Ellen Lindner: Art & Creativity

I’ve just started on a new quilt.  It will feature a red barn, sitting on a hill, with mountains behind.  My reference photo was taken in the winter.  I’ll shift the season to very early spring, but I’ll keep the background colors a little subdued so the barn will be the star.

First, I pulled fabrics, to see what might work together.  Key word “together.”  It’s not enough to ask “what fabrics might make a barn?” or “what fabrics might make a sky?”  They all have to work together, so I need to look at them with that in mind.

This photo shows my rough draft collection of potential fabrics:

Click any image for a larger view

Sky fabrics at the left, then mountains, distance trees, foreground grass, and a red barn in the middle.  Questions/issues I was considering at this point:
– Sky fabrics with enough pattern to make things interesting.
– Lightest sky fabrics at the bottom, to contrast with the mountains.
– A bit of pink in the sky.  But would it clash with the barn?  Did I need to place it far from the barn?
– What should those nearly bare distance trees look like?  (I painted fabric to help address this.)
– What value should the gray roof be?  It has to contrast with the sky and with the mountains.
– Do I have fabrics that are not only the color of grass, but have enough pattern to depict very near grass?

There’s always lots to think about!

After some thought, I tackled the sky.  This is what I have so far.

Is it right?  I have no idea.  I think it’s fairly close.  Close enough for me to tackle the mountains.  But, I won’t know if each component is correct until I see it combined with all the others.  They’ll have to work together, and that often requires some tweeking.

As you can see, I’ve got potential red and gray fabrics showing, just to help me judge those relationships.

On to the mountains.

Ellen Lindner