I’ve lately been working with some larger major works. This year has been about building back a body of work. And it’s been successful. Here are a few of the larger competition/gallery pieces I did this year.
These pieces excite me. They take a real chunk of time, but I’ve learned some technique this year that has speeded that up. But a large piece is about a lot of visual thought. It has to fill up space so it needs points of interest, both up close and at a distance. The longest part of a large quilt is taking the time to think it through. They don’t work like small quilts. I know people who enlarge a small design into a large quilt. I’m not one of them. The space gets filled differently. Larger quilts are made from a central object with paths drawn around them.
Smaller quilts are more like snapshots. Not much there. But it’s all good eye candy. I spent the last couple days pressing through some little artifact quilts (made with rubbings and found objects). Because they are so tiny they offer a lot of freedom.
Lately, I’ve been working smaller as well as bigger. There is something wonderful about a tiny world you can step into visually, as a private retreat. They are designed differently so they make your brain think differently. And because they’re small they’re affordable. Everyone deserves art.
Besides, tiny quilts can go in intimate small places. They don’t need a full wall. They don’t have to match the couch. They make a retreat into another world in just a tiny space.
This is the latest batch of tiny quilts. You’ll find them on sale in myEtsy Shop.
I’ve been working for a week on a flamingo quilt. It’s a commission of sorts, so I’m working with the owner’s druthers. Blissfully, we have similar druthers and I think she’s quite pleased.
Part of this week’s fun has been choosing the background The flamingo is all embroidered, so the next step is building her world. I was looking at colors when I pulled out fabric opportunities, but I discovered quickly that what really happened is that the background changed the time of day.
The different backgrounds suggest different times of day
The background changes the time of day and that in itself is a powerful statement. One way or another she’s walking in surf but is it night? Is it in moonlight? Twilight? Afternoon? Early cool morning?
Those are more than logical questions. They make a statement about the quilt itself and what it conveys. They tell me about this bird, who she is, where she is, and what her world is like.
All done by a simple choice of cloth. It never ceases to amaze me. Mostly the fabric choice is about letting the subject shine, but that choice carries meaning as well as color. Hand dye is a miracle that happens all the time but only once for each piece. The miracle we choose opens all kinds of choices and shuts other possibilities out. I’m thinking this will be the “right” background
Final Choice!
I turned around the darker one so that her face is in the light. We have a winner!
Still deciding about the moons. Do I want arced moons or just one? Decisions…..decisions.
Years ago someone asked me how many mushrooms go in a quiche. I asked back, “How many mushrooms do you have?”
I don’t make copies of things. I do make variations, and I find it useful to rethink some things I’ve done before, or more importantly tried to do before. I might get lucky. You never know.
But there are some things I know I can always use. There are never enough dragonflies, daisies, frogs, or mushrooms. They make an excellent point of interest for a visual path through a piece. And every so often I make batches of them.
The last two quilts had lots of frog and mushroom action. But they are such different pieces. Why did that work? Why do the same color elements work in two really different color backgrounds?
I’ve thought about it a bit and have decided that bright is a color all of its own. Green Heron Hunting features a bright fall-red sky, a stream, and some rocks. High Rise Living is a soft-colored background as a garden with lobster claw plants dangling in the breeze. The backgrounds couldn’t be different. But both backgrounds are a strong contrast to the mushrooms and frogs. High Rise Living is almost pastel. Green Heron Hunting is a bit somber. Both of them are high-contrast against the backgrounds
Batching regular elements has changed my work a lot. I find I can do larger elements with much less distortion. The downside is they need to be stitched down afterward. The mushrooms get stitched down with the most prevalent color on the edge. The frogs and other elements usually get stitched down with black. I don’t always like the heavier black borders, but it eliminates a lot of pucker and distortion.
So I continue to make batches of the elements I know I’ll use again and again, Contrast, any contrast makes elements work together. And there’s always room for one more frog.
I have two quilts I’m finishing right now that you’ve been watching me work on. The threads I choose make all the difference in their background effects. Shinier threads will create a shimmer, a wet or wild area. Less shiny threads are more indicative of air or ground. I’m treating them with different threads and patterns to create a specific effect in each case.
For a very wet look, I’ll use Sliver and other flat threads. These really shine across the surface. I prefer them for either starry nights or for water.
The other thread I’m using is Madeira’s bug body thread, FS2/20. This amazing thread has a black core that gives it a very different texture. Zigzagged it does look like bugs. As a stipple it has a sharp look without the intense shine.
I consider both these threads incredibly beautiful and essential. But I use them very differently. Because they create an incredibly different texture. Why is that important? The texture defines the area for our eyes. Shiny thread will create that wet feeling. A sharp undefined metallic does excellent air or dirt, all defined in our thread choices, with no more work to it than that.
Green Heron Hunting is set with water, air, leaf, and ground elements. The air and the ground are very similar. I don’t want a soft look. It’s fall, so I want it to be crisp and textured. So I chose Sliver for my stream. But the ground area with the frogs and the leaf tree tops are stippled zigzag with the FS2/20. There’s a glint of metallic, but it’s different from the high sheen of the water and the eye separates them immediately.
For the air, I chose a driving straight stipple pattern to suggest wind. But I put in a repetitive garnet stitch in it to make it look more driven.
For Fishy Business, the background is all water. So I used Sliver-type threads exclusively. The very shimmery background contrasts highly with the completely poly-embroidered fish. They both shine, but in very different ways.
Your thread choices and stipple patterns define the background. Contrast is the key. If your background and images contrast each other, they will stay visually separate, and help your eye to see the separation.
Every quilt you want to hang will need to have a rod pocket. The tradition is that you sew a tube and hand sew it on, I will never live that long. I hate to hand sew. It certainly would feel like I’d lived too long if I had to sew rod pockets that way.
Enter the wonderful world of glue. I’m a fond friend of Steam-a Seam for applique. But it has a version that comes in strips that makes a snap out of making a rod pocket.
Now we all know not to trust glue. It can, and will come loose at the most miserable times. I always stitch it down eventually for safety’s sake. But there are seams that take stress and seams that don’t. For a seam that has nothing pulling on it, you can fuse it and forget it. And a rod pocket has 2 hems and a seam that does not bear weight or take stress.
Each rod pocket is a rectangle that needs to be hemmed at the short sides and joined into a tube. It’s easy to do that with a strip of Steam a Seam 2.
It can be done in two pockets if you want a break in the center for a hanging hook.
What size should it be? Depends on your rods and depends on the size of your quilt. But I always go a bit wider than I think is needed. 6-8″ for something small. For a larger quilt, a 12″ pocket isn’t too big. If I cut the length of the rod pocket to the size of the quilt, by the time I fold over the two hems, it’s a perfect size to hold a rod without the rod peeking out.
I’ve put Steam a Seam 2 down both ends of the rod pockets and ironed the two hems. Then I’ve fold ed the rod pocket into thirds. I put Steam a Seam 2 on the folded up edge, and folded the other flap to meet. Iron it down and you have your rod pocket.
So now you have your pocket, without a stitch in it.
The rod pocket holds up the weight of the quilt, so it does need stitching to hold. But we can put it into place and baste it with the Steam a Seam 2 to prepare it for stitching.
I always stitch a rod pocket down, but I glue them first. I put two lines of Steam a Seam 2 down the length of the rod pocket. I center them on the back of the quilt on top and iron them down.
Then I put monofilament nylon or poly into both the top and bottom of my machine and set my stitch on a hemming stitch.I’ll need the hemming foot as well. It rides right along the edge of the pocket.
Set the hemming stitch just a bit wider than it sets for a regular hem. Stitch down one edge and then the other.
Will it show? Not very much. You might find the line of stitching where the hemming stitch is, but I guarantee you’ll have to look hard for it. Job done. Not a hand needle in sight.
I was working on Green Heron Hunting last week and put up several backgrounds on Facebook to choose from. Usually, people’s responses give me great ideas about what is and isn’t working. I put this up to a different group and was pretty much told unilaterally that they were all too wild. What was most distressing was the person who suggested that the black photo wall was the best background for it.
I don’t have words. I asked. It’s my own fault. In fairness, the backgrounds were wild. But not unusual for me. Mostly they were not “realistic” and the bird did have to be placed right to stand out,
This is the one that made the best sense to me
Realism is one of the old art standards. I’m always awed by it. That doesn’t mean I’m good at it. I’m constitutionally incapable of it, I suppose it depends on what your goals are.
Up until the impressionists, we measured art progress in terms of how real it looked. This came to a skidding halt for me after Delicoix and David showed us the French revolution and tables with dead rabbits up close. But another thing happened as well. We had cameras. We had photography. All of a sudden there was realism at the click of a button. Photography is still a measure of skill and eye. But instantly attainable.
The Impressionists opened the door to modern art by saying that we were not tied to realism. They suggested we could use art to explore other ideas, thoughts, and experiences. Art is a language of emotion and passion. It can reach past realism to say what is true in so many other ways.
My art has always been an examination of social systems. It’s allegorical and emotional. It’s about living on each other’s edges. I also am due for cataract surgery soon and that may be affecting my color choices. But I can’t imagine anything duller than a perfectly correct bird in 80 shades of brown. in a brown field.
Besides, color really is an excellent anti-depressant. Nothing brightens my heart more than a new color chart. Or a wild array of color that visually bounces off the wall. Or a new shade of purple thread.
So there’s no harm in a bright red background and a turquoise stream. Or a set of wild toadstools in glory gory shades. Or a bird with purple in its wings.
After all those larger pieces, I’ve relaxed into doing some tiny pieces, partially for a rest, and partially for having some new work at the Galesburg Art Center. I’d done a class with some fabric rubbing and had new colors to play with. So I played.
I’ve also been introduced to a new thread called glide which looks metallic without being metallic. It’s a matter of color matching, but I’m impressed. I love metallic but it always behaves better from the bottom than through the needle.
After this, I’m going to push through to the two next bigger pieces, but I needed a break.
The new pieces will be available on Etsy soon. Or you can look them up on my profile page.
I found the Glide thread at Feed Mill Fabrics and Quilts. They have a nice collection. If you’re missing that metallic look and you want to skip the metallic drama.
It happened again. I was sewing along, in the groove, grooving it when I turned over my piece and found I had the wrong bobbin in.
Not just the wrong color. Metallic when I had intended my bird to be soft poly feathers.
There are several things to do at this point. Certainly one is to put your head in your hands and wail. I tried that and it didn’t shift anything. I got out my mustache trimmer, and really looked at it.
The thread was the Madiera bug body metallic (black core) that’s purple, red and green. If it sounds odd, it is. There’s nothing else quite like it. All three shades are the exact value, so you can actually shade with it. The red was a little much, but it added an iridescence to the bird I really liked. I stitched more of it in and decided it a happy accident.
with and without metallic
There are other answers. This would have taken a lot of ripping if it was irredeemable. Enter the mustache trimmer. This is a Wahl Half Pint Travel Trimmer, that is the no-tears-lather for removing zigzag stitching. It’s available at Walmart and Amazon.
Here’s how to use it
I chose not to rip this time. But I’m equipped when I need to. As You Sew so Shall You Rip is about evaluating when you really need to rip and when it’s optional.
Building something with dimension usually means it has a recognizable top and bottom. Design-wise, I believe you should be able to flip a piece on any side and have the design still move and work. But it loses a great deal of credibility if you have upside-down fish. It’s not a good look.
Be that as it may, it helps to have a recognizable border between sky, land, and water. How can we make those obviously separate, without just putting a line across it?
There are several subtle ways and some pretty direct ways.
Dyed cotton thread in the sky, thick metallic in the water
The easiest subtle way is to change the kind of thread you are using to stipple. Not the color necessarily. The kind of thread.
Threads separate in how they’re made and how much they shine. Metallic threads usually shine more than poly or rayon, certainly much more than cotton. Sliver-like threads that are flat tinsel shine the most. Next, come the twisted metallics like Supertwist. Then there are the wound metallics like Superior metallics.
Now, if water is shinier than air, and air is shinier than earth, you can separate them out by having different threads stippling the piece. I usually use Sliver or #8 weight metallic threads for water, and Supertwist for sky, and/ or earth. If they shine differently, your eye will automatically sort them out as different.
# eight weight metallic threads in water
But the best way I know to establish earth is rocks. This is not subtle. It’s an in-your-face statement of land. A pile of rocks at the water’s edge defines the water/earth border immediately. Ad it’s so easy to do.
I cut rocks out of leftover hand dye. I pick anything that is rock color, always adjustable to the color of the background, and cut a whole lot of rocks for when I need them. They’re backed with Steam-a-Seam 2 so I can move them around at will until I iron them down.
Fishy Business is a mostly water quilt. But a pile of rocks in one corner establishes the bottom of the pond. I may have globs of thread and some water ferns later to create more movement. Now all I want to do is establish a baseline with the rocks and start getting the water to flow.
I’m using soft edge applique techniques for this. Soft edge has no visible stitching or edge to it. Neither water or rocks are improved by having a hard applique edge around them. Instead, I’ll go around the edges with monofilament nylon and a zigzag stitch. There’s more information on, this in Sun, Clouds Water and Rocks.
I cut some elongated c shapes to make water from. Both in blue and green for the water and yellow for reflected sunlight.
You can see the progression on this in these shots. I started with a corner pile of rocks to establish the bottom of the pond. Then I added in the water ripples made of sheers backed with Steam-a-Seam 2. Since each fish I put in the water changes where the water ought to be, I’ve added them one by one and adjusted the water around them. I added sunlit water shapes across the middle.
I’m pleased with this so far. Nothing is sewn down yet, so I’ll leave it up and look at it in case it needs adjustment.
Having a sticky fusible like Steam-a-Seam 2 lets me design this way. When I’m ready, I’ll commit and iron it down. It’s a very fishy business after all.
