt that I made in 2001:

I made a couple of pink and brown quilts. After that time I made quite a few quilts utilizing 'patience' blocks, or a simple log cabin block with set in seams. It is also my first free motion quilting, in the large border. The rest is stitch in the ditch.

This last one on the living room coffee table is factory made and has a larger companion that I hang on the porch. It was in the sweet little cottage that came when we bought the adjoining property along with a similar factory made 2 pc quilted schoolhouse block set. Lots of good stuff in that cottage! There is real linoleum from the bauhaus movement! Don't get me started because we are on the way out of here and I won't see how the cottage fares. It is loaded with vintage goodies, and stuff. I know someone will come here and love these things, and this place.

I'm thankful Spring has sprung:

I planted snowdrops in a few places but this was the first flower spotted by John last week.



These crocus were washed into the yard 3 years ago with the the flash flood accompanying the Leo-Irene hurricane combo of 2011. Now they have given us a lovely display for the 2nd spring in a row! There are more but one or two straggled about and I can't find them. Here they are before the deer ate them for Easter dinner:

Looks like a memorial with the brick I used to keep from squashing them as we walked about. I got right down on the ground with my back to the late afternoon sun to get this shadow effect. R.I.P.

I was struck by the notion that if there had been a nuclear blast, those shadows would be permanently emblazoned on the face of the rock.


Sue

I'm hooking up with Nina-Marie and  Off The Wall Friday
Thanks, Nina-Marie!