The Stranger's Challenge - Part III

Out of the desire to experiment came a pair of new small works.  I've had two 8" x 8" canvases on my shelves for years, so I thought it was time to take them down and play with them a bit.  For some reason, I felt the canvases were the perfect place for me to explore a new chair shape.

Blue Chair with Tea

Blue Chair in Bermuda

I began each canvas with a light spritz of teal spray paint and some light blue bubble wrap printed circles.  Blue Chair with Tea has an colored pencil enhanced extravorganza flower and a Kusmi Tea (Paris) label.  Blue Chair in Bermuda has some painted cheesecloth and a pair of used Bermuda stamps. Both of the chairs and the side table were stitched on white PFD fabric, colored with water color crayons and very carefully cut out.  Several times I saw an errant chair leg caught between the scissor blades just moments before I snipped.  

Collage is something that doesn't come too naturally to me, nor do I have a huge stash of ephemera to build upon.  My printer wasn't cooperating or I think I might have added something else -- perhaps a different extravorganza photo? --  to the Bermuda composition.  Perhaps the blue chair should have been bigger?  Still, I like the notion of placing quilting elements atop the canvas; there's a dimensionality that I like.  I also really like my whimsical new blue chair, based on the chair photo I took earlier in the year.  I think this all merits a bit more exploration, though I'd love your thoughts / critique on how I could have improved the compositions.

The Stranger's Challenge - Part II

A gentleman stranger challenged me to plant my tomatoes differently than I'd done in the past.   I did what he suggested without thinking twice.  Inspired by the fun of this experiment, I jumped straight into another: eco-dyeing.

Conceding a little to the fact that I don't have complete control over my schedule, I've decided to pursue cold dyeing as opposed to the more traditional dye extraction methods involving pots filled with simmering water that are carefully watched in an attempt to avoid turning everything brown.  I'm just not that good.  But with the cold temperature approach as described in India Flint's book Eco-Colour, harvested flora are first frozen and then allowed to steep in cold water to release their color.  That suits me just fine.

There are a number of lists of plants to use, though they are a bit is skewed to Flint's native Australia (I can only pick up eucalyptus at the store, instead of my backyard).  Still, all the possibilities are exciting to me and although neither is listed in any botanical dye list I could find in the book or on the internet, I scoured the yard on Saturday for dropped (and drooping) peony and rhododendron petals.  The rains had battered some of my peonies so I plucked the petals, leaving one denuded but still lovely flower

and jammed its petals into a Ziploc bag with all the rest I'd recovered.

The baggie now sits in my freezer, waiting for the day when I have time to see if any color will leech from the petals.  Chances are that nothing will come of it, but that's okay.  I have my PFD fabric ready to go, ash collected from the fireplace (thank heavens I hadn't cleaned the fireplace yet), and a giant aluminum stockpot I luckily found on sale at the grocery store, labelled for experimentation.

Yesterday some of my rose petals fell so I gathered those up too since they ARE supposed to create a wonderful dye.  Not surprisingly -- look at the gorgeous colors!  I think I need to gather more before I can dye. I don't know if the dye process will be impacted by petals harvested at different times and therefore, frozen for different lengths of time.  I wonder if the very light petals, which look bleached by the sun, can still give off any color.  I guess we'll find out.

The Stranger's Challenge - Part I

As I waited at the checkout counter with my wagon full of flowers and vegetables, an elderly gentleman approached me saying, "You have some nice things in that wagon".  Seeing that he only had two items to pay for, I let him go ahead of me in line.

When he finished paying, he turned back to me and said, "You should really plant those tomatoes up to here", pointing to a spot a good four inches above the soil.  "See all the fuzz?  Each one is a root, waiting to take hold.  If you cut off these bottom branches and plant your tomato deeper, you'll get a better yield.  In fact, you can even bury this lowest branch and it will sprout as a root."

"Really?"

"Sure enough.  But if you don't believe me, why don't you plant one tomato deep and plant the other one as is and see what happens?"

When I got home, I cut the bottom branches off a tomato plant, dug a deep hole, and planted it as the gentleman suggested.

Later, with my feet up and a glass of wine in hand I wondered, Why am I so willing to experiment in my garden at the suggestion of a complete stranger?  Was it because the gentleman was so kindly?  Was the notion of an experiment so appealing?  Why didn't I care about the time and money spent on the tomato? I love fresh tomatoes; I feel like I'm biting into a piece of the sun every time I eat a freshly picked tomato.  I would be disappointed if there weren't any in my garden.  But instead of worrying about whether the experiment will work or whether I killed the plant, I'm excited to see if it's successful.  I can't wait to find out.

Now why don't I apply that same excitement to my artwork?  Why am I so hesitant, it seems, to explore the "what if"?

The gentleman stranger's tomato challenge struck a chord.  In my next post, I'll describe how it manifested itself over the weekend and changed my plans.

Summer Planning

I planted tomatoes, basil and rosemary yesterday.  Tomorrow I'm finishing the vegetable garden with parsley and zucchini, and making a "rainbow garden" (as my daughter calls it) with zinnias, cosmos, and gerber daisies.  With a bit of planning and work, I'll be able to enjoy the colors and flavors of my garden in the coming months.

I decided to do a bit of advance planning for my quilting, too.  I created a spreadsheet populated with projects and target completion dates for the next three months.  To be clear, I  don't want to get caught up in timelines; I think that might be stifling to creativity and spontaneity. But I've come to realize that I'm very deadline driven when it comes to my art.  I'm hoping that a tangible timeline will help me prioritize my creative time around some special family activities we have planned, and help me be more productive in the studio. Aside from the fun of it,  I can see a few art benefits from this approach: more time in the studio > the creation of more artwork > my further development as an artist > a stronger and more personal body of artwork that might be suitable to submit to exhibitions.

I'm calling that my summer planning cascade theory.

I've printed out my spreadsheet and put it on a clipboard, along with relevant calls for entry.  I've hung it on the design wall in my studio so I'll see it every time I walk into the room and I won't ever have to wonder where I put it.  My ironing board faces the design wall so I'll see my timeline every time I iron, whether to smooth out wrinkles on my husband's shirt or to heat set some colors.  A gentle, but in-your-face, reminder.

 Do you have any plans for your art this summer?

Almost Wordless Wednesday

Prismatic fog....

Morgan and Momoy

Today is reveal day for our Latitudes Quilts group.  The theme for the latest challenge was "leave your mark".  I admit to being stumped; I struggled with how I wanted to represent "leaving my mark".  Each time I considered the theme, I came back to this thought: the greatest mark I'll leave on this Earth is my children.  They will be here after I'm gone.  Hopefully, they will be good people, responsible global citizens, and loving partners and parents.  That's the greatest legacy I can leave.

Morgan and Momoy 

With that in mind, I created this piece based on a drawing my youngest did when she was nursery school, celebrating the marks she made.  I have it framed and hanging in my studio and I smile every time I see it.  The color selections of my quilt are taken from what she drew, right down to the faded small figure.... and the spelling mistake.  (I love that spelling mistake and am so thankful her teachers didn't intervene to correct her!)  My first intent was to recreate the drawing with embroidered stitch, but I had a hard time recreating the spontaneity of the drawing.  Perhaps I just didn't leave enough time to solve that problem.  In the end, I  mimicked her crayon drawn line with paint.  I used my left hand so the lines weren't as sure.  It seemed to make a difference.  

In creating the piece, I took the "leaving your mark" theme one step further with my fabrics.  In our group discussions, some of our members have been talking about using only things from our stash.  I wanted to do that, but didn't have a good fabric for the center panel.  A piece of hand dyed fabric seemed a perfect solution, but powdered dyes make me a bit uncomfortable and I doubt I'll ever use them.  However, I like the idea of going to my garden and harvesting fodder for dyes.  As a result, I used a piece of fabric I dyed with onion skins to be ecologically-minded.  Every small step towards a cleaner Earth, I hope, makes a difference.  I'm hoping to explore eco-dyeing further this summer with India Flint's Eco Colour book in hand.  

I didn't think the piece lent itself to intricate or complex quilting and I struggled with my options.  I considered and discarded embroidered running stitches in the paint, echo quilting, and all-over meander quilting because I felt that, in one way or another, these options would detract from the simplicity of the drawing.  In the end, I hand sewed a few crosses in a very large grid to hold the whole thing together and called it a day.  

Please head over to the Latitude Quilts blog to see all the other interpretations of the theme.  

There's still time

I had a wonderful weekend; did you?  On my end, this was the first weekend when the entire family was home and I savored every moment of it.

I  also popped into my studio for some playtime.  Quilting Arts Gifts issued a Gift Tag Challenge for their 2013/14 issue.  Lucky for me, the challenge entry date has been extended to Friday, May 31st.  You can read all the details of the challenge here.

I still wanted to go to the movies with my kids and sip wine on the porch with my husband, so I created only one tag using a favorite tool of mine: water soluble crayons.  Given that it was Memorial Day weekend, I suppose it's not a complete surprise that I worked in red, white, blue, and black, though it was a subconscious decision.  Fortunately those colors are part of the pre-selected palette for the challenge.  I chose to use the oval template for my tag but looking at it now, it looks a bit like a tie-dyed Easter egg, doesn't it?

This was a great way for me to slip back into creating mode after almost a month away from my studio due to travels.  If you're looking for a quick, fun project, consider this one.  There's still time!