New Techniques/Old Projects

September has been full of travel, weddings, and family visits. Gradually time has opened up for a return to my artwork. A number of projects are in the works.....here are tidbits from two:

The oldest of UFOs
Our daughter has been visiting the past week and we have been going through old family memorabilia. This needlepoint was buried in a container with other miscellaneous photos and such.

It was a pillow top kit that an aunt had bought in Scandinavia on a trip long, long ago. She gave it to me in the 1970's to do for her and I completed it and returned with a note. It never got made into a pillow and was returned to me upon her passing back in the 1980's.

Needless to say, it is now on my 'To Do' list for September.

Mylar Experiment
I am still processing the mountain of information that I was exposed to at the June Ricky Timm's event here in Rochester.  The use of mylar in design work came up a number of times in the seminar and I have since seen it mentioned in a number of other blogs, articles, etc on art quilts.

I am currently working on another quilt in my Antarctic series and have decided to play with incorporating a mylar outline of my pattern into my process. What I have done is place a piece of mylar over a black/white photo blown up to my desired size of quilt and traced on the mylar the breakdown of the photo into fabric pieces as well as a tentative color scheme - capturing gradations for various colors I intend to use. The mylar will serve as my pattern for cutting and placing fabric. Will let you know how it goes as I work with this piece in the next month. I am excited at the possibility.

Intuitive Play

Years ago I took a personality test called Myers-Briggs which confirmed that I am a highly intuitive person. These days as I refine a process that I have for creating art quilts, I fully appreciate and trust the value of this intuition.

In the process that I am refining, construction begins with a blank piece of muslin tacked up on my design wall. Maggie McNabb writes in her book, Design by Nature: Using Universal Forms and Principles in Design (Voices That Matter), that emptiness gives you a point from which to start from. As I begin to fill in my muslin, I use a 'map' that I create by abstracting from a photo that I have been attracted to.

Portion of map from Illuminated Albizia

I begin to fill in parts of the muslin with fabric, following the rough guidelines of my maps.

Early stage of Illuminated Albizia

 While intuitive play is somewhat constrained at this point by my map, I always grant myself the option to not follow my map. Contrary to some other approaches that use a guide from a photograph as a strict diagram for their art quilt, my map marks a general direction to my goal.

 Once the muslin is filled with fabric, the stitching part of my process begins. This is where intuition  plays a major role. It is in the thread painting and quilting that my art work really comes to life.

Winter Morn prior to quilting

As I quilt each portion of a project, I allow my intuition to guide me. I actually create a 'sample sandwich' with pieces of fabric from the art work that I test various quilting ideas upon. This give me a general idea of how the quilting of a particular area like the mountains or a tree might look.

Sample of quilting effects

As I actually quilt my piece though, I really allow the fabric to 'speak' and guide me. This is often the most exciting part of my process. In Winter Morn, for example, I had a general idea of how to approach quilting the river. I started according to plan but soon was listening to the fabric and trusting my intuition. Quite honestly, when I completed the section, I wasn't 100% certain of what I had done. It wasn't until I viewed my piece from a distance that I realized my intuition had transformed the river from a quiet stream into a more interesting element - a dynamic flow rounding a bend.

I have taken a number of design classes with Dena Crain. An observation that shows up repeatedly in classes is the recognition that there is a point where you, the artist, surrender to the piece you are creating. If you allow that to happen, the piece will show you what needs to happen next. This is where intuition rules the day. When this occurs in the creative process, it reminds me of those perfect moments on the mat in my art of aikido where you totally blend with your partner and joy results.

In reality, it is this blending or dance that happens in all those moments in life where we are happiest and most fulfilled. The founder of aikido, Morihei Ueshiba, expressed it best:

To be one with the universe.

More Blog Resources on the Web

 Here are a few more resources that I have noticed in the past few weeks that may be of interest:

Entering Shows - Elizabeth Barton had a great blog post on May 3 with thoughts on entering shows. She discusses both the value of shows and deciding which to enter.

Displaying a small project - J Bryant Campbell had a great post on April 26 on mounting a small fiber piece. It would work well for small art quilts. Her photos really help explain the process which she has used many times.

Three Techniques for Binding - Susan Knapp had a blog recently on finishing an art quilt with a non-mitered facing. She provided pdfs for the instructions as well as a mitered facing and a pillow case style.

Kumihimo Braiding

I am always into discovery and am always finding new techniques/ideas when I have the time to surf the web. A few days ago I was checking out many of the fiber blogs that I love to follow.  Judy Wedemeyer had a really cheerful post on some flower quilts that she had designed. The day was dreary and the flowers were so cheerful.

Judy wrote a good deal in her post about the techniques she used to create the pieces and mentioned Kumihimo braiding that she used in a border. I was hooked. She referenced a previous blog on the braiding and showed some pieces that she had made.

Of course, I started googling Kumihimo braiding to learn more. I found a great 4 minute video on youtube.





 It looks fairly simple, doesn't it?

Next, I found a website that advertised Everything Kuminimo and browsed a bit.

The end result of all this is that I have an order for some basic supplies so I can play with some braiding. I am always searching for things relating to my art that I can do while I am traveling. I am optimistic that this may just turn into one of those crafts that will be very portable and even easily done in a plane. And, the result will be some beautiful braiding for a future project.

Will keep you posted!