Nothing replaces going to a gallery or museum and seeing up close what people create, and thinking about what inspired them, why they chose the materials they did, and whether their techniques were appropriate to their theme or intention… those are big questions I have in mind as I wander through any exhibition. Most weekends I browse for an hour or two on Pinterest, which I regard as the digital equivalent of looking though the latest art books and catalogues, and I can glance through so many more different media ‘shows’ than I could possibly visit in real time.

This morning I discovered the mixed media art of Wendy Meg Siegal with whom I resonated on many levels, for her thoughts about creativity and inspiration, and her techniques, some of which I also use. Her work features lots of raw edges that are mostly also frayed to emphasise their rawness 🙂 but what caught my attention was that many of her works include holes and cutouts as design elements. As my regular readers know, I’ve long had a thing for holes and lace, as you’ll see if you visit this Pinterest board htpps://www.pinterest.com/alisonschwabe1/holes/ My followers and collectors know that my inspiration comes mostly from patterning in and on the Earth’s crust, and Wendy’s art was a timely reminder of ‘holes’ everywhere around us – in both the natural world and in man-made objects.

Now that I’ve almost finished curating my January solo exhibition (eeek – hanging day Dec 27th is pretty close!) … the next project I’m self-committed to is make an entry (or three) for the SAQA Oceania Region’s exhibition “Opposites”, entries for which open and close in January. Back in September I began thinking about this, and I’m STILL thinking about it.

This little sample has been hanging round for at least ten years, along with others which have all appeared in various posts on the concept of ‘lace’ (I should date them like Shelley Rhodes – she has an actual date stamp) Recently this and the others have been on my mind, calling me down a path I should explore more. When we think of ‘opposites’, one of the things I myself go to automatically is black v white, and as I’m tipping there will be several entries in black/white designs, I probably won’t go there. But of course it needn’t be so cliched, as the design could be made using colours from opposite sides of the colour wheel, or even any two colours separated only by enough values so that, like the two above, as used they perform the function of ‘opposites’, the success of which would be determined by the actual shapes and their arrangement.

But first, I must choose some materials to work with ! I’d love to do a grid of black squares and the brushed metallic finish gold polyester I’m so in love with just now (here’s that ‘glitter’ thing again) but that fabric melts with the iron… nevertheless, I’m thinking about some way to work with it…

I was delighted this week to learn of my acceptance into the international III Salón Latinoamericano de Arte en Vidrio y Textil. The organisers prefer we not share the complete images until the show has opened – fair enough, so here’s a close detail:

The III Salón Latinoamericano de Arte en Vidrio y Textil opens in the Casa de Cultura, Maldonado-Punta del Este on February 6th, and will be open daily Mondays through Saturdays 10am-8pm until closing on February 28th. Come to the vernissage/opening on 6th if you’re around!

And if that sounds a bit familiar, yes, that is the same cultural centre where my solo exhibition will be the month before – Jan 2nd to 27th. The inauguration’s at 8pm on January 2nd – do come if you’re around!

I made “Maelstrom” for a 2009 exhibition with fellow members of a small group of Australian and New Zealand group of art quilters. Themed ” A Change in The Weather” the works on global climate change opened in Wellington NZ in June 2009, and travelled to Christchurch NZ. for showing there, but the collection was never organised into a showing in Australia, which was a shame, and the quilts were returned to us.

I’ve always loved this piece, even though it always felt an awkward shape we had to make our pieces to, determined by some spatial limitation available to that number of wall quilts in the gallery that agreed to hold our show. So in the next few days I’m going to re-size it to something like 50cm x 70cm, mount it on a white canvas stretcher, and include it in my upcoming January 2026 exhibition.

My inspiration was the cartographic symbol used by weather forecasters to represent the location and progress of those most violent storms we know as cyclones, typhoons and hurricanes in the regions of Oceania, Asia and the Americas. The Earth is represented by the very dark green base fabric. The huge variety of colours translates into the gathering swirl of  information, problems and expert opinions on what needs to be done to help the world deal with and adapt to the changes in climate now taking place at an accelerating rate.  Red is a colour warning of danger, hence my choice for the hand quilted grid pattern. Interestingly, this statement written in 2009 could have been written today; because according to reports from the recently concluded COP30, real change has been slow on climate zone issues.

I personally love things mounted on white or painted stretchers without further framing, but with a standard size, a new owner has the option to add a custom of pre-made frame that goes with their particular decor style, or that matches a colour in their own couch, so to speak 🙂

Throughout the history of textiles, of cloth making and all the needle arts and crafts, change has been constant, and until recently was all about cultural and technological change affecting the natural fibres produced by animals and plants that man processed for use in all those crafts. If this interests you I recommend the extraordinary website https://hapticandhue.com/about/ with heaps of reading and excellent podcasts presented by weaver Jo Andrews and several experts in their textile fields. While writing this post I checked on when man-made fibres appeared, and found this interesting summary – https://www.andy-kirkpatrick.com/articles/view/a_short_history_of_man_made_fabrics In 1885 the first fibre made from cellulose fibre was exhibited in London UK, and by 1899 it was being produced commercially in France. Since WWII in man-made fibres have exploded in use for many practical reasons, including being cheaper than natural fibres to produce, and being often stronger or more durable. There will be nothing like zero fossil fuel usage in the future of Man – they are a key element in textiles as well as being vital to apparently 6000+ applications vital to living and saving lives in the world’s 9 billion population..

I am so grateful for today’s digital technology through which the internet apps like Facebook, Pinterest and Instagram et al, and artists’ own websites, give instant access to the work of many fibreartists around the world. Fifty years ago when I became really interested in fibreart as an art form, it was much harder to keep up with developments as they were happening. After marrying in 1969, because of Mike’s work we lived for nearly two decades in remote, isolated areas and mining towns (Kalgoorlie, Darwin, Katherine, Mt.Isa) While they all had lively arts communities, each was a small world, and most of us had only occasional access to real time exhibitions in ‘the Big Smoke’. To get an idea of who was being inspired by what to create their fibreart, we all depended on print – exhibition catalogues, books, subscription magazines, and whatever could be obtained through town libraries; and in those places visiting workshop teachers were always a welcome treat. Since 1987 we’ve lived in cities (Denver, Perth, Montevideo) where it is great to be able to visit exhibitions in person.

Since medieval times, all the broad craft categories were backed by guilds of qualified master crafstmen, so there were guilds of spinners, weavers, lacemakers, dyers, metal workers, carpenters, potters, wood carvers, woodworkers, stone masons, and many more crafts. Most of those crafts were also carried out on domestic/nonprofessional levels, of course, and when I began stitching, ‘the crafts’ were still separated out like this, both in perception and reality. The whole process was considered to be making ‘craft’ anyway, as it was mostly from domestic settings and with a utility purpose. Mum smocked little dresses for us, made very fine crocheted table mats and runners for the antique dining table, and worked canvas needlepoint designs for chair covers and framing. One was mounted on the panel on a firescreen produced by Dad’s best mate, Uncle Bill, who was a furniture manufacturer. Needlework, knitting, lacemaking and crochet skills were principally handed on down through parents and other female relatives, although I know in 1945 my newly married mother aged 20, attended evening classes at the local tech college to learn basic home sewing and dressmaking which she hadn’t learned earlier, largely due to the social disruption in WWII (she also attended cooking classes, and became excellent at both) People knitted or crocheted wool or other threads; others spun and wove wall hangings of wool or linen, people made baskets of plant fibre from stems and leaves; embroiderers decorated things with hand stitch (machine embroidery was mostly used for company logos and names on clothing, hotel and hospital linens etc.) Quilters cut and pieced fabrics or stitched applique piece onto a fabric to produce a surface design before quilting the layers, and either way, they were ‘quilters’. Most craft makers were and still are grouped or described by the techniques used, and we still join established guilds and clubs as well as informal groups based around those particular crafts. Even as I write this, in a few hours’ time I’ll be talking over Zoom with a group of stitchers who formed initially, during the pandemic, under the auspices of StitchClub in 2022. We ‘meet’ fortnightly, and though we’re scattered between UK, USA and Canada and Uruguay, we’re as close as any group I’ve ever belonged to, like the Over The Edge Quilters (Denver) or Goldfingers Embroiderers (Kalgoorlie WA) and the internet makes it all possible – yay!

Which brings me to Studio Art Quilt Associates, SAQA When I joined soon after it formed, the internet was still new, and promotional publicity comprised albums of slides sent out to galleries which SAQA hoped to interest in exhibitions of quilted 2D fibreart, fairly newly beng recognised as ‘art quilts’ about which the organisation has always worked to educate the public. For several years now, SAQA has included quilted 3D objects, too, and has a dedicated special interest group for members interested in making 3D works, Back in August I was invited to talk to that group about the 3D creations I’d occasionally made in my fibreart career. In 1978 I was fortunate to travel from Mt Isa, Queensland, down to Goolwa, South Australia, for a 9-day summer school, which was fabulous, and I can’t overstate how influential that experience continues to be. For example, I was introduced to soft sculpture. A 2020 StitchClub workshop with Clarissa Calleson really revived my interest in stuffed fabric forms including suffolk puffs, and in 2024 and 2025 I made some in works selected for the first and second exhibitons of Glass+Textile here in UY.

Now I’m currrently pursuing stuffed puffs, as discussed in recent posts here and here. Where this will lead I’m not sure, but several commitments are looming, so I’ll be giving them a rest until well into January, and who knows what could develop over that time?

I’ve mentioned it a few times, but this announcement image will be popping up in people’s feeds over the next few weeks. The opening is on the evening of Friday January 2nd – and yes, I’ll be there that evening, so do come and say hi if you go then.