Creative June!

Wow! I'm actually getting some projects completed and feeling very good about it.......!

TREE OF LIFE

This little Tree of Life is from one of my sketchbooks. I photographed a selection of little doodles with the idea of printing them onto fabric and embellishing them. This little tree I did as an Inkjet Transfer onto black cotton fabric. It's been sitting around the studio for quite some time (as things tend to do here before I get back to them!) [I do find that sometimes the time factor allows things to stew or a new inspiration may be applied to something that has seemingly lost it's zest of creativity.]It is a mini art quilt (comprising 3 layers) but no actual quilting as all the embroidery was done before I backed it with a vintage napkin. I didn't use wool batting or craft wadding this time but just added a piece of vintage felt which added a bit of body and strength without being too soft and spongy. I'm really happy with it and have been playing around with some little tabs for hanging it but am inclined to mount it on matt board ready for framing. Size is 7" x 7" (18cm x 18cm)

My most current project is another of the Inkjet Transfers. It was a mosaic design I designed about 6-7 years ago (the actual mosaic tabletop is in here somewhere and is at about the same stage of finished-ness that this wee piece is now! ) What? You don't have any UFO's in your studio?
I'm using DMC Rayon thread in satin stitch and it is picking up the light beautifully just like a real mosaic! I will turn this into a little mini art quilt also!

Mosaic Rose

Gingham Lace Heart

 

I made this cute little Gingham Lace heart from a pattern I found and printed off of the net about 12 months ago. It is also known as Chicken Scratch embroidery and by several other names. It is very effective and very pleasing to work!

Gingham Lace Heart - Back

RETRO OWL

RETRO OWL - Back

I made up this little retro owl as I went along and have been meaning to graph the stitches into a chart but haven't got around to that yet! He only took me a couple of nights to stitch and I think he's quite cute! I love his Mother-of-Pearl button eyes. The background fabric is a vintage find in the form of a napkin (as above) and the backing was from my stash.

Let's hope the rest of the month of June is as productive as the first half! (I sold one of my little landscape art quilts at the gallery last week too!)

A Stash of Sorts

I’ve finally finished my liquorice allsorts art quilt wall hanging!

I’ve been working on it for a couple of months now (interspersed with about 100 other projects of course!) It has been so much fun. I originally designed it as a rectangle but loved the square within a square so stopped there... Another row of blocks would make a gorgeous cot quilt! (I'd have to use all cottons and prewash!)

All the fabric is from my stash; but not all cottons. The yellow is a flannel and the green which is the perfect shade is a synthetic stretch fabric of some sort. The black border and backing originally came from my MIL and is a vintage retro fabric with quite a coarse weave.

I decided to hand quilt it as the machine quilting just wasn’t adding anything to the piece. Each allsort layer is 1" wide and each allsort block is 5" square. The overall size including border and binding is about 25 1/2".

I’m really pleased with it. Just need to add a hanging sleeve and take it into the gallery!

Ties, ties and more ties! Red!

I can't stop buying ties! I've been picking them up here and there and bought 30 for $6 from a charity store last week! Some of them are so ghastly that they're beautiful! Some of them just sing when put together and I'm officially addicted!



The first picture I'm posting is similar to my last post. I haven't bound this yet because I'm thinking about making it into a shoulder bag.... I love the colours - colours I wouldn't normally put together. I haven't done much quilting so my early attempt at stippling over the tie fabrics is very exciting for me. I love how a thread colour can help tie the colours together.


I've been pulling the ties apart so far but met a woman in the op-shop who leaves them in tack and sews strips together to make up bags.

This second photo is an experiment called "Suit and Tie". I used suit fabric as the border - in this case a gorgeous charcoal wool (also from the charity store!)

I love the layout, the red themed tie fabrics but I do think I am going to have to stabalize the fabric somehow because the puckers on this are driving me mad! I'm certainly not a perfectionist (ANY MORE I can finally say!) and love those really loose art quilts that are more about the art than the perfect seam or binding. (This is the first time I haven't used a mitred corner binding and it has been a challenge for me!)


I am using tie strips left intack to bind this, (The perfect width!) which I am hand sewing on. I have machine pieced and quilted just the borders on this as I loved the way the silky fabrics puffed up like little pillows. Overall size is 18" x 18" (46cm x 46cm)

I am going to handsew some tie labels or suit buttons in the centre 4 intersections which may cover some of the puckering. Overall I am pleased with how this one has turned out. To me it has a slight oriental or ethnic feel. Probably not one to sell but I will hang it at home and it is now my officail prototype!

In truth I work on lots of different projects at once and seem to have quite a short attention span. I have a big burst and then hey! start on something new as a different inspiration hits me! I love the zing of a new idea and where it leads me. I love the idea of doing series of works (with my painting too) but in truth they develop so fast that the first and second may not even seem related!

Creativity

Yesterday I bought a dozen or so old ties (hubby donated a few from his wardrobe also – in the name of art!) and I spent a few hours unpicking them last night. Today I made some of them up into an art quilt, thoroughly enjoying playing with colour and texture. I usually at least do a sketch or have some idea of where I’m going but this time I didn’t have any preconceived ideas and I changed direction several times. I used a commercial printed cotton for the border.

I still have some binding to add and although it was intended as a vertical piece I quite like it orientated horizontally! I can see myself doing a series of these......