This year the SAQA-Oceania region members contributed 32 pieces to the annual SAQA Benefit online auction, and decided on a blog hop to highlight ourselves as a regional group of SAQA member artists.

Although here in Montevideo Uruguay I’m technically only about 100 km from the South Atlantic, as an Australian I am part of the SAQA-Oceania group, and as you know, home is where the heart is.   So, today I have a few notes on my auction piece, how it fits with my recent work, and then I’ll finish with a few pics of my workspace to give you some idea, if you want it!

I always make a 12″ square for these auctions, and they’re either small samples for new work, or examples of what I am doing on a larger scale.  Late last year I made a group of quilts for an Australian exhibition, and after fluffing around with samples,  I decided stenciling really was the way to go for that group, with designs based on images of sand ripple patterns I photographed and manipulated to produce the pattern from which I cut the stencils (out of fabric)  for each:

For this 12″ square, I cut a stencil of ripple patterns from template plastic:  the plastic didn’t start out gold, of course!

Template or other plastic sheeting is wonderful for stencils you might want to use over and over – easy to clean and store.  I’m a fan of the low tech approach, and  fabric stencils enable you to produce even larger surface patterns.

After stencilling, my auction piece was free machine embroidered with gold metallic thread; then layered, pinned and free machine quilted with a fine stipple pattern (rather tedious) using fine black polyester thread top and bottom.  I am a great fan of Guterman’s Skala thread as used here, and in fact use it whenever I piece, too.  I buy 10,000m cones of the basic colours of black, dark grey, light grey, white and cream … which tells you something!

It was then trimmed and bound.  There’s a hanging sleeve which is easily removed if the buyer wants to mount it in a frame.

I use unbleached calico / muslin for backs, so these Tidelines quilts all look like this:

Mike agrees the following photos are a totally normal, reasonable representation of my workspace at any given time !  and I  include them to give you some idea of where I beaver away creatively.   Of course, all spray painting, stencilling and burning are done outside in the garden, with my back to the wind, but for everything else, this is my workspace.  I think ‘studio’ is rather too refined a term, although some  might not agree.

My pin wall, right,  is large, half a wall in a long narrow room. 

Having pride of place in my work area, shown in the back corner of this photo, is an extremely unusual wooden cabinet, a re-purposed antique, closeup below.   Perhaps you can guess the original use, but everyone I’ve ever shown it to has been totally stumped.  We were too, when we first found it.   The answer’s at the end of this post.

I find it very useful for thread storage.  Each little sliding door/panel has a small finger-size indentation, and there’s one spare space per row, enabling access to every cavity by sliding the panels back and forth.  Some cones and spray cans go below.   It’s a beautiful thing, and the original use will surprise you!

And finally my actual ‘sewing’ area, (complete with the other usual occupant in the room) showing my cutting table at right angles to my sewing table with recess for the machine.  Both were custom made to the same height, so it’s easy to move it as necessary for machine quilting.  When piecing, I cut, sew and press each seam as I go, so again, convenient for how I work.

OK – it might look a bit like a jumble sale, but what I need is close to hand, suiting how I work.  If a bunch of coloured fabrics out on the table become too distracting I simply put them away.  After a big project I tend to tidy up, put everything in its place,  then for something new I get fabrics and threads for fresh consideration – I audition them, really.

Now, that cabinet?  When we found this interesting piece in a furniture restoration and reproductions place, we were very puzzled.  The proprietor, Roberto, told us it was from the ticket office of the central railway station in Montevideo, and the little boxes held pre-printed tickets for every railway station along the radiating lines.  The rail system in Uruguay is largely defunct as most lines closed 30+ years ago, the magnificent C19 Central Railway Station was stripped of all furniture which was auctioned off, and the grand building stands sadly empty and unused to this day.  Before that, well into the ’70’s, you bought your ticket from Montevideo to somewhere, paid for it, and then it was then date-stamped with the date of travel.   Mike, bless him, suggested I could use it in my studio.  Roberto was thrilled that someone wanted it, especially for such a practical use, and we both thought it was a snap at  twice the price we paid.

The blog hop began on July 16th, so a number of artists have already posted,  such as Ali George and Rasa Mauragis just before this, but all posts on the hop are scheduled HERE    The next is from Maggie Gilbert on August 7th, then Susie Cujes on August 9th.  We hope you’ll enjoy the whole blog hop excursion!

A few months ago Mike and I were in Panama City, and while there we visited the fish markets, near the old part of the city.  There these doors appealed to my love of grids and appropriateness of design to function.  Battered and well used…  (pun)

A reminder that tomorrow, Tuesday July 16th (Aus Eastern Time, so this afternoon ir you’re an American or European reader) – the SAQA-Oceania Blog Hop begins! and the complete list of participating artists can be found  HERE

SAQA-Oceania Region members decided to group and highlight our contributions to this year’s  SAQA Benefit Auction.

Beginning next week, on July 16th, and with a new blog post every couple of days up until September 6th, you will enjoy a feast of interesting behind-the-scenes insights by some of the SAQA member artists in this region.

Come back  here on August 5th to see my piece, my process and some one-time-only revealing views of my workspace!

A full list of participating artists can be found  HERE

Mark the page, visit regularly and share the excitement with your followers and quilt lovers everywhere.

One of my favourite columnists in “The Australian” is demographer Bernard Salt.   Many of his articles are based on observations and analysis of Australian census data, and you can tell which section of the recent census he’s been analysing.  Other articles are on his interesting observations of collective human behavior and social trends in modern Australia; and a recent article on restaurant menus contends that the social aspirations of its clients are reflected in menu’s style.  Although published last month, somehow I missed it and only read it just recently, as it happens just after my first experience with a restaurant menu on a digital tablet.   After being seated at a restaurant table, we were each handed a small iPad – a tablet I guess, I’m a bit behind in the technology department, a late adopter you might say.  Anyway the whole menu was on it!  Bernard would have loved how it took social pretension to a rather more sophisticated level.  You could select whatever language you wanted – and as Australians and Brasilians were present, and all speak at least some Spanish, we agreet to have the waiter give the nightly specials in that.

As a late IT adopter, I had to be shown how to select a menu section of an item from a group, click twice and then scroll from side to side, but I got the hang of it easily enough.   Each menu item was photographed in colour with descriptions in Spanish and the chosen alternative language.  I noticed the photos really matched up very well with what we each received on our plates.  Great use of technology.   One thing I did find a little unsettling was that you couldn’t run your eye down the whole menu and get a feel for the total offering that night; there was no little ‘specials tonight’ slip tucked somewhere to let us know that the chef found particular foods either great quality of great value at that morning’s markets…

The restaurant not being very close to where we live, we hadn’t been there in a year or more, despite the interesting blend of European and Asian cuisines with lots of herbs and spices,  creative presentation and good value.  The owner-chef’s a creative man indeed – a Uruguayan returned home, bringing  influences from his world travels with him.  It’s a nice alternative to the most common menu of parilla, the marvelous bbq-d meat found everywhere in this part of the world.  The Uruguayan national palette is very bland, so although the food is nearly always tender and  wholesome, it’s never spicy, hot or creatively assembled on the plate.  Typical Uruguayan restaurant menus are gradually including or even giving way to creative changes, exactly equal to changes in dining out when I was a young thing: we were usually offered soup of the day, roast of the day, followed by jelly and icecream or tinned fruit salad and cream. (it was Tasmania in the mid ’60’s, after all)  Australian restaurant far and indeed peope’s home cooking is very interesting these days.

  A really delicious little cup of soup was a starter we all had – pumpkin with onion prolly, definitely banana, ground fresh ginger, and, um, not sure what else  – I have no recipe to pass on, just a nice idea, but I’m sure you can google something like it and experiment with the flavours.  We’ve managed to produce something like it here at home.

Following what I  did with the silver samples last week, I have begun a new work.  It’s to hang it in a particular small room here at home, so its not likely to go on exhibition, so no need to be secretive about it.   I’m loving the reflective depth so far, and plan some more bonded slivers, once I decide whether or not to do a round or two of machine stitching at this stage then bond over the top of that stitching later; so I’m needing just another little sample or two to see what the effect of that is.  I plan machine quilting with silver metallic thread – a huge cone has been sitting here several years waiting for something to grace with its presence.