"Fearless Color"

Rayna Gillman's second class at VCQ Celebration which both Sue and Elizabeth took was called “Fearless Color”. Elizabeth posted this picture of the class on Facebook with the class title, but no one commented on the black & white photo!

We began with a package of six 5 inch squares and were told to pick 2 which were our least favorite colors and then one which we liked.  Elizabeth chose a brown and a green as her least favorites and a pale yellow as one she liked.  After cutting them into different shapes and gluing together a collage we were allowed to add an accent color. Elizabeth picked red.  Our choices were very limited in the packet to get us to stretch ourselves out of any normal comfort zones.

Rayna demonstrated how she uses her iPhone to look at the values of a composition by turning the phone to a black and white camera option.  This is a handy tool to use and could replace all those old color filters we have around our studios that block out reds and greens and helped with seeing value. Our phones are usually close by and not buried under piles of other supplies.  This was one of the take-aways from this class.  Another is that "there is no such thing as doesn't go" - as long as a fabric is repeated in the piece.

In the afternoon we all were given a square of multi-colored fabric with stars and asked to create something that was a pleasing composition to us even if we didn’t like the base fabric.  Here is what each person made both in color and black and white.

Strips and Squares with Rayna Gillman

One of the workshops Sue took at Celebration was on improvisational piecing with Rayna Gillman.  We learned her methods for creating strips and squares to create building blocks for a quilt based on her book, Create Your Own Free Form Quilts.

Strips of varying widths are cut free form (without a ruler) and stitched together. Then sometimes cut crosswise and inserted between other strips.  Or built out as a square in a square.  Solids and prints are needed.  Curvy and uneven are more interesting than straight.  Following your instincts is more important than planning. Repetition is important to unify the whole.

Above are examples of units made by Rayna - strips and squares - that can be the foundation of a quilt.

Below are some of Sue's building blocks.

 Here, everyone is hard at work playing with their fabrics.

Once you've got enough pieces, you can start working with them on your design wall to find a pleasing arrangement, and figure out what else you need to fill in.

Here are Sue's pieces stitched together.

Below are some of the other class participants with their creations.

 Sue says it was a fun, low-stress class and process and looks forward to more improvisational piecing.

Free Form Process

Sue shares a bit more about her free form piecing:

I took only a few process photos from piecing the rail fence block.  But the process I used is Rayna Gillman's in her book, Create Your Own Free Form Quilts.  I cut random width strips and did some wonky seams (meaning slightly angled) and gentle curves.  The process for cutting and stitching gentle curves is in her book.