A Brief Haitus

I'm on a brief blogging haitus while I celebrate a joyous time in my personal life.

I'll be back soon. Thanks for checking in.

Viewer's Choice!

I've received exciting news! My Mystery Fern received the Viewer's Choice award at the Images 2008 exhibit held at the Zoller Gallery at Penn State University this summer. I covered my visit to the opening of the exhibit previously on my blog here. At the time I commented on how grateful I was to the organizers for the way the work was displayed--it was well lit, and it looked like a million bucks (IMHO), and I'm sure that being properly displayed had something to do with the award. I'm very grateful to everyone who took the time to fill out a viewer's choice ballot.

I'm also very pleased to note that this was an exhibit drawing from all disciplines. This was the second year that fine craft was included, and there were only a handful of fiber pieces. I think this recognition shows how the textures and details of an art quilt can speak to the viewer. When I was at the opening I heard lots of surprised comments that quilt imagery could be this powerful. I see myself as part of a continuum of the many artists who have labored to change and enlarge the public perception of what a quilt can be, and hope that this award will in a small way help to pave the way for other quilt/fiber artists to receive acknowledgement of their efforts.

A Brief Respite

Summer is short. I took a day off from a too-busy schedule to go hiking in my beloved River Hills in southern Lancaster County, on properties preserved and maintained by The Lancaster County Conservancy. The pictures barely begin to convey the serenity and beauty of the experience.

We first walked a rugged, rocky ravine trail that winds along a clear, fast moving stream. The trail crosses the stream in several places--a good excuse to splash around-- and there are a few swimming holes, one where you can sit in a waterfall for a stimulating experience. Parts of the trail are bordered by extensive stands of towering native rhododendrons:

The main bloom is finished for the year, but we spotted a few late flowers:

No matter how many times I hike this trail, there's always something new to discover--a fungus, a rare native plant, a water strider:

This time I found a gorgeous caterpillar. I've looked through several guides, and haven't been able to ID it yet. If you know what it is, please leave me a comment:

At the end of the trail we took a short drive to another of my favorite places, Pinnacle Point, with a grand view overlooking the Susquehanna River. Last year I used a photo from here to make View From Pinnacle Point:

Here's the detail shot:

Summer is short. I hope you get a chance to get out there and enjoy it.

Recycled Postcards

I've been a member of Postmark'd Art for years. You can read about the project, see lots of fantastic fiber art postcards, and read articles at the website. (Check out my article on working with heliographic prints!) We are on Round 7 of exchanges, and it just keeps getting better and better. (You can read more about this group and Art2Mail in my interview with The Alliance for American Quilts.) This time around I committed to making my postcards out of recycled materials.


As I work in the studio, I keep a sample quilt next to my machine. It consists of two layers of muslin sandwiching some of my favorite batting. I use it to check thread tension when loading a new thread, to audition stitching motifs, to experiment with couching on threads and yarns, and so on and so forth. Once I have things to my satisfaction I move on to the actual quilt at hand. When the sample quilt gets filled up, I make a new one, but I am always reluctant to toss the old one because there is a lot of interesting, if random, stitching on it.

So this time around I recycled it. I layered it with tulle (recycled from alterations at a bridal shop) to hold down all the loose threads and did some more stitching. I cut it up into the 4" x 6" card format, and added raised motifs. The motifs were the trimmings from the "Canopy of Leaves" cards I had done several years ago, and had saved because I thought they might prove useful. Also because I just liked them.


Here's one of the new cards:
One of the nice things about the being a Postmark'd Art participant, along with the camaraderie and the thrill of cool art showing up in my mailbox, is that it provides an impetus to try out concepts in a small format. As I am currently deeply ensconced in working on not one but two Very Large Quilts, I enjoyed a quick side trip into something achievable in a short time frame. I also enjoyed the departure from my usual stylistic themes. I don't usually work with abstract images, and had fun with the brief flirtation.

Is it art? Quite possibly. It has lines and forms and colors and a focal point. Is it Art with a capital A? Could be--it expresses an concept, even if the concept is simply "let's see what I can make that is interesting/pleasing with materials at hand". At any rate, they are finished and mailed off to all sorts of exotic ports of call, and that's enough.


Here's one of the "Canopy of Leaves" cards that the motifs were trimmed from:





And here's a few more of the Recycled cards:

Quilt Odyssey at Hershey

I attended the Quilt Odyssey show in Hershey, PA, yesterday. Above is the obligatory photo of me wearing my exhibitor's badge and posing with The Organic Garden. This is a nice show-not large by quilt show standards, but well juried and with a nice spectrum of quilts. I'm always pleased to be accepted here, partly because they treat exhibitors well, with a free day pass and encouragement to stand by your work and talk to people about it. It's always very instructive to get the public's take on your work!


Another of the delights of this show is that Usha of Handloom Batiks has a booth there. She is such a lovely person, and has a wonderful assortment of fabrics. (No affiliation, just a happy customer.) I lived and traveled in India as student many moons ago, and still have a strong affinity for the colors and textures of Indian textiles. Take a look at the ones I just purchased:


The subtleties of the color combinations give me such a thrill--and look what happens when they are paired with a piece of dupioni silk I already had on hand:



These are for an upcoming project that is still in the cognitive stages. Stay tuned!

PNQE Acceptance

My Wood Poppy will be going to the Pennsylvania National Quilt Extravaganza in Harrisburg, PA in September. It's close enough that I can easily travel to attend the show, which is held in the Farm Show building. (A digression--if you ever get the chance to attend the Farm Show, jump on it! There's fun for all ages, and the food is unbelievably delicious.) It's a good show, lots of beautiful and interesting quilts to admire, diverse special exhibits, and plenty of vendors.

This is the first time out to a show for this quilt, and I'll be interested to see what kind of reactions (if any!) it elicits. It's not a complicated work, in terms of the number of pieces involved. But I like to think that it's elegant in its simplicity. There's nothing excess there, and everything that is there seems exactly right to me.

It features cyanotype prints on silk of the leaves and flowers of the wood poppy, Stylophorum diphyllum, a handsome native perennial that likes a moist shady spot.

The patchwork is silks, velveteen, and some high-end home dec fabric samples that I rescued for reuse. The border is a wonderful piece of vintage barkcloth fabric that I was given in exchange for offering up opinions on fabrics destined for an estate sale. (Thanks, Jan, for facilitating that adventure!) It was the absolutely perfect foil to the prints and patchwork.

Here's a detail shot, where you can see some of the beading:

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Size Does Matter

There's two old fashioned favorites starting up in the garden right now. The tiger lilies are blooming, with glaucous plume poppies leaves in the background. The gladiolas are opening up as well; they make wonderful cut flowers, and only their lack of fragrance keeps them from utter perfection. Here they are with cannas and the asparagus behind them:

Both of these plants are pleasing and commonly grown because they are visually engaging--they are satisfyingly large. You know you've got something worthwhile when the display catches your eye from a distance. It's also important that when you get up close, there's lots of detail in the shapes and colors and markings to hold your interest.

In the studio, I have finished piecing Plume Poppy. It's enormous, somewhere in the neighborhood of 7ft. x 8ft. I am probably certifiably insane to tackle something so large. But once I started, there was no turning back. The scale and proportion had to be right for the subject and my interpretation of it, and in this instance that meant an imposing size. I will be kicking myself the entire time I am wrestling it under the machine for quilting, but cie la vie......the design turned out very well, and I am excited by it, so the the excitement will carry me through the slogging parts of construction. And the quilting will add another level of detail and texture to catch and hold your interest when you get up close.

High Summer

It's high summer here in Lancaster County, and the fecundity, as well as the humidity, is palpable. A trip to my favorite farmer's market, Root's, garnered some amazing locally grown produce, such as blueberries for cereal and freezing:

Stripy Italian eggplants, shown here in with vintage melmac and vintage embroidery:

Two varieties of sugar plums--these are bite-sized plums that are amazingly sweet without being cloying--better than candy, and eagerly anticipated each summer:

Early garnet peaches, fresh from the orchard and covered with fuzz:

And bi-color sweet corn for supper:

I've been fortunate to live in farming country most of my life, with access to locally grown food, so it's just been a way of life for us. I'm so glad to see the concept of eating locally is gaining in popularity--small produce farmers work incredibly hard, and deserve our support and our food dollars.