Saturday, July 24, 2010

NQA lights my fire

main street

Not once, but twice I left the NQA really excited about something I saw, with pictures on the camera, ready to get a post up on the blog…and left without writing down the details. The quilt pictured above was made by a group in…ah…Can anybody help me? It reminded me of the same technique I wrote about in my Quilting Party book.  The quilters started with a panoramic photo of their town and then cut it into vertical pieces. Each member made their section.  The sum is greater than the parts! I must say, though, the parts are each pretty great, too.

This technique created a very effective quilt which would be especially great in a public space in their town, any town. It would also work beautifully in a hospital lobby, town hall, library etc.

I think I may suggest this to my quilting guild as a great civic project (not to mention fun activity) to commemorate some of our historic and picturesque “Main Streets” here in central Ohio area. 

If you need a good public service project idea for a quilt guild, high school art class, junior high sewing class, (insert group name!), here it is.

norkio-like 2

Don’t see moose too often in quilts!

This quilt reminded me of Noriko Endo’s landscape quilts, especially with the tiny animals Noriko and this quilter added.  I sent this photo to Norkio, actually, to show her how effective the use of white tulle was in this quilt to simulate sunrays coming through the trees in the forest.  After the quilt was completed, strips of white tulle were placed on top with some branches overlapping them.  Take a look here at the close-up:

noriko-like 1

What a great idea! The more I see, the more I want to quilt all day long!

PS: Who made this quilt??

Monday, July 19, 2010

When life gives you blueberries . . .

. . . on a gorgeous summer day, you just gotta make jam.

Rather than work today, that’s what we’re up to.

However, work for me is play, and I couldn’t help but stroll a little around the internet while the boys picked blueberries. I found a nifty website.

Frieda Anderson’s Blog

Frieda is coming here to teach in November. Her classes fill up fast. I’m not sure I’ll be able to get in. For now, I’ll have to settle for keeping up with her on her blog, full of good ideas and great pictures. Keeping with my blue theme, a nice quilt called Duluth Trees:

Now, must go have some jam.

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

Talent Envy: Judy Coates Perez

Judy has a great blog, one of my favorites. Head over to her site, and read the July 7 post, then watch her video of how to sew metal onto fabric to make her iconic ornaments:

An Ornamental Fiesta at Create

The ornaments are so pretty! I'd like to make a tree full of them and give some for Christmas gifts.

Judy is teaching at all the major venues like Quilt Festival Long Beach in July and Quilt Festival Houston in November. I’d love to try her class. Our quilting guild wanted to bring her here for a class but the scheduling didn’t work out. I wish they would try again! Private lessons would be a wonderful treat.

In addition to her considerable sewing skills, she is a talented painter. Painting isn’t easy (especially to me) but she teaches so anybody can do it successfully.

I bought her small book of her quilts and love the whimsy in many of them. Her themes are beautiful, as are her color choices. Animals are her specialty, but it is her metalwork that really makes them  appealing to me.

Shiny, shiny...always attracts my eye!

Sunday, July 11, 2010

A peek into Barbara Olson’s Studio

Barbara is author of Journey of an Art Quilter, published by Dragon Threads in 2004. The book was one of our best sellers, for good reason: It was and is a terrific book by a fantastic artist.

Barbara lives in Billings, MT, where she creates her amazing art quilts. I had a chance to catch up with her recently, and see what’s happening in her studio.

Barbara, laughing, told me that her husband has been travelling recently, which is always beneficial for her work: less cooking, more free time to quilt!

She sent me these 3 photos of tops she finished. These are from her new technique called “Quilting with Leonardo da Vinci, if da Vinci Quilted!” (Who’s to say he didn’t?)

Aren't these quilts fabulous? Her use of color is always full of punch. These, of course, are just the tops. When she adds threads and quilting, it will make them even (more)irresistible! Barbara is, among other things, a master of using thread for impact. I'm so envious of the free-motion she can do with a domestic machine.

Barb is also writing an article for Quilting Arts magazine called “Painterly Images” which shows how she uses fabrics like brush strokes to create representational images. Watch the magazine for it, or stay tuned to this blog for notice when it is published this fall.

You can see more of Barb's work at www.barbaraolsonquiltart.com. Believe me, you want to see more of Barb’s work. She’s amazing.

Wednesday, July 7, 2010

Guest Post at Bernina.com


I'm a guest-blogger over at the BerninaUSA Blog today. The post is about Judith Montano's Fibreart Montage. There's a little history about the book, a preview of a few inside pages, and if you can stand it, a picture of me! Head on over to check it out:


Tuesday, July 6, 2010

Mystery Solved!

I told you Beth Schillig knows everybody, and she has saved the day on the Mystery Quilter in my last blog post. The quilter is Linda Roy. She had a quilt Beth remembered seeing in the American Quilter Magazine.

You can see her work at this link, at the American Quilter's Society Quilt Show award page. She did #121, Vintage Bouquet Button. Linda won the "Hand Workmanship" award.

I love the internet! Thanks Beth.

Monday, July 5, 2010

National Quilting Association Mystery Quilter

I'm so lucky that this show is permanently held in Columbus every June. In fact, I won't take my vacation in early June or I'd miss all the shows in town. Wikipedia reports that Columbus is within 550 miles (890 km) of half the population of the United States. (It must be true if it’s in Wikipedia, right?) I can see why the Spring Quilt Festival show has moved to Cincinnati starting April 2011 also!

This show was so exciting and inspiring. It took my friend Vicki and me 4 hours to walk the floor and see all the quilts on display and shop all the fabulous vendor booths...and a try on a mid-arm machine too! We were exhausted mentally and physically after that but very,very happy.

Of course many quilts were just amazing. In addition to the dog quilts from the last post, there were a number of quilts that really stood out for me, and I’ll be writing about them soon.

This quilt was one of the top prize winners and I'm sorry that I lost the name of the quilter! WHO IS THIS QUILTER?

What was impressive to me is her use of ruching--the gathered dimensional parts in the photos--that is an old-fashioned quilting technique which never appealed to me. However, this quilter managed to work it so it seemed fresh and a beautiful accent to this masterpiece. She has made me a believer. Who is she?

Now I want to incorporate it in my quilts too. That is one of the great things about going to these shows. In addition to seeing just about every quilter you know, you never know what will get your blood rushing! I'm going to have to learn this technique. But first, I need the name of the quilter.

Sunday, July 4, 2010

National Quilting Association Goes to the Dogs

I love dogs! I have a Portuguese water dog that I adore. (I got him before Obama did. I AM that cool.) So, it figures that I love dog quilts too. I found a few great ones at the NQA show I thought I’d share. They may not be award-winning, but they are fun and adorable and make you smile.

This next one titled Roxie is by a member of my Quintessential Quilters guild, Teri Tope. She was a featured teacher at the show this year and is the author of a new book called Applique in Reverse that came out this spring.

I love this technique she developed using high contrast photos and just stitching black lines on white fabric. She has done portraits of her family that are really effective....I see book number two soon. I want to be a test guinea pig when she writes this one.

As you can see from previous posts, our guild has a lot of talented people.

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