Something in Hot Pink Maybe.....

Uggh.  I really need some new stuff.  I want to buy some white shorts and a hot pink top.  Or a cute little denim skirt and a flirty Bohemian blouse.  Something.  Anything.  As long as it has COLOR --lots and lots of color. I'm sick of wearing jeans and dark sweaters, heavy black leather motorcycle jackets, black leather boots.  So today to celebrate Spring - I liberated myself and tucked all my winter stuff away.  As for the bikini - a girl can dream can't she!? 

Slice Quilt/Fractuired Quilt - Spring has also made an appearance in the downstairs studio by virtue of some "Spring-esque" projects.  I dug out the Van Gogh Iris slice quilt.  The panels have been sewn together and now I'm trying to decide what to do next.   I don't think I want to "box it in," with a traditional border.  I've been entertaining the idea of   making iris petals and leaves to carry over and "out" of the quilt along the edges.  Deconstructed.  I've also been free motion quilting some the panels by the other artists - by way of adding the "black" outline to more of the iris flowers and details to leaves.  I can see this is going to be a long work in progress - but I must finish it by June 1st as I want to bring it to the June Cyberbee meeting.  I'm the last one to finish.  Everyone esle finished their quilts and they came out just beautiful.

Here's a tiny peek at a little blackbird I threadpainted for a special friend. I don't want to spoil the surprise as she hasn't received it yet - so I'll show the entire thing at a later date.

How did YOU celebrate Spring this weekend?  Did you stay inside and Spring Clean??  Or did you run outside and embrace Mother Nature?   Me - after I cleaned out my closet - I got down and dirty.  Got all the vegetables in the ground, the sunflowers planted and the corgis bathed. 

After a full day spent in the dirt - EVERYBODY needed a bath!

THIS is the face I got when I said the word, "bath!"

Van Gogh Iris Slice Quilt - Continued.....

It's been a while, I know. You may recall, I participated in a group project wherein we each selected an image, sliced it up into five pieces and handed out one piece to each artist to interpret. I received all the pieces back months ago, got frustrated with this and put it aside. (You can click here to see the history and beginning's of my Van Gogh Iris art quilt slice project.)

I've had a hard time getting the pieces to fit together properly and just put it away for a while. Well, I got it back out this past weekend and am bound and determined to complete it. The pieces have now been stitched together and I am in the process of adding painted details to unify the pieces. Once I finish the painting process, I plan on adding some beads and hand stitching. I may or may not add machine quilting/stitching, depending upon how my hand stitching comes out. I'd love to just do the rest of this all by hand.

I'm so glad I brought this back out. I'd like to get this finished and maybe get it in to Symposium. We'll see.

Saturday's Progress...

After securing all the necessities for a successful quilting session (the new iron Sal bought me for Christmas, some magazines for reference AND, my favorite moose cup filled with chai tea), I began working on the appliqueing process of the iris flowers. All the flowers have been cut out, freezer paper removed, wonderunder attached to the back. Next, each and every flower is ironed down in place -- being extremely careful to place the each item along the edge "exactly" where they are on the original painting, so that when my "slice" is attached to the neighboring slice (on the left) the flowers, stamen, leaves and stems match up. I check and re-check placement as I'm working. Now - I am getting ready to lay in some white acrylic paint and some Tsukineko dark blue and black ink to highlight and outline. I use my really crappy brushes when I'm doing dry brush technique.

These cheap brushes (made in China) have long wooden handles and feel like they are made out of straw. I love them for dry brushing as the bristles stay separate and work really well for this technique.

Now comes the really fun part. I have selected several hues of blue, yellow and gold threads -- all types - rayon, cotton and silk. I use different types of thread because the way the light plays off of the different fibers (silk, cotton, rayon) adds to the texture of the piece.

LEARNING CURVE ITEM #1: I remember as a kid growing up in Ohio that every spring, our little white house was surrounded with tulips and gigantic iris. My mom loved tulips, iris and hiacynth. I remember those iris being all different shades of purple - from the lightest to the darkest, so, it naturally made sense that when I first began selecting fabrics, paints and threads for this project, I immediately went for the dark violets and purples. I went with what my "brain" told me an iris looked like rather than what Van Gogh's image of the iris was. Alas, I bought all the wrong colors. Worse yet -- I didn't even realize the colors were way off until after I had the first batch of flowers totally cut out. What I love about doing these slice quilts is that they take me far out of my comfort zone. I have to really stretch my abilities and sometimes that means doing and re-doing the same thing over and over again until I get it right. It also means that I really have to "see" things, and not just "look" at them -- and I think I'm slowly acquiring that skill. How cool is that!!!

Fractured Art Quilt - DONE

Dorothy just e-mailed me a picture of the fractured "gladioli" art quilt we've been working on -- and it's all put together. It's not quilted and bound yet -- but WOW did it fit together nicely. Isn't it hard to believe this is done in fabric, threadpainting and applique? Doesn't it look like a painting???? It's too bad you can't see the details -- because there are beads, metallic threads, three dimensional applique petals and other amazing embellishments on this. I will try to get a picture with my macro lense the next time I see Dorothy -- so you can see the amount of detail that went into this.

If you recall -- this was the art quilt that I posted about below wherein five artists each got a "slice" of a poster and did her own interpretation of that slice -- knowing that once complete, everyone's slice was going to be re-assembled into a final picture. This is such a cool concept and was so much fun.

My art quilt is next. I've selected Van Gogh's "Iris" painting and it's quite large - about 36" x 25". I have sliced mine up into five slices vertically with each slice about 6-7" wide. This should be really interesting because each artist basically has the same thing to reproduce and it will be fascinating to see how each one interprets Van Gogh's iris flowers and leaves.

I have been thinking about opening up this type of project to my blog friends. I'd like to find out if we can get five or six artists from around the world (or country) who may be interested -- to participate in a project such as this. I'll think more about that and post on it later.

Meanwhile - have a great Friday. Oh, and the dress -- it's done (wooohooo!!!)-- ironed, satin ribbon attached - and on it's way to the talent show as we speak. Pictures will be posted tomorrow.

Enjoy your day!!!