A week of finishing

I have been busy this week getting up to date with a couple of projects. First a quilt I have been making as part of the online Studio11 workshops which Christine is running, having been rather scuppered by Covid. I blogged earlier about the project with Coronavirus as a theme; that is still ongoing as I've been doing too much thinking and not enough doing, which is often a failing of mine. However her "Potato Chip Quilt" project was straightforward, and took much less thinking about to achieve. There seem to be several variants with this name: one is a series of blocks with a square at the centre and a different coloured border on each square; another, similar to the one we made, consists of strips joined with a diagonal seam. The one Christine teaches comprises a pile of fabric strips of a consistent width but differing lengths and a pile of squares the same dimension as the width of strips. You make a long, long, looooooooong strip by alternately stitching strip, square, strip, square at random. The strip is then seamed and trimmed several times until you have a rectangle. Sounds very simple, but you have to get the maths right in order to know how big your quilt will be, and to make one that has sensible dimensions. 

It is all finished, 

quilted with a design I based on some of the fabric, 

 

with some hand dyed fabric as backing

 

I am really pleased with it, and have enough strips left (my poor maths!!) to make another of a similar size, though perhaps with less random and more deliberation.

Then there was my Noro jacket, started back in 2018. It too is finished, though currently awaiting a decision on buttons. 

 

You will see that I ignored the Noro "just make it random" philosophy (be "charmed by the non-uniformity, unevenness, & coarseness of nature"), I prefer to mirror the colour changes. This did involve quite a bit of reeling off from the start of the ball to get a match, but I used those bits in the back to vary the changes where no matching was needed. The yarn feels lovely knitted up and this jacket will get a lot of wear I hope, but I'll probably steer clear of any future Noro temptations. Beautiful as they are, with such a high price I don't like feeling that they are using a bit of marketing BS to cover flaws in both the yarn (which did sometimes fall apart in my hands as I was knitting) and the multiple knots and joins per ball (presumably because the yarn fell apart as it was being spun).

And yes, I am decidedly less sylphlike than the model in the pattern, but hey ho, I am somewhat older than her as well, and did once have my sylphlike moments!! The cat chaps don't mind, so long as they provide biscuits their humans can be any size they like!

Ambushed by events

I have had a small project on the go - a cot quilt for the first child of the next generation to be born in my husband's family. He nicknamed her Flopsy when she was on the way, so Flopsy she has become to us. She was due to be born on the 20th November, but snuck in two weeks early. Her quilt (Flopsy's quilt) had been designed, planned, all parts cut out and ready to go, but not quite assembled. So now I am hurrying to catch up with events.

The quilt is just about finished - with Mrs Rabbit and, of course, Flopsy, Mopsy, Cotton-tail and Peter being tucked into their winter coats to go out and play. There are lovebirds to chat to along the way

And trees in the surrounding gardens and woods to run in and out and roundabout; they might frolic in fields of blue and yellow flowers and have busy chats with the bees.

Layered together with wadding and a snuggly brushed cotton backing, there is some hand quilting, but mostly machine. The binding is one where the backing is brought forward to the front, so the soft brushed cotton folds round the edges for little fingers to grasp.

There is just a little bit of hand quilting left to do (Flopsy must be highlighted of course), then the finished article can be tucked into a squishy parcel, along with a lovely soft blanket which darling daughter has crocheted for her, and a book from her great great uncle to amuse her as she grows. We hope she enjoys both snuggles and book for many years to come.

She does, of course, have her own name - in fact three of them and very lovely names they are too, but I won't be so indiscreet as to launch them into the ungoverned spaces of the internet.

In between times I have been doing other things too. I'm not sure you saw the finished "One Over the Eight" quilt that I have been making in our monthly patchwork class. We have, since then, moved on to several other things, all of which need finishing, some of which are not yet started

We had a lovely crewel work workshop at the Embroiderer's Guild with Fay Maxwell, a delightful and patient teacher - you can hear her talk about her crewel work in the linked video. She adds an extra element to the traditional crewel work by cutting out felt shapes for the basic design elements, which are tacked onto the backing cloth and then embroidered.  Freehand cutting of felt shapes was quite a challenge, especially as I was basing my design on fabric that once covered some cushions of my grandmother's; fabric that echoed crewel work designs itself. I think I managed OK. Now to finish the embroidery!

and finally, from last weekend, this little fox is gradually appearing, poking his nose through the bluebells, He was designed by one of our branch members for us to try out some bead embroidery during a half day workshop

So, quite a bit has been happening, just not in Mesopotamia!!

Festival time

Darling daughter and I had a wonderful couple of days at Festival of Quilts in Birmingham last weekend. There was just so much to see and be inspired by, from exquisitely executed "traditional" quilts to the marvellous art textiles in the various galleries. Here are just a few of them

My favourite, and the first gallery we visited, was this beautiful, fragile emotive piece by the lovely Christine Chester. She entered it for the Vlieseline Fine Art Textile Award and was so thrilled when it was accepted (why on earth wouldn't they?). As with much of her work, it centres around the theme of memory and loss. She shows how a condition like dementia takes so much away both from the sufferer and those around them. How the person they love slowly fades away, and then even their own memories of that person become fragile and thinned by time, once they have gone. She created all the fabrics herself, then used the very traditional English Paper Piecing technique, with incredibly fine stitching, to evoke this delicate image of her father mending his fishing nets, cap pulled down, concentration absolute. It is a picture she has used in previous works about him, each one expressing her loss and his in a different way. She wanted it to hang so it could be viewed from both sides, bringing that sense of transparency and fading memories to life. We, her students, were lucky enough to watch it evolve and when I first saw it complete, I was moved to tears. It touched deeply on my own sense of loss, bringing to mind my Dad, who I haven't seen for more than 51 years, but who sits in my heart every day.

The next gallery I wanted to visit was that of India Flint. We weren't there on Saturday to hear her talk, but it was marvellous to be able to get close to her eco printed works, to see the way the different textures of wool, cotton and silk affected the prints that she makes with her "botanical alchemy". Very special, too, to see her sitting quietly there, stitching, barefoot, like an alternative Whistler's Mother; the same pose, the same gentle muted colours, but a whirled away from 1870s America. It was good to be able to thank her for her inspiration.

That satisfied my immediate priorities. Then it was a matter of wandering through the textile forest, pausing where inspiration struck, and doing our best to manage both my and Jen's frailties by stopping regularly for food and drink, or just to rest our aching and exhausting bones for a while.

Here's some more things we enjoyed

Leah Higgins' marvellous breakdown printing inspired by the cotton mills of Manchester and Salford.

Eszter Bornemisza's complex stitched and layered works that speak of maps and cities and time 

Caroline Nixon's oh so delicate Underground Overground, eco printed and then stitched

Niki Chandler's Le Ciel Electrique.“And all in a flash night turned to day. Capturing the haunting experience of camping in a pine forest during a violent electric storm.” 

Crafted in transparents and shimmering organza, a photo can't catch the sparkling luminosity of this piece.

Alice Fox's allotment year, Plot 105 : 52 weeks. 

seasonal plants, eco printed and gathered together in fragile handmade books, part of the Natural Selection gallery of plant based artworks

The vibrant colours of Liz Jones' Moving On, made with her own hand spun and hand woven merino wool

the quiet reflectiveness of Ann Beare's The Sentinels: Silent Witness, inspired by The Purton Hulks

and finally Beatrice Bueche's shining Tree in the Moonlight

Of course we saw and enjoyed more than these, but I would run out of words, and you would run out of patience if I showed you everything.

If you want more, you'll just have to go yourself - next year 

Patchwork update

I hope you've all had a wonderful festive season.

We usually have quiet Christmases, and I always feel that I have to apologise for that for some reason, but we are really quiet folk and the aren't many of us. Quiet is good, restful, almost contemplative, with tie to appreciate the good things as they happen.

I have been working on our next block, Rose of Sharon (I think), applique finished, wadding and backing pinned, now to quilt which is always fun and usually dangerous to fingertips

The previous block, Rocky Road to Kansas is also in need of a stitch or two, but what better way to spend a chilly dark evening by the fireside

A little indigo a little Japan a little Jude

I was deeply moved by the quilts of Shizuko Kuroha at FOQ in Birmingham last weekend. A lovely weekend spent with my daughter meandering up from and back to the South Coast.

This was my second time at the show, and again Christine was there exhibiting; this time with unFOLD, a textile group she belongs to. All the works were themed around Lynn Knight's fascinating book book "The Button Box". Here you can see Christine with her "Just Got To Finish the Mending", in the background and below, mending being metioned in the book as an informal contraceptive of sorts - read the book and you'll find out. Christine's piece, which we have watched develop during our Studio 11 days, is densely stitched over a deconstructed shirt, with the darning stitch so often used to mend, and mend, and mend in those days when we still did that sort of thing. It was marvellous to see it hung in the gallery space along with so many other thought provoking textiles.

If you look closely there's just a hint of a daughter in the background as well!

While there we also really enjoyed Ruth Singer's textile meditations on the lives of women prisoners. Again, such an inspiration to see how textile artists express their thoughts about life and ideas using the medium of cloth and stitch. A thing I aspire to, but haven't quite worked out the how yet!

But back to Kuroha and her beautiful indigo quilts, impeccably pieced and hand quilted, each one a symphony of movement and subtle colour. They really are works of art. She was there in her gallery space, signing books for eager middle aged ladies, amongst whom I include myself (though not in this picture); her smile so sweet as she inscribed the book with my name and her signature. 

I was touched to the core, both by her and her art.

On my return home I had a week off work, but am preparing for two momentous things: first, at the end of the month, after forty years of fulfilling work in my local library service, I am taking early retirement - a big step, but one I am longing for. The ability to just go to bed in the afternoon and sleep for a couple of hours will be transformative! Oh, and get on with my stitching, and weaving, and dyeing, and gardening, and perhaps a little piano playing, and a thousand other things that have been waiting for "when I have time".

Then in September, I am off to Bhutan. How easily that types itself out, what an amazing thing to be doing. One of Colouricious' textile trips, I will be beside myself when it happens. Will try and post a couple of updates while I'm there.

So, Indigo, Japan, Jude? What's the link you are asking yourself?

Well, I need to take a sketchbook to Bhutan, obviously. I loved the simplicity of the indigo quilts, and all sketchbooks should have a cover. Especially one made from a couple of pairs of jeans I haven't worn since my slim early twenties, but have always kept because "I'll do something with these one day".

And Jude? Well this is a sort of Jude house, patched and darned and quietly stitched.

Festival of Quilts

Well, this time last week I was just back from my first experience of this amazing celebration of all things quilt related. I had the pleasure of helping out in Christine's gallery on the Saturday morning - there is a lovely blog post here by Helen Conway which says much better than I can what a lovely and moving gallery it was. It was very engaging to spend the morning there greeting people who came to look, watching their reactions to the emotion and thought in the textiles, moving towards and away to get the detail and the overall view. In expressing her experience of watching her father succumb to dementia, it was obvious that these quilts and textile portraits were deeply moving to many viewers; they touch a chord with those of us who have watched one we love slowly disappear, piece by piece, as the mind fragments; I felt privileged to be there.

Christine Chester - Palimpset, detail

So what is my newcomer's impression of the event? Astonishing, exhausting, inspiring, overwhelming, um, all those superlatives. It shows one how wide the umbrella is that embraces the term quilt; themes were as broad as human ingenuity can imagine:

there were traditional quilts, 

Lynne Johnson - Billings Coverlet Reborn

Liz Jones - All Things Bright and Beautiful

art quilts

Chrry Vernon-Harcourt - Coastal Study 1

hand quilting, 

Vanessa Stanfield and Tricia Neale - A Medieval Bestiary, detail

machine quilting, 

Ximo Navarro - It is not a dream, this quilt is real, detail

pictorial quilts, 

Hilde van Schaardenburg - The Threatened Swan, detail

Sally Hutson - The Clothmakers Window, detail

landscapes, 

Kate Dowty - Marshwood Vale

Jean McLean - Silence. Judges Choice

quilts full of detail, 

Kirsti Hovland - The Milky Way - Stars Wandering

Kirsti Hovland - The Milky Way - Stars Wandering, detail

quilts with presence, 

Judy Doolan Kjellin - Sadness, detail

those about ideas

Natalia Manley - Beyond the Black Hole. Judges Choice

or poetry - in this case one of my favourites by Yeats

Jill Exell - Stairway to Heaven

or history, 

Marisa Marquez - Lost Inheritance

decorative embellishments, 

all sizes and shapes, 

Amanda House - Dragons Ho!

some to be viewed from both sides 

Sue Palmer - Bou Baretea, one side - detail

and the other

oh I could go on and on. I saw work there that was a million miles from anything I could, or would want to achieve, some that was akin to the tentative experiments I'm working with, some that I might perhaps aspire to one day. And I haven't even mentioned the marketplace!

It is marvellous to me to see how great the variety of human expression is when you come to a show like this, be it large or small. We see things and think, "gosh, I couldn't live with that", or "how on earth long did that take to achieve", others that leave us in awe of the skill or a technique, yet others that we could just gaze and gaze at. It is such a celebration of skill, artistry, invention, technique, thought, hand work, colour, texture; things which we are unique in being able to create and then use to express our endless inventiveness.

Here are a few more favourites

Gloria Loughman - Merrill Hall, Asilomar, California. Detail

Kate White - Dragonfly Studies, detail. Judges Choice Contemporary Quilts

Dianne Firth - Earth Bones

Annabel Groom - Costa Rican Moons

Christine Restall - Estuary

Mary McIntosh - Copper Plates

I loved it!