BLOG 239

BLOG 239 Sunday March 15^th 2015

What a difference a week makes. Last week I was pushing ahead with my calendar quilt feeling exceptionally focused and making good steady progress. I was also trying to off-load a quilt (that I did just to find out how a pattern works) that I didn’t want to make any more because it was distracting me from things that I really wanted to make. And now I am working at full throttle on an exhibition quilt (quilts if it goes according to plan). I have been invited to mount another exhibition of my work at the Ucheldre centre in Holyhead to coincide with an exhibition of work by the resident quilters. I have exhibited there twice before and when asked this time, I turned down the opportunity because I doubted that I would be able to fill the gallery space without repeating quilts. With some persuasion and a desire not to disappoint the teacher whom I know well, I have agreed to do it. I am going to include our group quilts which will help to fill walls and then I decided to try an idea from my sketch book to potentially bulk out my exhibits.

When I was travelling around America last year, I was doing my usual doodling in my sketch book. My school files used to be covered with similar fractured images because I used to do them as I was listening/day dreaming. These images are very personal to me and part of who I am so it seems like a good idea to try and utilise them as a design idea. Whether it will work or not remains to be seen! Here are the simple sketches, with the initial idea of the images being part of a wall.

                                                           Horse

                                                                   Dolphin

                                                            Flower

                                                              Fish

 I drafted the horse pattern to size as a Master pattern.

                                                     Master pattern

 I have a box full of fusible off-cuts and these proved ideal for tracing the pattern pieces from the WS of the master pattern.

                                                                 Tracings

 I placed some baking parchment over the pattern so I could pin the fabric shapes accurately in place.

                                                             Parchment

I set up my ironing surface and found some colourful fabric. I have always wanted to work an image in bright colours but have somehow lacked the confidence, being a realist at heart. But ‘nothing ventured, nothing gained’ and ‘he who dares, wins’ as the sayings go. So let’s give it a whirl.

                                                  Ironing station

                                                          First shapes

                                                          More shapes

 And, as I am enjoying the start of this project, I realise that I should have traced the pattern again onto the baking parchment so that I always have access to the master pattern!! Put this fundamental error down to my enthusiasm for getting started!

                                                Parchment pattern

                                                     More progress

                                                    So far so good

 I like the look of this a lot! And you won’t believe how happy I am working with vibrant colour. And it is only by seeing it through the camera lens and eventually on this screen that I can see how it is working and I can fine-tune the colour choices. This exhibition might just have been the push I needed to be creative again and, as I have said many times before, I am always better working under pressure!