Travelling Quilt

"Postcard from Rajasthan" the quilt mentioned in the March 7 post, is on its way to Deer Isle today! Here's hoping the horse and his handler are well received and maybe even find a buyer. No word yet on whether any of the floral quilts sold, but CA Hecker, gallery owner, did say if any artist wanted to leave small pieces at the Small Works gallery for a time, that would be OK, so I have inquired about that option.

Sunday, a group met for a workshop on adding hand stitching to quilted pieces--mixing in embroidery stitches, rather than hand quilting. The results are big, meant to be seen, stitches in a variety of styles and colors. Very striking, but very slow going. Always good to have another tool in the embellishment tool kit.

"Giraffes" met "Gorillas" and both have returned to their permanent home in Amsterdam, NY. They make a nice pair, although they should not be displayed quite so side by side!

Meanwhile, I am making progress on "Bali Bloom." Redid the background leaves to be somewhat lighter around the top, and fused everything in place. Next comes thread painting, which I have not done on this scale before and am excited to try out.

See more of my quilt photos at: http://community.webshots.com/user/roconnorquilts

Pinned

Making progress, wouldn't you say? Each petal is complete, background and center laid out. Next steps--fuse, and add the anthers (that's the little bit on the end of the filaments--in this case they are bright yellow!) which are too small to pin in place, fuse them down and then the thread-painting can begin!

Since I start back to work next week after a wonderful 12 weeks of Sabbatical, I will have to go back to making quilting time in the evenings or on weekends. I am afraid progress on this piece could slow to a crawl. Luckily, the base will be done. The thread painting, quilting and embellishing can happen in small chunks.

Don't think I will have it ready to enter in this year's Maine Quilt Show. However, with no need to travel to Augusta to collect a quilt, a road trip to the Lowell Quilt Show, which takes place the following week, is in order.

Bali Hibiscus

I have been thinking about this quilt for a long time. I had a single, oversize flower in mind. Then a friend e-mailed photos from a trip to Bali, and this hibiscus was amongst them. From the photo I created a drawing showing highlights and shadows, which I enlarged to 36 x 44 inches. Then I went shopping for a range of pink fabrics. Since the photo was taken in Bali, I chose to use nearly all Bali Batik fabrics in the quilt. When completed, the individual petals are about two feet in diameter and somewhat fragile as they travel from ironing board to design wall to be pinned in place. Each petal is made up of 20 to 25 shapes, each cut individually and pieced together like a puzzle. The resulting petals are taking on their own life, which, while maybe not recognizably like the photo, are pleasing. I really love the scallop shape of each petal, and don't know that I would have made the connection if they were purple, say, or orange. A deep brown Batik with a subtle leaf pattern forms the ground, and several shades of green will create a crown of leaves. I am looking forward to the thread painting part--bought a special spool of variegated thread in many shades of pink to help blend the colors.

Finished

The Giraffe photo quilt is finished! The binding went on while watching TV last night. Don't you love the way the applique tree branches and three dimensional leaves enhance the photos? I especially love the one of the baby giraffe. The quilting for Giraffe was done with gold metallic thread, first outlining each photo and the branches, then filling in with vines and leaves. My daughter suggested using metallic thread when I was doing Gorilla, to suggest light in the trees. Don't you love the sparkly effect? I am a sucker for anything sparkly, of course. Leaves were created by fusing a leaf print fabric to a deep purple, then thread painting the leaves with green thread. Leaves were individually cut out, some used purple side out as shadows. As a few leaves were left from Gorilla, I incorporated them here, as one more way to tie the two pieces together.
Can't wait to see these two quilts side by side--hope they make a good pair.

Yippee!

Carolyn Hecker, the gallery owner at Pearson Legacy Gallery in Deer Isle, where the flower quilts will be exhibited (starting tomorrow!) included me in the prospectus for her next exhibit, 'Portraits' (of people, not animals.) The only portrait quilt I have is of an Indian man and his Mawari horse. Figuring I had nothing to lose, I sent off a couple of photos of the quilt (Postcard from Rajasthan, left) to see if it would fit the theme. She wrote back that the piece would be just fine. Yippee!

She went on to describe a visit to India in which the Raj at the place she stayed had Mawari horses and that she had pictures of one of his favorite steeds and is a big horse lover, herself. Small world, isn't it?

Finally, she mentioned that the flower pieces are already gathering kudos even before the show is hung, and am I sure about the prices as they are very modest! Of course, my goal is just to see them sell at this point, but most exciting to hear they are being well received.

"Postcard from Rajasthan" was modelled on a photo taken by Henry Dallal and used with his permission. http://henrydallal.com/