Grief Quilt

The original title for this piece was to be "As the Crow Flies". I saw birds flying over a winterscape. However, I did the quilting while caring for my mother-in-law at the end of her life and this piece communicated a different "story" to me.

"Transfiguration" - 39"x39 - 1996 (Initially titled "O Blessed Release")

The tree limb patterns and their quilted extensions became associated with the network of pain she was never free from. The red color came to represent her courage and strength in spite of that pain. I felt the significance of the blackbirds during her last week. The day after her death I added the spirit bird to portray her release.

This piece is constructed of uphostery/home dec fabric samples. It's quilted in the Japanese sashiko style with carpet thread. The quilting lines follow and extend the printed branch patterns. The black triangles are quilted with a bird shape. The appliqued organza bird repeats the shape.

Exhibited in 1996 Dogwood Arts Festival Quilt Show
Awarded Honorable Mention

This piece hangs in the home of my nephew in Kaneohe, Hawaii

I wish to express appreciation for the care given to her and to me and to our family by the wonderful people who work for Hospice.

Our family will celebrate what would have been our matriarch's 100th birthday with a family reunion at the end of June.

City Cats

There are a lot of "cat people" out there, so here's a cat quilt that I had made for my daughter-in-law. She and my son have Gizmo, Zuzu, and Spot ... Snatches (click to see quilt featuring her) has gone to kitty heaven.

"City Cats" cuddle quilt size - 1996

My son and daughter-in-law lived in a condo when this was made. So my version of attic windows became windows in a big brick building. Each cat is cuddled in a crazy quilt (made from my scrap bag, of course) in a room with fancy wall paper (decorator fabric samples).

The cats are quilted and have a bit of needle sculpting about their faces.

The quilts are "tied" with embroidery satin stitches done with 3-ply strands of floss.


This is the third quilt I had made from a 1/2 yard of cat fabric. Quite a few blocks in other quilts feature some of them AND I still have cats to go.

Taken By Storm

This small collage started out as an exercise of the technique in Ilze Aviks week long workshop at Arrowmont in 2000.

"Taken by Storm" - 10"x13" - 2000
Materials: Hand painted silk, silk, rayon fabrics, threads

It all began with a piece of silk I had painted earlier in the week. I had taken a bag of "orts" (British term for scraps/leftovers) and silk fabric samples to the workshop. The black stripey fabric pieces are trimmings from a tunic I had "created" the fabric for. Silk chiffon samples were layered between an outer layer of rayon fabric and a silk lining ... then all were channel stitched together ... then just the top layer was sliced through.


All the fabric pieces are the shape and size as they came out of the ort bag. The silk squares were cut to their sizes. Then the threads were pulled out and arranged. I was just going for a interesting compostion. It wasn't until hand-quilting the piece that I became aware of the tornado.

The hand-painted piece of silk on the back got wrapped around to form the borders on the front.

"Taken By Storm" hangs in Memphis, Tennessee.

Challenge Quilts

A friend sent photos of the quilts made for the fabric challenge for which I created "Its A Hot Time...(in the old town tonight)". I think there are some wonderful uses of the required fabrics ... red/yellow polka dots by Jane Sassaman and the other one of multiple colored squares within squares.






I like to participate in challenges and block exchanges once in awhile. Usually it gets me to think outside "the box" ... to take a direction I wouldn't normally have thought to go. This one was a bit different. When I got the two fabrics at Christmas time I knew immediately that the polka dots were to be the foreground as well as the background for a Hunderwasser Happy House quilt and that the squares in the other fabric would become windows and doors. Without these particular fabric requirements I would not have made this quilt.

Ortwork

You've been reading about a collage technique I use to make art quilts. There's a variation of collage that I use extensively which involves utilizing mostly scraps of threads and fabrics. The British term for leftovers or scraps is "orts", so I call it "ortwork" ... my play on the word "artwork". It began for me in the year 2000 with this piece.

"Twist and Shout" - 48"x48"(approximate) - 2000
Materials: cotton & silk fabrics, cotton thread, rayon yarns, organdy ribbons, and buttons. Hand and machine quilted.
Exhibited: 2000 Smoky Mountain Guild Dogwood Arts Festival - Knoxville, Tenn.
Award: Surface Embellishment

The patterns throughout this piece twist and shout with the joyful exuberance of the Beatles in the 60's. The center square is the result of a workshop, Organdy Ribbon Transparency, presented by Dianne S. Hire

I couldn't bear to throw away the scraps of ribbon. They were placed under the silk organza that I layered over the black&white checked border around the piece I made in Dianne's workshop. The black border with the small dancing white squares got the trimmings from the rayon yarn that I had used to tie on the buttons. They're layered under additional strips of organdy ribbon. From that point on, I have not discarded any thread or fabric scraps.

"Twist and Shout" was gifted to my younger son and his wife. It hangs in Oak Park, Illinois.

Previous postings that feature my "ortwork" are:
Here I am
Last Flowers of Summer
More Sunsets

With all the bags of scraps I've saved, or rescued, I really should be making nothing but "ortwork". I'll feature more pieces in future postings.