The students in my “Design Your Own Nature Quilt” class did really excellent work. Their task was to be INSPIRED by their photos, but not to actually copy them.
Eldora had a beautiful photo showing a ton of beautiful flowers, so she wisely cropped it way down.
She did a great job depicting the foliage and the flowers loosely. This is going to be great!
Patricia started with a lovely mountain vista.
She kept the composition the same and made great progress. She’ll add lots of orange triangle and V-shapes for the lilies in the foreground. They’ll really pop against the green.
Karyn had a very interesting photo, with wonderful shadows and colors. The things she liked the most were the dark tree trunks creating contrast in the background and the busy, colorful plants in the foreground.
She easily worked loosely and very closely emulated the feel of the photo, capturing her favorite things in the process. Isn’t it great?
Ann’s photo showed two weeping willows. She cropped most of the right one, which greatly improved the composition.
Then, she had a blast creating a “hairy” weeping willow. It really conveys the type of tree well. The dark shape on the right is the place holder for the second tree. This one is fun!
Sue’s photo had wonderful light and dark spots in the water and intriguing reflections. She noticed these areas and brought a very good selection of fabrics.
See what I mean? Her trees and water really came together nicely.
Construction tip: when you need little tiny pieces, like the white part of the water, don’t cut them to size. Instead, cut them larger and then tuck them under a larger piece. Let the shape of the larger piece cover and define the shape of the one below. In this case the dark water fabric has tiny cuts in it with a larger piece of white below showing through.
Wow, these ladies did extraordinary work! In one day they learned some useful design principles, created a sketch for their quilt, and made excellent progress with the collage of their quilts. They really pulled out their artistic courage! And we had fun to boot!
See other student work in the Part One post.
This class can be in person or via Zoom, as a 2 day class. More info.
Ellen Lindner
