My views on ‘artist statements’ are well known – that the best statement on a work imho is a well chosen title, and  preferably short – although I do admit there have been some very clever rather long titles for creative works in all media, but it’s not a widespread trend.   I’m sure all writers, composers, painters, sculptors – in fact all creative people at times have trouble naming some or all of their works to their satisfaction, and from personal experience, I know that in some stubborn cases it can take ages to get beyond a working title like  ‘untitled/greys’ or  ‘ blue one with silver /gold patches’ or similar kind of thing.  Sometimes I have measured, signed, dated, and priced a work in my master list before it’s very own distinctive title finally emerges; one piece remained as ‘untitled’ for 3 years until someone asked to buy it and I felt forced to give it a name, not a very inspiring one but it was entirely appropriate to the design content.    Naming is an essential part of the whole process, and I could no more farm out that part than any other part of the process, like quilting or binding.  

Recently I have seen several calls for help in naming quilts on the various quilt art lists I read – there was even one by a PAM (Professional Artist Member) of SAQA (Studio Art Quilt Associates)  which I see as rather amateurish, when considered.   These calls for assistance are sometimes even matched with a little prize/give away for the person whose proposal is accepted by the artist.  Rather sad imho, that someone is not up to the final little challenge in the overall process of creating a work of art.  Today someone was looking for a snappy title for her blog – which is also a creative work, but I’m not sure she sees it quite that way.

“If you’re going to use something every day, why not make it beautiful?”   is the comment made by Quiltart list member Wendy Starm, in context of discussions  on various aspects of this area of quiltmaking, and many totally agree.  In the days before cheap industrially produced bed coverings of cotton, wool and now man-made fibre were available, in better-off  households a select few quilts of relatively fine design and higher standard of craftsmanship were kept aside for ‘best’ – (weddings funerals, special visitors etc)  compared to the other other more hastily constructed quilts for every day, which produced as quickly as possible for the required warmth, and therefore often showing fewer stitches per inch quilting, which was one of the main ‘rules’ or standards some members of the Quiltart list have become a little hung up about lately.

Anyway, Wendy’s comment prompted me to share this memory of a highly memorable afternoon I spent with an elderly lady, Marta, here in Montevideo some years ago.  Marta told me how for many years she and 7 or 8 friends used to meet every week from around 2 in the afternoon to 8 in the evening, breaking once for afternoon tea around 5pm   The rest of that time they organised into teams to  produce these very utilitarian scrap bedcoverings.  While some laid out the wool samples they got from local manufacturers,  others sewed on their machines and others pressed after that.  In Australia we’d call these ‘waggas’.  They were backed with either whole cloth or pieced large areas of wool fabric, but had no batting and were not quilted but tied here and there just to hold the two layers together in relation to each other.  (For the technical minded it was a bagged backing)   These ladies’ work began as their relief effort response to unusually severe flood damage and losses among very poor people in the mid ’60’s; but continued through many years because they found there was an ongoing need for what they produced.  As time moved on their work finally stopped as one by one they just became too old to go on.  She was left with a couple of these covers which she showed me, and this one I found especially beautiful.  I remarked how the cherry red patches really ‘sang’ in among the earthy neutrals, and her comment was an echo really, of Wendy’s above:  “We might have been making them for charity, but we always felt we had to make them as beautiful as we could for these needy people.”

A couple more beauties for those who love the elegance of yesteryear expressed through lovely lines, soft fabrics and beading.  Modern embroiderers and crafts people in general are currently ‘into beading’ , although it tends to be more chunky and often rather light on design; and its interesting how beading comes and goes from fashion.   Even many of today’s quilters who add beads to their works tend to be rather wimpy, adding just a few but stopping well short of the potential exuberance a mass of beading can express.  Wanting a quick fix, and swiftly executed with little of no patience I guess, just wanting to be part of whatever fad is the latest.  People often say to me about various aspects of the quilted textiles I make ” Where on earth do you find the patience to do this?”  It’s not a matter of patience, it’s just a matter of doing all that is required to produce the vision I have of the finished work. And I love doing most of the steps in the whole process – those one or two phases I don’t  ‘love’ I just accept do need to be got through to reach my perceived goal.  (and that’s where recorded books come in so handy) 

I love a bit of glitter myself, but tend to add it as earings or other temporary add-ons to the body beautiful.  My gold tennies are due for another airing now that summer bbq weather is coming.  Imelda M and I have a collection thing in common – hers was shoes of course, and I can’t rival her in that department – but I could give anyone a run for their money in earings.  It irritated me a bit yesterday to find one earing on the floor of the wardrobe.   I realised I hadn’t worn them in  quite a while – and then couldn’t find the other one anywhere in the cupboard or in the crowded box the pair lives in.  I hardly ever lose an earing, and love them all, cheapies and more costly ones alike.  Earings are a wonderful little souvenir of anywhere you are travelling, and I can remember where I bought each pair in that category.  But I digress.  Back to glitter of yesteryear… enjoy these beauties:

This gorgeous dress was displayed to show the back interest, with a mirror placed so that the viewer could also see the front. The elegant tassel hanging down from beneath the lace layer, and the beading at the back of the waist are shown in more detail below.

At the heart of the universal appeal of patchwork or pieced fabric constructions, whether traditional or contemporary style, is the potential for colours to interact either side of the line separating them.   Numerous techniques of construction within the patchwork/piecing world, freehand or carefully cut, some employing rulers, templates, covered paper shapes, strip and paper piecing, are used separately or in combination to produce geometric or more organic less precise shapes to make what is in effect a ‘new fabric’, and with further treatment this becomes a quilted houshold item such as quilt for the bed or the wall, or a garment to wear.

Although I have blogged this before, I am posting it again today so that people who have never pieced this way can have a go at what is widely called ‘ improvisational piecing’   in which lines range from organic or non-straight to the very, very curved lines possible with some practice.  (There are more detailed instructions in my articles in Quilters Newsletter Magazine nov.2004 and in Down Under Quilts magazine nov 2004)  Since 1992 when I learned this way of working, this has been the way I work to piece fabric.  When it suits my design, I often combine my pieced work with precisely cut squares in a grid, so I haven’t entirely abandoned quilters tools.  But for the most part, my pieced work is all cut freehand with the rotary cutter and  pieced using machine. 

In two galleries on this website, mostly in the “Colour Memories” and the more recent “Ebb & Flow”  there are many examples of my works using these construction basics and the more advanced techniques I have developed.  (shown is detail from “Ebb & Flow 11” )

Although you could use  this technique to piece some wavy lines by hand, when you want to cut across those lines and put in inserts to make more complicated, multi-step constructions, it becomes pretty well impossible without machine stitched seams.  I mean, you probably could persevere with it and eventually succeed, but the question would be, ‘Why on earth would you?’ … unless of course you are one of those I meet from time to time who says, (with a superior sniff) ” Oh, I always do my piecing by hand”  as if that somehow makes something better.  But many of us are past taking any notice of the quilt police who still seem to dictate such rubbish to the gullible out there.  So, although my instructions say it can be used by good hand piecers, if you piece by hand, just realise that it really goes only for the single unbroken wavy line.  I apologise for that wording which I only just noticed, after all these years … hmmm.

By following the instructions and diagrams for each step, without too much trouble and a little perseverence (hey, you could even ‘get it’ first time!)  you too can master this fast construction technique that is widely used by art quilt makers today.  It’s really a modern tradition if such a thing can be said, since it is so widely used by fabric artists in non-traditional patchwork and piecing.

The basic steps in the construction of 'improvisational piecing'.

 This kind of technique also goes well with ragged or unfinished looking edges, which however can be carefully finished behind to be stable while still looking ‘raw’ or rough from the front.  I have blogged elsewhere on this and may post again on it sometime soon.  Or may not.