Fly Me to the Moon

The Quilt Show was fun but the spectacular quilts were in the back of the venue in a special exhibit called “Fly Me to the Moon”.  Our friend, Susanne Jones, whom we met at the CABS (Creative Arts Business Summit) is the curator and she has done a great job with the exhibit.  All the quilts are the same size and in some way reflect (pun intended) the moon and the Apollo project to send a man to the moon.  Here is the online gallery of the exhibit.  All 179 quilts in the exhibit will be included in a book that will be released September 28; it is available on Amazon for pre-order.  You can also find the exhibit schedule on her website; some venues will have only a portion of the quilts, while others will show the entire exhibit.

There are so many amazing quilts in this collection that it is almost impossible to pick favorites.  The variety of techniques and artistry is truly impressive.  Suzanne's concept for the exhibit and the book included depictions of the astronauts for the various missions as well as other moon-related topics.  You can explore more fully in the online gallery linked above, but we did pick out some of our favorites. In fact, as with the main show, it's too many for one post, so come back to see more!

The photo above gives you an idea of the size of the show.  There were 3 rows, each with 5 panels that each contained 6 quilts - on both sides!  Having all the quilts the same size and hung at the same height provided a pleasurable viewing experience.  Another nice addition was that you could call a phone number and enter the number on the quilt's label to hear a recording of the maker talking about their quilt. In no particular order, some of Sue's favorites follow.

Wolf Moon is by Timi Bronson of Hartsville, SC.  Her quilt depicts her interest in Native American lore, with the January full moon, the Wolf Moon.

Moonlight Sonata, inspired by Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 14, was created by Wendy Starn of Alexandria, LA.  I love how she created Beethoven's portrait in the clouds.

Verne's Moon, by Marisa Marquez of Madrid Spain, is a tribute to Jules Verne, who is one of the biggest influences on the steampunk movement.  Click on the photo to enlarge for a closer look at the detail.

Kate Themel of Cheshire, CT, created Moonlight in Vermont.  This is her interpretation of the Ray Charles rendition of the song.  What a lovely moonlit scene she has created!

Leaving Home: Launch of the Apollo 8 is by Tanya Brown of Sunnyvale, CA.  This mission was the first to leave earth, orbit the moon 10 times, and return home.  This quilt is painted with water colors on cotton, and heavily stitched.  If you go to the gallery page you can see what the stitching looks like on the back of the quilt.

Letter From Granny by Diane Wright of Guilford, CT, features a letter written by Diane's grandmother in 1969 after a visit at the time of the moon walk.  In it, Granny marvels that she and Grandpa courted in a horse and buggy and now a man was walking on the moon!

Patricia Hobbs of Macomb, IL, created The Moon in the Classroom.  Not only does it perfectly evoke a 1969 classroom, but the image on the TV screen brings the moon landing to life.  Amazing detail!

Ricki Selva of Arlington, VA, is the artist behind Last Quarter Moon.  She depicts the line between daylight and night, when "steeply angled light rakes across the craters".  The amazing thing here is that Ricki spent almost 2 months drawing and painting the moon with permanent inks, dyes and paints.  You really need to see this in person to appreciate the detail and work involved.  If you didn't know better you might think it was a photograph.

Pseudo Lunar Topography is by Meggan Czapiga of Bethesda, MD.  She was inspired by microscopy imaging which captures a black and white image that is then colored.  This image depicts the topography of the lunar surface; blue areas are the lowest spots, red areas are the highest. 

As you can see, these are some amazing quilts.  But wait, there will be more tomorrow!  None included here depict the astronauts - those are pretty amazing too!  Kudos to Suzanne for conceiving and curating this project!

Elizabeth's Favorites at the QU Show

The Quilter’s Unlimited show in Chantilly VA is always an enjoyable weekend.  Close to home, it has nice vendors in addition to member quilts and usually a special exhibit.  This year was no exception with the super “Fly Me to the Moon” exhibit, curated by our friend Susanne Jones, and in which Sue has a quilt honoring a favorite song associated with the moon.  More about that later.

Here are Elizabeth’s favorite member quilts from the show.

This quilt by Martha B. (apologies, the last name on the sign is blurry in our photos) appealed to Elizabeth not just because of the purple and green color theme, but the use of the large print mixed with the smaller squares.  The proportions were so pleasing to the eye.

A second quilt in the purple and green color theme was this one with stunning coneflowers placed on a gradated background of green squares. This quilt is called “In the Garden” by Ann Clare of Fairfax, made from a pattern by Barbara Persing and Mary Hummer.

“My Twitter Feed” by Preeti Harris was made by paper piecing all these fun birds.  You can read about it on her blog at:  http://sewpreetiquilts.blogspot.com/ She blogs about the show as well as the technique used in this quilt when she made the quilt in a post on February 28. http://sewpreetiquilts.blogspot.com/2017/02/he-tweeted-she-tweeted.html

This quilt, “Morning Has Broken” by Nancy Firestone of Annandale simply glowed from all the way across the room.The pattern was designed by Patches Quilt Shop of Mt. Airy, MD, for the 2015 Quilters Quest Shop Hop.  Quilting is by Kathleen Sihrir.

In Tahitian Journey by Jeanne Coglainese of Fairfax, the blue and orange colors complimented each other very well. 

Having once taken the workshop “Happy Villages” by Karen Eckmeier, this little quilt “Cinqua Terra Village” by Rosemary Ryan of Centreville was fun to see.  It is always interesting to note how someone else interprets the class.

I couldn’t resist liking this leaf quilt which is from a pattern designed by Quiltworx.com.  It is not crooked, that is just poor cell phone photography.  It is called “Cruisin’ Leaf” by Dena Brannen of Reston.  Made in a class while on a quilting cruise to Alaska, she bought all the fabric while on the trip.

This quilt, made from a tie collection, was part of a recycling challenge.  It was one of the nicest tie quilts I have even seen.  Called “Retired Ties” by Sharon Gookley of Vienna.

Near the end of the quilt show, I spotted this take on the Wizard of Oz called “My Sister” by Susan Smith.  Having only a sister, it did make me giggle.

While I missed going to the show with Sue, I am glad I got to go and being by myself meant that I saw the show and visited with the vendors at my own pace.  A nice way to spend a Saturday afternoon.

Quilters Unlimited Annual Show

You may have noticed that we have not been blogging very much lately.  May was a difficult month for Sue with the passing of her father-in-law and both mother and mother-in-law first hospitalized and then in rehab.  Both still continue with recovery but are improving.  Now that summer is rapidly approaching we will try to get ourselves back on track to blog more consistently.

Last weekend was the annual Quilters Unlimited show in Northern Virginia.   Both of us were able to attend, but on separate days, so you will get our individual viewpoints on this show.  By far, Sue's favorite part of the event was the Fly Me to the Moon exhibit, but she'll save that for a separate post.  First, today's post covers the main part of the show, which consists of quilts made by members of this guild.  QU has 11 chapters and over 1,000 members; members are able to submit up to 4 quilts for the show.  This is a non-judged event.  As well, each chapter has their own small display area that can include group challenges.  Along with the show, vendors, demos, and classes round out the event. 

These are Sue's favorites from the main show.

"My Small World" is a Jen Kingwell pattern pieced by Kay Lettau and quilted by Beth Shafer.

 "Pastorale" is an original design by Jennifer Emry who both pieced and quilted it.

Above is another original improvisational quilt by Jennifer Emry, "Strip Tease". 

"Everyday Best" made by Ann Littleton added some bright, happy color.  It is a Piece O'Cake design and is quilted by Cindy Luby.

"License to Shop" by Zebra Patterns  was made by Cheryl Miller and quilted by Mary Tims.  What a great way to use those Row By Row license plates!

Judy Ballance created "Fade to Black".  Using a traditional block and techniques by Louise Smith in her book, New Twist on Strips and Curves, Judy created an original layout.  Quilting is by Lisa Marshall.

"Zinnias by Yim 3" is the creation of Linda Cooper.  Based on a photo, she used Susan Carlson's collage technique to create this original quilt.  Lovely!

Of course, these are just a few of the many quilts on display.  There are many exceptional quilters in Northern Virginia and it is always a show worth seeing.  Stay tuned to see what Elizabeth highlights from her visit.

Threads of Resistance

Back in February, a call went out for fiber art interpreting the theme "Threads of Resistance" for an exhibit organized by the Artist Circle Alliance to protest the Trump administration's actions and policies.  The Artist Circle, made up of 10 prominent art quilters, conceived this exhibit as an opportunity for fiber artists to express their hopes and dreams, fear and anger regarding this new administration. 

The entry deadline was May 1 and over 500 entries were received for this juried exhibit.  Though the jurying is not yet complete, an online gallery of the entries has been created so that all the artwork may be viewed and the artists' voices heard.  The number of pieces that will be chosen for the traveling exhibit is not known, but likely will be only a fraction of the submissions.  Whatever your views and political opinions, we appreciate this opportunity for fiber artists to have their voices heard. On the website menu, go to "the artwork" link to see the submissions which are divided by topic and can be played as slideshows.

Sue submitted a piece for this exhibit called "Women's Voices Matter"; it depicts the Women's March on DC on Jan. 21 in which she took part.  Here is Sue's quilt, which can also be found on the website in the Women's Rights group. 

There are currently 12 venues scheduled for the exhibit through October 2018.  If you have the opportunity to visit any of these venues beginning in July at the New England Quilt Museum, we're sure it will be an exhibit worth seeing. 

Cindy Grisdela - Improv Quilting

Recently, Sue attended a lecture/trunk show by Cindy Grisdela, author of Artful Improv.

Her lecture traced her transition from traditional quilter to improvisational quilting. This is the style that she works exclusively in now. 

Cindy is a quilter local to Northern Virginia and also serves as the editor of the QU Digest, the e-newsletter of the Quilters Unlimited guild, so Sue was already familiar with Cindy and her work.

Below is the quilt featured on the cover of her book.

Not only is her piecing and layout interesting, as in the quilt below,

her free motion quilting makes great use of and enhances the negative spaces.

Sue was particularly interested in the lecture because she has an improv quilt in process and was looking for some inspiration to figure out how to complete it.  It's always helpful to see and hear about other quilters' work and process to help refine your own. More on Sue's quilt in another post.

How Do I....Gelatos

Once a month Artistic Artifacts holds a demo/make and take session on how to use a particular product.  Last night Sue attended a session on using Gelatos.  Gelatos are essentially acrylic paint sticks that are crayon like but easily blended with water.  Their main use is in mixed media art, but Sue was excited to learn some ways to use them on fabric and ribbons.

Sharon was the facilitator and demoed some of her favorite ways to use Gelatos.  Since water is an important component, we worked on the coated side of freezer paper. Other "tools" included a water spray bottle and baby wipes.

We were provided with a variety of materials to play with, including card stock, cardboard, found papers (map, sheet music, book page), ribbon and fabric. The baby wipes are perfect for smoothing and blending colors.

You can also use stencils and foam stamps. With stamps, they may deposit color, and sometimes take it away.

The piece of velvet ribbon really soaked up the color. It was fun to see how a bit of color and added water could transform a white piece of fabric to completely colored, much faster than dyeing!

The metallic Gelatos added a really nice sheen to paper.  It was fun to play with a different product and consider ways to use it in art quilts.

Open Studio April 23

We are repeating this post from March as a reminder that we are offering an Open Studio opportunity at Artistic Artifacts on April 23.  One of the big advantages of this open studio is a workspace where you don't have to worry about being messy or getting paint on the floor - especially if you don't have a dedicated wet studio space at home.  You also get to use our many screens and print to your heart's content!  So come join us and print some yardage for use in future projects!

After talking about this idea for a while, we have finally scheduled an Open Studio session at Artistic Artifacts.  The date is Sunday, April 23 from 9 AM to 1 PM.  This is a 4 hour block of time to print with our extensive collection of screens.  We will offer support and encouragement and address any individual questions but there will not be formal instruction.  The prerequisite is to have previously taken our basic Thermofax printing class, either at Artistic Artifacts or another venue (such as VCQ).  This is a wonderful opportunity to print yardage (or smaller pieces), improve your comfort level with printing, and experiment with patterning and layers.  You are also welcome to bring/use gelatin plates and rubber or wooden stamps to combine techniques.  All of these surface design techniques play well together.

This class will be held in the warehouse at AA, which can be cool depending on the weather, so dress in layers and wear old clothes or bring an apron, as well as comfortable shoes.  If you are a member of JAMS (Judy's Altered Minds), they will be meeting at 1:30 that day, so this is a great opportunity to spend the morning printing and then stick around for JAMS.  Check the class listings on the website for all the details and registration.  We hope to see you there!