Adventure Quilter

On a recent visit to the Maitland Art Center I saw some very interesting art, both inside and out.  There were several vessels made by Dale Chihuly, but they were over shadowed by this large installation piece in the next room.

It’s called The Lack of Distinction, by Lorrie Fredette.  Pretty cool, right?  Here it is viewed from the other direction.

From reading the sign, we figured out that each pod is built around a brass armature. They’re covered in muslin and coated in beeswax.  After being joined together they’re suspended with nylon line.

It was quite intriguing.

The friend who was with me has an excellent sense of smell, so she smelled the latex in the next room before we even saw it.

Since I gave you a hint, maybe you can tell it’s made from balloons.

This piece was made by Jason Hackenwerth and it’s called It Tasted Like Lead.  The title is a reference to the first hydrogen bomb dropped on Japan.

After viewing the art by these three artists we were a little puzzled, because four artists were listed as having work in the exhibit.  We asked, “Where is the work by Paige Smith?”  The answer was that her installation was located all over the premises, sort of like an Easter egg hunt.  Well, that sounded like fun, so we set off to look for the geode-like crystals described to us.

And we found some right away.

As in the example above, most of the crystals were nestled into “wounded” spaces.

The outdoor fireplace, above, shows more of the Mayan Revival architecture.

It was especially fun to discover little “geodes” underfoot or tucked into some crevice.  Can you see them there?

A very delightful stop.

Ellen Lindner
P.S.  I love the work of Dale Chihuly, even though the vessels in this exhibit didn’t excite me.  If you’re not familiar with his work, you should definitely check out his website.

What is it about little twisty leaves that add so much character to a simple tomato?  I’m not sure, but it’s clear that they’re a wonderful addition. Per Susan Carlson’s instructions, I had left the edges of the red pieces unglued so the green leaf fabrics could slip right under.  At least I THOUGHT I had left them unglued.  Apparently I got a little carried away with the gluing, making it difficult to add the green. I’ll need to tweak my technique for sure.

See the blue circled area above?  Those are little individual leaf motifs which I’ll use to merge the fabrics. Perhaps you can find a few of them in the next picture.

Here’s what it looked like when I finished the leaves.  I’m very pleased with them!  They don’t have quite the definition I’d like, but I’ll remedy that with some black outline stitching. (Oops, ignore that out of place red piece on the left.)

Even though I declared this “finished” in the above picture, I did find something that bugged me:  the highlight on the right side.  I decided it was just too light – causing a very strong contrast in that area.  I switched out the dark outer fabric and started fiddling to soften the light center.

And ended up with this.

Eventually the pink patch below the highlight also bothered me and I changed it as you can see below.

You can really adjust something like this forever!  But, I had my fill after a while.

As you might imagine, all those little snippets go everywhere, making for a messy work station.  (Not that mine is ever that neat.)

Having completed this first tomato, I’m assessing the technique.
I like: softening the edges with little overlapping bits of fabric, and working sitting down.
I don’t like:  the difficulty tucking tiny green leaf fabrics under the red ones.  For the next tomato, I think I’ll apply the leaves on top.

I’m happy with this tomato and fully intend to integrate it into a full composition. But first, I need to get back to my leaf quilts!

Ellen Lindner

A little more eye candy for you from the AQS Daytona show.

This is Petals in the Wind by Cassandra Ireland Beaver.  (Sorry for the fuzzy phone photo.)  There is no black in this quilt.  The black you see are holes which show the black curtain behind.

Wouldn’t this be pretty against a pale wall, with some excellent lighting?  (To create shadows?)

There was an exhibit of small quilts in which the makers had interpreted artwork of famous makers.  (I didn’t catch the name of the exhibit.)  I’m sure you can tell this one depicts the work of Claude Monet.  It was made by Michelle Schaal, from France.

Although this detail shot is rather fuzzy, I thought you’d like to see the very effective way that couched yarns were used to depict the water.  Especially the one with a little white in it.  Those white bits look like sparking reflections.

One of the special exhibits featured quilts made by Karen Stone and her students.  Windsor Gardens, was made by Karen.  Although the leaf colors aren’t overly bright, when combined with the dark background they really pop!

Check out the great variety in her leaf fabrics.  Wouldn’t this be fun to recreate?

 On an unrelated topic, why couldn’t something like this win “Best Use of Color?”  It doesn’t always have to be something with complementary or bright rainbow colors, does it?  Although beautiful, those combinations are very predictable.  A quilt like this required more creative thinking and I really admire that.  What do you think?

Ellen Lindner