The annual benefit auction begins later this month, so I’m posting on several membership advantages that I’ve particularly valued from among the wide range of resources offered by this organisation. One special interest group is the Multi-Day Challenge SIG

I’ve been designing and making textile/fiberart for many years, and only rarely am I stumped with absolutely no idea of what I’ll do next, and only occasionally get stuck mid project. Back in the late 80s, though, I found it very helpful to join a group of quilters who were experimenting beyond traditional geometric P&Q, and moving into more personally inspired textile art. That group, Quilt Explorations, met monthly to accept the next challenge offered by one of our 15 or so members, and show and critique what we’d all done with the previous month’s challenge. By 1993, when we left town, Q.E. had turned into a critique group only, as most members were now following our own inspiration paths and didn’t need prompts provided by someone else’s challenge to create our art.

Today, with this post in mind, I googled “quilting challenges” and about 3rd or 4th down the page I found this an interesting blog, Online Quilting Magazine.com and read the article about challenges which includes this succinct summary of the whole challenge thing – “Joining a quilting challenge can be a fantastic way to hone your skills, gain new techniques and have fun with others who share your passion for quilting. As with any challenge, the main goal is to encourage you to try new things and branch out from your normal routine.”

SAQA runs at least two challenges a year. During the pandemic, 2021, with heaps more unstructured time at home than I was used to having, I realised this was a gift of time to explore new things in textile fibreart. In addition to joining StitchClub, later that year I took part in the 100 day SAQA Reboot Challenge. In 2019 I’d taken part for a while in a 30 day one, but got distracted and didn’t stay the course. However, with so much time it was easy to keep to my plan for 100 days. SAQA’s challenges are individual – the participant sets their own agenda, does at least something on it every day, and posts about it on that day’s album on the challenge’s private FB page. Part of participating is giving helpful or encouraging comments to others for what they’re doing. Over the course of those 100 days I made 100 x 3.25inch square mounted samples, and blogged several times about how I was doing, using the title “Very Small Pieces” https://www.alisonschwabe.com/weblog/?p=6891 through to “Very Small Pieces,#14” https://www.alisonschwabe.com/weblog/?p=7096 and the final one, “After the 100 Day Thing” showing some favourites from the 100! https://www.alisonschwabe.com/weblog/?p=7124

Handled by volunteer coodinators, such challenges use little of SAQA’s financial resources, but they do rely on the efficient ever-ready technical backup and support of the several salaried SAQA staff – my thanks to you all! @saqaart

The annual benefit auction for Studio Art Quilt Assciates, SAQA, begins in just over 2 weeks, on September 15th. This popular annual benefit auction helps fund various outreach programs of SAQA including the important touring exhibitions.

Nearly 400 works are offered for sale in this 3 week on line auction, and this year’s offerings include some wonderful works which you can see here My work “Out Of Order 4” is in section 2, which goes on sale September 22nd:

Bidding is only online, and bids can be placed from anywhere around the world simply by pre-registering here on Handbid . I recommend carefully reading how the auction works, plus all the tips and guidelines in advance to get the best from your auction experience. Decide if you absolutely must have one work that you’re prepared to pay $1000 for on Diamond Day, September 12th … and note that as I write today, regular collectors are already scoping out the works and compiling their lists of preferences and must haves – so good luck!

I’ve been donating these mini-quilts every year bar one since the auctions began, and it’s always a thrill to learn where my small work has gone to its new home, and perhaps this year I’ll be wecoming you as one of my newest collectors!

Occasionally since the late 80s I have turned to making something in 3D, and recently presented a talk to SAQA 3D Special Interest Group to show those works. Since that talk and the Q&A dicussion generated, I’ve been thinking of doing more in 3D, and am currently stuffing suffolk puffs of various materials, including fibreglass, to assemble into an entry for the 3rd glass+textile exhibition next February (entry conditions at salonartevidriotextil@gmail.com)

I did a quick update browse on Pinterest this morning – that algorithm does produce quite a bit of uninteresting stuff, but I’ve always likened it to browsing through exhibition catalogues as it occasionally throws up some interesting ideas in a wide range of media. For example, when I saw this one this morning, https://www.pinterest.com/pin/454019206204303580/ , “Anointed Rank” by Mary Giles, I stopped browsing, began thinking, and pinned it to my 3D board for several reasons… It reminded me of the earliest childhood stage of drawing people as blobs with a few attached straight lines which I learned about last year are known as tadpole people Back then I mused I’d love to explore this idea, and posted this quick doodle to remind me –

And this morning I began thinking that I should make some explorations of tadpole people in 3D.

A really interesting exhibition of artisan crafted theatrical masks opened last week in Montevideo, and will be showing in the Estela Medina Gallery at the Teatro Solis, Tuesdays through Sundays, 5pm to 7pm, until the end of October. You could add it to the itinerary for an afternoon in the city, or go early as a prelude to an evening at the theatre. I was too unwell to attend the opening, but visited the exhibition the following weekend, so parking was easy, right at the theatre itself, which is not the case mondays to fridays 🙂

Entries could be on any theme, with free choice of materials and techniques. Works had to be sized within 40cm x 40cm x 15cm, and were limited to 1.5kg weight maximum. I’m proud to have my own entry selected, and it’s hanging mid-wall at one end of the innermost part of the gallery:

On the Saturday we went, there were a few people wandering in and out while we were there, so it was relatively easy to photograph each one with the artists’ statements or technical information. More than half the masks were made by Uruguayan artists; then there were entries from Chile, Argentina, Mexico and I was listed as Australian Uruguayan – nice! In addition, the international selectors were each invited to submit a mask, as were several professors and people involved in theatre arts here in Uruguay. It’s very impressive how the 50 artists outside that invitees group chose an incredible array of techniques and materials in answering the call. I’ve already described mine in full here, so won’t repeat all that, but let me share my favourites from this wonderful show.

I hope these ten masks and my reactions to them help motivate you to visit this exhibition before the end of October !! And, if you’re an artist in Uruguay or other latin countries, keep an eye on the Facebook page CETU Centro de Arte Textil Uruguayo, which is how I hear about these things. As a fibre artist based here in Montevideo, I’m always grateful to the diligent efforts of Felipe Maqueira to spread information about upcoming opportunities, in addition to his worldwide coverage of interesting developments in the fibrearts.