My regular readers may have noticed I haven’t posted in a while -but I will just comment that about 6 months ago Life, in the form of a fairly sudden onset drastic hip problem, simply got in the way of my creative energies.  These are now coming back as I adjust to my new artificial hip joint.

This time last year I was daily walking and photographing on the nearby beach, sometimes posting the offerings I found there, and other times posting some of the beautiful patterns left by wind and wave action.  There are lots of examples in posts from feb-may, but take for example the post from april 18th, with a beautiful mosaic of photos – Sand Tracks Low Tide   For decades my textile designs have been inspired by landscape textures and patterns.  I notice them, I draw them or I photograph them, and they have several levels of significance for me.

A time of change being a time of opportunity, I am now starting some new work based on my continuing fascination with sand patterns. I have more fabric and more patterns, so there will be more in this series.  Since this particular work is site specific and I plan to keep it in my own collection,  so I am  going to post its progress over the next week or so, so that you can see how my ideas come together within an actual work.  I don’t normally chart progress of my work publicly, but this one is not intended for any jury process that requires any kind of pre-exhibiton secrecy.   (An odd comment possibly, unless you are familiar with this issue that swirls round the Art Quilt world regularly, usually before a new Quilt National event,  but apparently is not common in other sectors of the art world …)

Background:  last year  in the fabric quarter in BA, I found some interesting old cream coloured fabric of unusual width,  a little stained and of strong character.  It was cheap, so I bought it, and has been sitting about in my workroom since.  It’s rather tightly woven, (so that some of the threads I wanted to use embroidering it just shredded, which put me off for a while)  and the selvedges are wobbly.  But recently, perhaps as a flash of reburgeoning creativity since my rehab,  I realised I wanted to use those characteristics, not hide or eliminate them, as I envisaged  a textile work being non-flat, non-straight – ‘rustico’ as they might say here.  After all, a beach undulates and there’s nothing really tidy about the edges.   If beaches have edges.

With a working title 'Beachwork' this view shows how the work will hang, on the wall which is a warm grey-neutral of medium-light colour - too hard to change its colour without making the rest look terrible.

Painting the bathroom totally changed it’s character – from white, the walls are now a warm hard-to-describe-greyish neutral colour that complements some of the little mosaic tiles.   So, a quilt of mine that hung there several years now looked terrible, and the picture that was on another wall looked out of place now, too.  But, I had a print of coastal far N. Qld, given us by one of my sisters, which since framing had been sitting around for a couple of years waiting to be assigned the ‘right’ wall spot- perfect.

Next follow a couple of detail shots, showing the rough finish of the textile, some of the initial stitching by hand and machine, and one of the machined button holes which will simply go over the screws already in the wall.   If I begin to feel that is too ‘tidy’ I may go even further and just cut the buttonholes out.  I  make hanging and display decisions right at the start, as some construction mid course may be required. (irregular shaped works)   This one certainly didn’t need a fabric-bound, tailored button hole or a metal grommet:  it’s really tough fabric and I won’t be moving it about.  So, I’m using the screws left in the wall, since who knows, one day there may be another quilt on a rod there, maybe not. 

Machine and hand stitchery. It will not be ironed on completion.

Torn top and bottom edges, wobbly selvedge sides. The button holes will be the only support for this work - and I may even cut those out and leave just ragged holes - but I will try that look on a sample scrap first !!! It seemed to be too, too 'neat'n'tidy to sew some kind of hanging loop on the back where it couldn't be seen.

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.