"Nature Quilts" at Isadore Gallery

I am very pleased to announce that "Nature Quilts", a solo show of my botanical works, will be at the Isadore Gallery in Lancaster, PA, from November 5 -28. The show will feature a dozen major works from my series "The Woods" and "The Garden", as well as some smaller framed pieces. There will be an opening reception from 5 till 9 pm on November 6th, in conjunction with First Friday activities in Lancaster. I will be there all evening, and I hope that you will be able to attend as well.

As I was updating the exhibit information on my website, I was struck with how travelled these pieces are--they have been to a wide variety of venues all around the country and even internationally. This is a unique opportunity to see them all hanging side-by-side, in a lovely gallery space in historic downtown Lancaster.

Since the show will consist of twelve pieces, and I have (almost) 12 days until the reception, I would like to spend some time focusing on them individually. Today I am showing "Mystery Fern", which is also on the exhibition postcard. This piece began when I was out rummaging around in the woods and found a patch of ferns I couldn't readily identify. I made some cyanotype and heliographic prints, and adopted Mystery Fern as a working title until such time as I found a positive ID. I never did track it down precisely, but in the process realized that it was OK if it stayed mysterious; there is a lot about the natural world that is beyond facile understanding and classification, and that is part of what draws me back outside again and again.

The green painted panel in the upper left started out as a piece of bridal silk, and has a subtle embroidered pattern on it, and the panel in the lower left is on a silk/hemp blend that has a wonderful rough texture, so the photograph can't quite do justice to its inviting tactile qualities. The fabrics in the patchwork are a blend of a few commercial fabrics and a lot of silks and cottons that I custom painted to get just the right colors and gradations. The small digital prints on cotton are from a photograph I took of the fern fronds while the heliographic prints were drying.

"Mystery Fern" has been exhibited on five different occasions, including "Images 2008", a fine art/fine craft exhibit at Penn State University, where it won the Viewer's Choice award.