Design Exercises

I'm off to Pacific International Quilt Show in Santa Clara for 3 days. I thought I would leave you with a fun design exercise to try. Last month, Jeanne Surber, shared this exercise with our Fibervision group. It's an exercise that I find very useful and have been doing for years.Cut a hole out of an index card, I have 4 different sizes that I use. Move it over a magazine page, fabric, etc. until you see a composition that you like. Jeanne traces the design, but I have a hard time seeing the details through the tracing paper, so I just draw what I see.Turn each one around to see if a different orientation looks better. Choose a composition that you like and develop in whatever way suites your style.
Sorry about the photo quality, I'm in a rush . . . I need to get ready for our road trip. Yeah!

Photo Manipulation

After a full day of gardening, I needed a break. I decided to play with Photoshop. The image that I started with is very different that what I ended up with. I thought you would be interested in seeing the progress. This is a close-up of the bark of a palm tree.This is the original photo with a little contrast added.
I wanted to change the color dramatically, so I decided to solarized it.Next, I posterized it at a setting of 5. It didn't change it too much, but it added a lot of depth.Here I've changed the colors by changing the master saturation to +60, the hue to +52 and the lightness to 0.I've decided to displace a photo of circles. The horizontal and vertical setting was 70. The displacement map was stretch to fit and the undefined areas are wrap around. I like how the circles added texture to the large areas, but it's a little too obvious.

So, I added a tile filter. The number of tiles was 50, the offset was 20% and the background color was black. It knocked the circle back a bit and added another layer of texture. I like it, so I'll stop here.
Photoshop is a lot of fun. The more you play with the tools, the better you will understand what they do. Just remember to rename all your changes and Save As.
Image how surprised I would be if I opened the palm tree bark photo and found the altered image above!

Pyramid Pazzazz

I watched Kathy Rose piece zillions of colorful triangles together. She seemed to have a plan, but I didn't know what the intended outcome was. When I'm not making the quilt, I kind of like the final surprise. This quilt top was on my bed as we auditioned the inner border and I saw it again after it was quilted. I wasn't prepared for how different it looked hanging vertical on the wall. When it was flat, I hadn't noticed the plaid design, the triangles within triangles, the diamonds,, the hexagons, etc. Every time I look at it, I see different shapes! The colors are gorgeous and the color values were handled beautifully. Great job, Kathy!

Here's a close up of Pyramid Pazzazz. Kathy added the misspelled Pazzazz in honor of the musical I worked on earlier in the year. It took Second Place in the Large Traditional Pieced, Commercially Quilted category. Nancy King from Santa Barbara Quilting is responsible for the beautiful all over quilting.Here's our next project. Not quite so beautiful, huh? I didn't really get the "before" photo. All the Juniper bushes have already been removed. Those itchy bushes should have been removed 20 years ago! All you can see in this photo are the stumps. Yeah!

We also removed the Veronica bushes along the curve. We still need to remove all the dead grass/weeds. We ended up with 55 trash bags full of green waste.

Now I've got to come up with a design. Something that incorporates curved paths, drought tolerant plants and pretty colors. My husband thinks planting a garden is like designing a quilt. Do you think they are similar?

Go with the Flow

Joanna requested some close-ups of my Go with the Flow quilt that won the blue ribbon.
This quilt was made for a Fibervision exhibit at the Big Sky Cafe in San Luis Obispo. The theme that we chose was Blue, but as usual, I had a hard time sticking to the rules. The blues were too cool; it needed some spark, so I added a bit of pink and purple to warm it up.

This is a close-up of the middle section. The pink semi-circle is Angelina fibers. The blue vertical strips on the right have been sewn together with the raw edges exposed.Hopefully, you can see some of the hand stitching in the vertical Tye-dyed section and in the diagonal lines in the middle. The top left section has a grid of pintucks.

Here you can see the beading in the smaller machine appliqued circles. This line of beading continues throughout the whole spiral.

Harvest of Colors Weekend

It seems like I'm always rushing from one place to another, barely one step ahead of the next deadline. I like to stay busy; but lately, it's been a bit too busy. I'm hoping that the next couple of months will be a little quieter.

The Coastal Quilters Guild held their quilt show this past weekend and I'm happy to say, that one of my quilts won a blue ribbon.

Ranell, one of my Fibervision friends, won Best of Show for her series of Wild Women. This is the first time that our traditional guild awarded Best of Show to an art quilt. It's a definite milestone. Way to go Ranell. My good friend Kathy also won second place for her beautiful quilt. I'll ask her if I can show a photo.

Ellen Anne Eddy was the featured artist. If you've never seen her work before, you should definitely check her website. I spent a fair amount of time with her over the weekend and found her to be a very kind and sharing person. Whenever a child came into her booth to look at all the colorful thread and angelina, she would ask them if they quilted. They would chat about their projects, then Ellen would tell them to choose a half yard of hand-dyed fabric as a gift. She gave them a business card and asked them to send her a photo of whatever they made. How cool is that?

And no quilt show is complete without lots of vendors! It seems like I always manage to spend some money. My poor studio is going to burst soon!

oooooh . . . . look at this neon fabric. Do you think I was in a happy mood that day?

The Fabric Art Workshop book is full of techniques, my kind of fun! Ellen highly recommended the Quilt Halo for doing embroidery work and quilting. She said it saves a tremendous amount of time because she doesn't have to keep re-hooping the fabric. So I just had to have it. And Ellen's book shows how she finishes the edges of her quilts with satin stitching.

That's it for today . . . off to my Dreamweaver class.

Smoked Out

A few posts ago, I offered a close up of my latest fire inspired quilt "Smoked Out". I didn't want to post the full image until the exhibit was hanging. The show at the Cabrillo Pavilion Arts Center has been hung and is open to the public, so now I can share my quilt with you. Don't forget about the reception on October 7th, 5:30 - 7:30pm.The background is a hand-painted piece of fabric. The mountains, clouds and sun were formed using layers of tulle and the raw edged flames are made from organza and commercial cottons.

I'm really pleased with the results and have been getting some great feedback. I'm pretty sure that I have at least one more fire quilt left in me.

If you're a regular reader, I'm sure you will recall the Gap Fire and the trauma surrounding it. Well, the effects of the fire are still being felt; but now the problem is flooding. All five watersheds have been burned, which means the chance of major flooding is extremely high. Planes and helicopters are dropping 200 loads of hydromulch per day, 7 days a week, for the next two months. I feel confident that they are doing everything possible to prepare for winter. Let's hope it's enough!

Studios Magazine

My fabric wall can be seen in the newest Studios Magazine! Page 8 features a short blurb and a photo of my fabric storage. I am number 2 of the 85 ways to find, sort & store your stash. For those of you that haven't seen my extensive fabric stash before, you can see it here.

As expected, I'm thrilled to be included in this magazine, but I wish they would have spelled my name correctly (RYS). At least they got the blog address right!

It's pretty interesting to see the variety of artists studios. Amazing art is created everywhere from closet sized spaces to super organized studios. If you wait for the perfect time and space, you might never create anything. So make do!

Spin Cycle is Done

Spin Cycle is the newest piece in my Stretched Series. Each piece is a mini quilt in itself (top, batting and back). The gallery wrapped canvas is painted, then the mini quilt is attached to the canvas with hand stitching. Spin Cycle is, by definition, a whole cloth quilt. The top is one piece of fabric that has been painted, then stitched, and embellished with hardware. Yes, you read that correctly. There are brass washers and silver lock nuts in two different sizes and of course, beads and embroidery. And, once again, the batting is exposed. Don't you just love the colors and textures in the close-up photo?

Do you name your pieces? If so, how do you chose a name? Does it pop into your head when you're in the shower? Do you dream about it? Do you find the process difficult or easy? I would love to hear from you.

Gelatin Printing

As promised, here are some of the Gelatin Printing experiments from last weekend. Unfortunately, I didn't take photos of the pieces that Andi took home.
All of these pieces were printed on a commercial cotton fabric with grey fracture lines running through it. I knew this would make a great background fabric, so I bought several yards when it went on sale.
For this piece, Andi pressed a 2" x 10" plastic packaging piece onto the red gelatin plate several times.I think I used a combination of baby blue and grey on this piece. I pressed a face stamp all over the paint.
We used berry baskets and plastic netting from fruit boxes for the first print. Once dry, we inked the plate with yellow and pressed a potato masher into it.

First I ran a notched squeegee through the paint, then I stamped into it with a large grid. When it was dry, I used purple paint to stamp the large grid on top.

Life in general is so full of rules, it's much more fun to just let loose and play without any expectations. Rarely am I disappointed!

I followed the gelatin recipe in Rayna Gillman's book, see here for previous bragging. Rayna's step by step instructions are very easy to understand. After we pulled the first print, we were giddy! We were acting like two kids with new toys!

A couple of years ago, I took a wonderful 2 day workshop with Rayna and I just signed up for a 5 day workshop with her in June of 2009. I can't wait!! I'm hoping she will teach deconstructed screen printing.

Mystery Fruit

Andi and I were getting ready to have a play day with gelatin printing. Just as we were taking the gelatin out of the pan, my husband walks in with this odd looking fruit.Boy, does he know how to get our attention! What is this? Where did it come from? And, how come we've never seen one before? The exterior looks like an artichoke, and the inside looks and tastes like a kiwi. So Strange!
It's called a Dragon Fruit and it was purchased at the farmer's market. Apparently, one of the local farmers grows them here. They are expensive, but this little fruit entertained the entire household for at least 30 minutes.I had fun arranging the cross-sections into various compositions. Andi thought they looked like ladybugs. What do you see?

Could we use the rind to print with? No, it was too soft, it wouldn't survive the process. Will it release it's wonderful Fuscia dye onto fabric? Good thought, but the results were underwhelming.
We managed to pull ourselves away from this colorful experiment and continued on with the gelatin printing. More on that later.

Fibervision: New Views

I'm working hard in my studio, trying hard to meet all of my upcoming deadlines. There are so many fiber happenings coming up in the next month; it's going to be a blast!
What's this, you ask? A detail shot from my "Smoked Out" quilt that I started after the Gap Fire. I posted a rough layout here. It's completely finished and it is very colorful! I love, love, love the way it turned out. It will make it's debut at Fibervision New Views exhibit at the Cabrillo Arts Center, 1118 E. Cabrillo Blvd. in Santa Barbara.

The exhibit will hang from October 1st through October 24th. And all of you are invited to the reception on Tuesday, October 7th from 5:30 - 7:30 pm. It's going to be a fantastic show! If you can't make it to the reception, please call the gallery for their hours, 805-897-1982.

Fibervision also has an small exhibit throughout October in the display case at the Santa Barbara Main Library.

And if that's not enough, the Coastal Quilters is having their Harvest of Colors Quilt Show on October 4th and 5th. It is being held at the Earl Warren Showgrounds in Santa Barbara. There will be over 200 quilts on exhibit ranging from traditional to art quilts. Ellen Ann Eddy is the featured artist. There will also be workshops with my good friend Andi Perejda and Joe Cunningham. Stop on by, Santa Barbara has an incredibly talented group of artists living here. The quilts are always amazing.

Another Self Portrait

My daughter saw my continuous line, self portrait and decided to give it a try.

Don't you just LOVE how this one eyed beauty turned out? I believe this was actually her 3rd drawing. If you aren't used to doing this sort of thing, it takes a little bit of warming up.

If you want to give it a try and missed the original post and guidelines, you can find it here. I would love to see your self portrait, please send me a link or a photo.