Going to be interviewed

Next Wednesday I am going to be interviewed by someone from the State College Magazine. The article is going to be about Olli instructors. Last spring I taught a class on making an art quilt from a photo and will be doing that spring 2020 as well. So I will be included with lots of other interesting teachers. The person interviewing me will be taking photos of my quilts as well for the article.

"When the Dark Night Seems Endless"

Energy/Environmental Quilts

"Dawn on the Charles Bridge"

"Midwinter Visitor"

"Midwinter's Night"

Thanks for reading.
Chris

The show was a big success!

Yesterday was the opening reception for my art show at the Bellefonte Art Museum. (Current exhibits). The museum is an old house in an historic Victorian town. The person that hung my show (Lori) did a great job. I was really pleased with how it looked.

It was an ego boosting experience. There were a lot of people that came through and they really, really liked my work. Of course plenty of people said I should sell my quilts. I suppose I should have put some prices on things, but am still skeptical that things would have sold. Or maybe I'm not ready to part with them yet....

Here are some photos. The first one is my friend Ellie and I in front of my most recent circle quilt.  I am the grinning fool on the left. My energy quilts got a lot of attention. I don't think people had seen anything like them before. What was also amazing is how many people got that they looked beautiful from a distance, but then when you look at them up close you see they reveal an ugly problem. A lot of people really liked the toxic barrel one....go figure!

I never took a photo of this quilt that was also in the show. This one got a lot of attention.  It is based on a Frank Lloyd Wright window.  I almost wish I had put a price on it. That price would have been $600 ($450 plus some added for the 30% commission the museum takes). Not sure people would have payed that much!

Visions Past 19 in by 26 in

Thank for reading.
Chris

Nearly there

Linking to Nina-Marie.  http://ninamariesayre.blogspot.com/

I have been working on finishing up the circle quilt. After a lot of agonizing over the quilting I decided to go the simple route proposed by my daughter and a friend.  I just quilted lines across the quilt at + or - 1/4 inch. The spacing depended on how the strips broke up. I did not try to physically make the circles float above the rest of the design. I was not sure how successful that would have been and figured the design itself would speak for itself. My daughter said "cleaner" was better. The entire time I was quilting it I kept hearing in my head about being precise. It's so hard to be precise when quilting straight lines.

It is blocked and now needs to be squared up. Not looking forward to that. The colors once again look more beige than they are in reality.

"Light in Darkness" 36 in by 36 in

close up

I also had to make the yearly ornament for my daughter. This is the 30th year for that tradition. You can see all of the other years on the cloth ornament tab at the top of the blog.

This year she asked for a character (the probe) from a video game. It is a yellow sphere with a blue eye. With no pattern to work with and images of this character all over the place online it was not easy. Well at least it's done! This year we have a lot of my parents 1950's ornaments on our tree. You might recognize some of them. 

Ornament 2018

I had an experience at lunch yesterday. There was a discussion among some of my fellow fiber artists about how they work. Well that's OK to have a discussion. Two of them basically just improvise and were really looking down on anyone that actually plans out their quilt before making it. One of the women said why bother making the quilt at all if you plan it out ahead of time. Well that planner is me! I think a lot of that is my science background. I like to figure things out before cutting fabric. I like to know pretty much what I am doing and what I am up against. The circle quilt I feel is not one that could be improvised.  I did not contribute my 2 cents to the discussion.  I know we all work differently, but why look down on someone that works differently? Sometimes I don't feel like I belong in that group. What are your thoughts?

Thanks for reading. 

Chris

Some decisions made, but more to make!

I decided a few things about my circle quilt. Gosh I feel like I have been making this quilt for years.

I decided against pink thread and went back to gray. Had to do some negative stitching, but am glad I did.

I decided against quilting circles within the circles. These circles are not perfect circles so trying to keep the perspective in the quilt would not be easy. Plus quilting circles is more difficult than straight lines.

So now the decision is whether to quilt the circles less densely parallel to the background or "perpendicular" to the background. The first quilting design I sketched for this quilt was the "perpendicular" version. Or maybe it doesn't really matter!!! See sketches below.  The large circle on the left partially floats.

option 1 ("perpendicular" partial floating of left circle)

option 2 (parallel partial floating of left circle)

Then I began to think whether I should completely float the large left circle. Will the partial floating be confusing? Will it ultimately even look like it is partially floating or not?  See below for option 3.

Option 3 (all circles floating)

 Any thoughts? Or are you just as tired of this quilt as I am?

Thanks for reading.
Linking to Nina-Marie.

Chris

Pulling my hair out!

I have never struggled so much with deciding how to quilt a quilt as with the circle quilt.

Here is the original computer generated design. Outlined in orange are the areas that should float above the design.

 Quilting idea 1

 Quilting idea 2.
Straight lines everywhere. More dense quilting for areas that should recede. Quilt some ghost circles. Sizes andpostions of ghost circles subject to change.

 Quilting idea 3
All straight lines. Less dense quilting for areas that should float.

Quilting idea 4

Echo quilt the circles. The rest in straight lines.

Any thoughts? Something that I did not think of?

I was going to quilt in medium gray, but it has been suggested to use a pale pink, yellow or blue.
Thoughts on that?

Thanks for your thoughts.
Chris

All steam (or stitch) ahead!

"Light in Darkness" 36 in by 36 in

Here's the feedback from EB (Elizabeth Barton) on my quilt. EB: I’m back in New York for a couple of days and have a decent signal here so can see the piece correctly and I think it looks just right!! You got it!!!  A nice balance, very interesting...love the play of light..and the illusions created by it...the Sense of lost and found...you’ve done an amazing job...
So stitch away!!  I’ll go back to your previous post with the other image....very well done...I love it!  E 

 Here's the other design. This is the quilt that I will work on next. She suggested that I rotate the image and shift the dark parts to the bottom. Also to simplify things and make sure I have some negative space for the eye to rest.

Here is the image rotated 90 degrees and it does seem to be better. What do you think? I know this will be a challenge, but I am mentally ready for it!

Thanks for reading. I am busy making a birthday cake for my husband today so I probably won't get to do any sewing.

Besides I'm still basking in the praise from EB!!!!!

Chris

Am I finally there?

Boy this last circle on this design has been quite a challenge. The lower right circle was not in the original composition that I started with. This design started as a pixelated image of a photo that I turned into gray scale and put into a fragment app on my iPad. This happened while playing around watching TV.

So you might ask what was so hard about drawing a circle? Nothing if it is a perfect circle. These circles are not even close to being perfect circles. So I had to try to draw an oval shaped circle. I kept looking at it and I think it was too oval. I kept cutting off the sides and I think it is better now. It is still oval, but looks more circular than before. It bothered me so I had to change it. I am teaching a class on making an art quilt from a photo in April 2019 and one of the things I tell them is to change anything that bothers you. If it bothers you now it will bother you once the quilt is done.

I also moved the smallest circle down and near the center since it was looking like the circles were only on the right side and left side of the quilt. Something had to move toward the center. I will sew the circles down next week once I get the final feedback from EB (Elizabeth Barton), my teacher. She has been away. Any thoughts????

"Light in Darkness" 36 in by 36 in

Well then it will be time to think about my next project. It will be another pixel quilt design. I have pulled Cherrywood purple fabrics to make it. This design is also original. It is created by layering a pixel image with an abstract image. Both of them I created. It will be a challenge. The values will be extremely important. This is almost like doing one of those transparency quilts.

The Cherrywood fabrics (I might need some white)

Linking to Nina-Marie. Thanks for reading.
Chris

TIme to sew

circles is 36 in by 36 in

I wish the colors would come out accurately for this quilt. It is not this beige. The fabrics are more silver or gray. The whites are actually white.

Well I think I need to get moving on sewing the background together for this quilt. I have put it off long enough. I think if I take it slow and focus on accuracy I will be OK. On the other hand I might be pulling out my hair!

At any rate having it sitting on my design wall will not get it done. I just have to do it. Usually I find that once I get going it was not as bad as I anticipated.

Do you ever have to convince yourself to get moving on something? I have a hard time getting started on a new project. Then sometimes I have a hard time moving onto the next step during a project.  Is it a fear of failure? I suppose that is what it is. Or making a mistake. I often have that fear when I have created a great quilt top and I worry about messing up the quilt when I quilt it. Maybe I will make a bad decision on the quilting and turn a good design into a bad one. Do others have this fear?

I think at least I have gotten over one of the things I used to do. When I would start a project I would think that I am going to create the best quilt ever. Then of course that does not happen and I am disappointed. Now I realize I am just making another quilt.

Linking to Nina-Marie.

Thanks for reading. Wish me luck with the sewing.

Chris

Circle pixels coming to life....

I really moved forward on the circle pixel quilt this week. The circles are already pieced, but the background is not. The circles are cut oversized so I can decide how I am going to attach them. I will decide that after I piece the background. Things don't line up yet, due to the background not being pieced yet.

I still have a part circle to add to the bottom left. As usual my sewing room looks like a tornado went through. This past Wednesday we had severe storms and a tornado watch. There were 13 confirmed tornadoes in Pennsylvania.


Now I need a title. So far the only thing I have come up with is "She dreamt of circles in the air."  Any ideas?


My canal houses made it to the art quilt show in Auburn NY. I was a nervous wreck until it got there. My name is on the list of quilt artists on the website. http://www.schweinfurthartcenter.org/exhibits_details.cfm?id=104

Linking to Nina-Marie.

Thanks for reading.

Chris

Some progress....I need a lot more fabric!!!!!

I finally got motivated to start the circle pixel quilt. First thing I found out is that I did not order enough fabric. Most of my fabrics look like Swiss cheese right now! I did not take into account that these pieces would have to be fussy cut when ordering fabric.

Fussy cut fabric.

I have started a few parts of the quilt...near the top and near the bottom. I have ordered more of the fabrics I already have and then I found an ombré fabric from craftsy that I don't have. So now I wait for fabrics to arrive before I can move further along on this quilt. My machine went in for a tuneup so I can't even sew things together even if I wanted to.

The top of the design....the colors are off. My design wall looks yellow.

The upper right side of the design

The bottom of the design...more accurate colors. I think the ombré fabrics are working for this. What do you think?

The bottom of the design

While I wait for more fabrics to arrive I think I will trace the layout of the design on a piece of muslin and hang that on my design wall. I am having a hard time laying this out to see how it look since the pieces are not at the usual angles we deal with as quilters. I think that will help me lay it out. 

I think I need to lay out a lot more pieces to really see how this is going. Hopefully the fabrics will arrive next week. One thing for sure is that I have a long way to go!

Linking to Nina-Marie. She is discussing cleaning out the sewing room this week. I think I need to clear out fabrics I will never use and books so maybe this will motivate me!

Thanks for reading.
Chris

 

Decision made

I decided to work on the pixel quilt that looks like windows first. I sent for some gradient fabrics to make the circle quilt so while I wait for them to arrive I will start with the windows. I do have some construction issues to work out. The white windows have curved edges. If I want to piece it the curved edges will be impossible. Should I keep those curves? I was also thinking about appliqué. If I do white on black I will have to line the white with another piece of white fabric. Maybe reverse appliqué? Any thoughts?

I did post these questions for EB. Waiting to see what she says.

Just saw this technique online....https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=djvh4Hx6ZoA

Chris
Linking to Nina-Marie. http://ninamariesayre.blogspot.com/

The world we knew or living in the past?

I did get my large blue and orange quilt pieced this week. Still having a hard time getting a good photo due to the windows in my studio. I guess I should be glad that it is a warm sunny day today after so many bleak and cold ones. I keep reminding myself that it is June since it feels more like April.

Here is a close up shot. I am still tossing around titles.

• The World We Knew
• Living in the Past

I have used some of my fossil fuel fabrics for many of the orange blocks. I chose blue fabric to surround the orange because it a complimentary color, but also because the climate crisis will cause the oceans to rise as more ice melts and even more greenhouse gases are released into the atmosphere. When ice melts the methane stored in the ice is released into the air making the climate crisis even worse. Methane also causes warming. The blue represents the rising oceans.



I want the title for the quilt to represent our refusal to move away from energy sources from the past and the consequences for this refusal. Which title would you pick? Or maybe you have another idea?

Here is a photo of the fossil fuel fabric that I used in many of the blocks. I had it printed at Spoonflower.


















The other thing I did this week was to make covers for composition notebooks. I ended up using instructions that I found at Craftsy. The pattern is free.

The first one is what I got when I cut up a quilt I was not happy with.

 And yes you would be right if you think the quilt would be big enough to make 2 journal covers. I accidentally sewed the second one with the wrong side facing out. Yes I know that is really dumb. I just tossed it in the trash because I was not going to rip it out and try again!

Here is the inside of the cover. I was not happy with where the pattern place the ribbon marker. So I moved it when I made 2 more covers. The 2 covers are from a quilt top that I made about 15 years ago from African fabrics. I never made it into a quilt and put it aside to cover a journal some day.

African journal showing new placement of ribbon bookmark.

The 2 African journals.  If I were to sell these how much could I sell them for?

I have to make my husband one with the Penn State Lion on it! But today I will pin baste a large quilt.







Thanks for reading. Linking to Nina-Marie.

Chris

Busy Week

 If you are still looking for "Beantown" from the fiber art challenge it is here.

Lots of things going on this week. I am designing a new quilt. This is what is on my design wall at this point. Each blue block will have the orange/yellow/red fabric in the center. The blocks are 8 inches and the orange squares will be 4 inches. I know that is not the sizes of the orange squares in the photo. I was trying out different sizes to see what I liked. I think larger is better. These squares will be fused on top of the blue squares. I will be using some of the fabrics that I had printed at Spoonflower for the orange squares. The Spoonflower fabrics are of oil rig/coal plants.

The fabrics.

I finished quilting "Tequila Sunrise." I am so disappointed that after more than 30 years as a quilter I can be so terrible at things sometimes. The vertical lines are too wiggly and with the high contrast it really shows. I think the problem in part is the excessive quilting and the distortion caused. Should have done less quilting. I am thinking of using this quilt to cover some composition notebooks so that it does not go to waste. The other thing I thought about is to cut it into squares and sew them back together with a zigzag. I saw this on a quilt show. You butt the squares together and stitch them.

This is what that would look like. I guess if I did not like it I could still cover the notebooks! What do you think?

I am still working away in my art on the iPad class. This is an image that I drew just messing around with one of the apps. The I took the image into another app and got the images below.

Some other images from this week.

My Dad's pond.

Thanks for reading.
Linking to Nina-Marie.

Chris