I haven’t posted for awhile. I’ve been at Nancy Crow’s Timber Barn studying with Claire Benn, and came back so inspired and full of ideas and color I’ve done almost nothing but work in the studio. I started some large pieces while at the Barn, challenging myself to take advantage of the large printing tables they have. This piece is 13 x 55, and was printed using a break down screenprinting method. The piece was twice this size but I cut it in half because I wanted a kind of totem pole vibe. This is the second half, which is now a second piece, slightly larger at 17×59:

I thought it would be interesting to quilt this one horizontally but I think I like the vertical quilting (on the first one) better.

The screen I used had text that I scribbled on it using a needle nose bottle. When I scraped the color on I deliberately let the fabric wrinkle, which made for some beautiful marks.

I’m also really happy about another piece I just finished:

This one is 17×57. It’s tentatively called “A Mother Who Loves Books,” because I was thinking of my mother when I made it, and the text is a poem from Let it Be a Dark Roux, “My Mother’s Perfume.” It’s linen, and I am loving how unfinished linen looks like on the edges. I’ve been working on a few more, unfinished, pieces using torn linen, and I can’t imagine tiring of the tearing for awhile. There’s something powerfully, almost…archaic about linen that’s unraveling a bit at the edges. This piece was originally twice this size horizontally but it felt too symmetrical, and Claire showed me a way of getting rid of the symmetry by manipulating the fabric–I cut off a bit of one side and folded the middle, leaving the pleat. There’s no batting, only a backing of black felt, which I allowed to project beyond the back. The marks in the middle are a kind of graffiti–my mother’s name and my name written over each other. I added texture to the fabric with a crumpled piece of parchment paper dipped very lightly in a couple different colors of thickened dye then again very lightly touched onto the fabric.

I’ve been working a lot with color these days; right now it’s shades of yellow, gold, curry, mustard, etc. This is one of the first ones that I experimented with different mixes. I think this one is about 7 Golden Yellow to 1 Hot Chocolate, maybe a touch of Rust Orange. What fun!

This one (above) is actually “finished,” that is, it’s quilted and “bound,” using hidden binding, also known as face, or art binding. This is my go-to binding for art quilts. Unlike the binding for traditional art quilts, you can’t see this binding on the front side. I could make a hanging sleeve for this quilt but since it’s not very big or heavy (about 18″ wide and maybe 46″ long) I think I may be able to get away with inserting a small dowel into the space left between the facing and the quilt. Going to try that first.

This quilt was made using hand-printed fabric.

This one, not yet finished, will be put on a canvas, a new process for me. I’ve been experimenting with stretching pieces on canvas, like painted art, because it’s so much easier to hang. I’m still learning how to do it.

The fabric was painted with earth minerals–deep wrinkles in the fabric made the fascinating texture on the piece. I didn’t want to iron or stitch the painted strips as I felt it would take away from the texture already there, which I loved–you may have to see it in person to appreciate it–. Instead, I glued it to black canvas, allowing some of the rough edges and stray threads to remain. I have stretcher bars that will fit this piece, but I haven’t decided if I’ll actually wrap the quilt around the stretcher bars (which means I’ll have to add more black canvas on the edges if I want to keep this size), or if I might just attach the piece to a larger canvas, maybe a deep brown or tan…or black. I’m also thinking I might add some light stitching to the black canvas, though I don’t want to take away from the minimalist design. Will have to leave this up on the wall for a bit to decide.

This one, improvisationally pieced using fabric I painted and printed with earth minerals, is not yet quilted or finished. It’s large, about 2.5 feet by 4.5 feet, and I’m considering stretching it on canvas. Will write more about this process in another post.