Have you done any abstract work? I have and I often find it difficult to come up with the original design. One exercise that’s been floating around via Pat Pauly and others it to randomly cover an index card with fabric scraps and let that become your design. So I tried a few.
Some of these (like that last one) were real dogs, so I tried a more deliberate one.
It was only slightly better.
But wait, there’s more! If a composition isn’t appealing try visually cropping it to see if you can find a more pleasing design. Like this.
I do this with paper or cardboard L shapes. With them you can easily crop the image much smaller. It’s important to rotate it, too, as this often helps the design quite a bit.
Here are a few more crops.
I think these are much more dramatic than the originals (although they may still require some editing!)
You can also do the same exercise with printed photos. I had several vegetation photos which I stacked and cut into mostly squarish pieces. This was my first arrangement.
It already had good contrast and interest, but there was a lot going on. I rearranged a bit more, now confident in the results I knew I could eventually get. This was that second arrangement slightly cropped.
But, I took it even further.
That would make a pretty great quilt, don’t you think?
I’ve found this technique to be useful and have just finished an abstract quilt designed in this way. I’ll get it photographed and show it to you soon.
What tips do you have for designing abstractly?
Ellen Lindner
P.S. This is one of the tools Pat teaches in her “A Dozen Ways: Design for Art Quilts,” a class which I recommend.
What an interesting idea – I hadn’t heard of this (using fabric on index cards). I really like the first piece under your heading “Here are a few more crops.” with the blues and green and black.
It’s a useful tool, Kristin. Sometimes you get something useful, sometimes it needs some tweaking or cropping, and sometimes it’s simply a creative exercise (which is still valuable.)