I belong to a wonderful organization called SAQA, Studio Art Quilt Associates. The primary purpose of the group is to promote quilts as art and to support art quilters. As part of the first goal, SAQA puts together a trunk show every few years. Members are asked to make art quilts that are only 10″ high x 7″ wide. These are mounted and presented very nicely, then divided into groups and sent around the world to show people what art quilts can be.
I decided to participate this year and, as usual, wanted to make something similar to my usual style. But, I find that to be quite difficult on this scale. Still, with some simplifying, I came up with a design that would do the trick.
This is the background before stitching.
You’ll notice the colors were taken directly from my recent work. I simplified the sweeping shape, though.
Next, I auditioned the placement of a large flower, again borrowing from recent work.
There’s one thing that’s important when working small like this. That is, you need to see the actual finished dimensions while creating. To achieve that, I’ve pinned on muslin strips which visually crop the piece to the intended 10 x 7 dimensions. (The piece wasn’t actually wonky. That’s just the photo.)
I liked the open flower. As you can see, some of it will be cropped off.
Next, I used my favorite white pen to add dots. Something new for me, which I really liked. I used the same pen to draw white squares.
As suspected, the white squares didn’t show up well enough, so I started stitching some orange ones.
That was better, but I wanted them to show up more. So, I added another lap of stitching to some of them.
Better, right?
Next, I stitched the orange flowers in place with clear monofilament thread. Almost finished. I’ll show you the final details in the next post.
Ellen Lindner
