labels

The Art of Documenting Your Art: How to KEep Track of Your Work

| ellenanneeddy

Today we take 16 quilts over to the Peoria Art Guild to hang the show opening next Friday night, Sept. 1st. In the rush to finish a couple more pieces, find all the unlabeled work, and get all the hangings on, the rods cut, and the cat fur off, there’s a final task that has to happen. I need to do my documentation.

There are 1,107 quilts on my price list since the 1980s. There are around 200 quilts in house. I’m not good at keeping track. I regularly find I’ve got a piece at a gallery I thought I’d lost. I don’t even panic anymore. The chances are excellent that the missing piece is safe in a store where I left it, coming home in time.

But I do have some documentation tricks that help.

photos, photos, Photos

Take full and detailed shots of your work, without Fido in the background. It helps to take process shots too.

Everything Has a Number

Each piece has a number of its own. Its number is the next sequence, plus the year it was made. That gets documented in an Excel file that has the size, and price of each quilt.

The price list is the listing for each quilt by number.

Everything has a Signature

I always sign my work. Right in the stippling. Sometimes it’s obvious. Sometimes it’s not. But it’s always there. Yes, I can sign it backwards in case I have the cool thread in the bobbin.

Everything Has a Label

I’ve done everything for labels at one time or another: written in pen on the back, or stitched on a computerized machine. Now I run them through the computer. I use June Tailor’s Iron on Quick Fuse Fabric, an ink jet printer, and Avery’s free label printing site. I can print a sheet full of any kind of label I want and cut it out with a rotary cutter.

1-large-quilt-labels-b7-24Download

Labels are a safety feature. How does anyone know it’s your quilt if you don’t label it? I have a recognizable style, but it’s hubris to pretend everyone would know. Telling one quilt from another on a price list can be harder than it looks. And it has my contact information so someone can send it back to me or contact me if they should find it. I don’t send quilts out without a label.

So how do I manage to lose quilts? I’m so tired at the end of this I don’t always mark off when something sells or when it goes somewhere. The best system is subject to human error, and boy, am I human.

These are some quilts that just came home. They’re on my Etsy site on sale.

The opening for the Peoria Guild Show is at:

Peoria Art Guild 

Natural Threads Ellen Anne Eddy Show September 1-28

Peoria Art Guild, 203 Harrison St, Peoria, IL, 61602, 309 637 2787 

Hours: Monday 9-4, Tuesday 9-6:30, Wednesday 9-6:30, Thursday 9-6:30, Friday 9-4 Saturday 9-2, Sunday CLOSED

Anonymous Was Who?

| ellenanneeddy
Beachcombers
Beachcombers

For heaven’s sake, sign your work!

I’ve told this story before. I worked with a gallery who thought it was to their interest to remove the labels from the backs of my quilts so no one would be able to contact me except through them. They did not tell me that.

What happened next they really couldn’t have predicted. Someone stole 7 of those quilts. It was ugly. I know who. And I was that willing to never see that person again, that I have resigned myself to never seeing them again.

Even if the thief dumped those quilts in a place where someone could find them, they’re like children traveling on a bus without a note pinned to their collar. Someone might recognize them. In the same way that we may have snow in July. Not likely. I’m resigned that these quilts are gone for good. They were my teachers, as all good quilts are. At some point, I’ve learned to let go of pieces and hold on to what I’ve learned.

Breaking the Ice
Breaking the Ice

Recently I was on facebook where someone posted about how they hate to sign their work.

My hackles raised. I climbed on that hobby horse and here I am! Sign your work!

Why?

Because your work is a measure of your life! It deserves documentation. It is a document in itself. Someone, your children if not your critics, will look at it and know you better. And find joy, and knowledge and power in what you did.

There is a book called Anonymous Was A Woman. This book, with all respect to the author, makes me furious.

It’s a lovely book and a real situation. Most women at some time have been only known as anonymous. It makes my blood boil. It’s a self inflicted nastiness. You can choose to be anonymous.

But why would you? Why would you silence your own voice? Why would you hide who you are? Who is served? Who is honored in that?

We are not anonymous. We are women making statements in our art and our lives that need to be heard, even if our statements are private and stay close to home. Not signing your work is an anonymous ransom note to the universe.

I now label all my quilts. And I sign and date them in the stippling. Someone will want to know. And I want them to know all about you and me and the things we made. And who we were. Sign your work.

Stippled signature
Damask Rose 911-20
Available on Etsy for Sale

It may be subtle, but the signature is in there, and they have to harm the quilt to remove it.

I also do an iron on label, computer printed from June Tabor’s Iron on Printer Fabric

This label has my name, the studio name, address and web site and phone number. The quilt number is the actual number of the quilt with the year it was made afterwards. There’s a space for me to sign the label when the quilt is sold.

Of course that can go wrong too.

Nothing is correct on this label at this time except the name of the quilt. Since the quilt itself is a document, I tend to leave them as they originally were made unless an owner asks for a label with their information on it.

Should you have a quilt of mine you want an updated label on, contact me and we will of course make one for it. Safety first.