Ice Jam – New Work in Progress

Last winter was an extraordinary one.  There was a long hard freeze, punctuated by partial warming, that transformed the Susquehanna River in bizarre and magical ways.  Thick chunks of ice piled up on the river and the shores in surreal formations. 

I took a lot of pictures and shared them previously here and here.

I have been very driven to work in my series on The River lately.  The Susquehanna has been a constant in my life experience, and I feel it is sometimes underappreciated in the world at large.  I wanted to document this amazing ice jam experience.
I started with the same collagraphy plates I used for If I Woke at Dawn, and made positive and negative prints with textile paints on cotton sateen.

This is good place to mention that there’s a chapter on collagraphy  in my recently released Quilting Arts Workshop Video, Surface Design Essentials for the Printed Quilt.
  As I was working on making and selecting the prints, I also started on a needlefelted centerpiece.  The background is brown wool/rayon felt, and I built up the river texture with wool roving and slivers of wool and silk fabric.  Above is the first mockup on the design wall.  There’s a lot more to go, to reach the icy texture and feeling I am aiming for.

I demonstrate my needlefelting technique on Quilting Arts TV Episode 1408.

As always, thanks for reading and commenting.