Last month I got to spend two and half days with members of the North Suburban Needle Arts Guild when I conducted my class, Design Your Own Nature Quilt. Because this group includes many non-quilters there was quite a mix of skill levels in the class. About half had never made an art quilt and several had never made a quilt of any sort! But, they all bravely dove in and they achieved EXCELLENT results.
In this class, each student brings their own inspiration photo, which means we’ve got 15 DIFFERENT projects going all the time. It keeps me on my toes, but I love it. They learn so much in this class!
I wish I had thought to photograph their inspiration photos, rather than just their resulting quilts. (These photos were showing on my computer when photographed. The quality is sometimes low, but you’ll get the idea.)
Gretchen was inspired by a photo of water lilies. She changed the nearly black water to a dark plum, which worked beautifully. She’ll use fusible web to add the skinny little grasses, and she’ll stiffen some of the leaves to make them 3D. It will be great!
Ronna also worked with water lilies, and also switched to purple water. This complementary color really adds drama and contrast. And check out how effective those black shadows are. Nice!
Val’s lily pads are coming along nicely. She’ll add some shadows to add dimension. Check out her water grasses and their reflection near the top. She spent a lot of time on them and I think they’re very effective.
This photo doesn’t do Barbara’s work justice. Her photo had three delicate flowers against a complex shadow. She had to work at providing contrast with value. Her later progress showed that she was moving in the right direction.
Nancy cut loose in a really wonderful way. She started working with solids, but needed some dappled light. As we searched her print fabrics she realized that she had quite a big selection of them, so she switched gears. This brought a lot of energy to her scene. She’ll add some thread-painted grasses in the foreground.
I had a great time this past week at Quilting by the Lake. It was like (a rather intense) quilt camp. What fun! We stayed in dorms, ate our meals in the cafeteria, and used the college class rooms as our own. The camaraderie and Adrenalin surges were just fantastic! Viewing the related quilt show…
Whew! After LOTS of rearranging and trial and error, I’ve finally finished this piece. And I’m quite happy with it. The finished piece is 36″ x 26″. It’s available for $695. The yellow in this detail shot looks a little yellow-green, but it will show you the circular quilting pattern, done both on the machine …
Still testing one of my blog features. Here’s a little eye candy in appreciation for putting up with this. This is Carefree, on of my favorite pieces. It features my son and two of his cousins skipping down my parents’ farm road. Click for a larger image Ellen Lindner
I was really impressed with the “Stitched, Stamped, and Sculpted” exhibit opening, which was recently held in Ormond Beach, FL. The pieces were hung nicely and lit beautifully. And, in most cases, all the work by one artist was shown together. This made for a lovely and interesting display. Here I am with a couple…
It sure is great to be able to interact with students and teach, via Zoom, to people across the country. I recently taught “Floral Improv” to a group of students in the Ann Arbor, MI area. They all did an excellent job and these late-in-the-day screen shots are proof. Woah, Grace got a LOT of…
The retreat I attended recently had a very interesting and fun ice breaker activity. Karol Kusmaul led us on a HIGH SPEED collaborative portrait making exercise. Since she works exclusively with recycled clothing that’s what she provided for us. Each table of about 8 people had a bag on monochromatic selections, with buttons, cuffs, etc….
