El Anatsui, part 3

This part of the exhibit was a complete surprise to me.  At first we all thought that it was paper mache using newspapers, but we found out that they were discarded aluminum printing plates used to print all kinds of media, such as newspaper sports, political and obituary pages to wedding invitations.

The bag form resembles the large woven bags that Ghanian refugees used to pack their belongings to return home from Nigeria.


         

This shot gives you a sense of the scale.  They were quite large.

Here you can read some of the print.

And that's the end of this report.  As I said before, it's an incredible exhibit. Go if you if possibly can.

El Anatsui part 2

While Anatsui's metal wall art is spectacular, he also does smaller wooden pieces.  I wasn't expecting to like them as much as I did.  His strips of wood are hung on a slat and can be moved around and interchanged to give many different designs. Of course, they reminded me of quilts.  I'm still working on my skinny, wiggly strips on and off and could see myself arranging them like these, especially the second and fourth ones.

These are just a sampling.  There were several more.

El Anatsui

This week my FiberWorks group took a day trip to the Brooklyn Museum of Art to see the El Anatsui exhibit.  I had seen a smaller exhibit of his a couple of years ago at the Clark Museum and I was blown away, so when I heard of this exhibit I knew it was a must-see. He is an African artist who makes art out of what would normally be thrown away, such as metal strips from around the necks of liquor bottles and the lids from tin cans.  It is hard to believe that this is what he uses until you get up close and see that you can actually read the writing on the strips.

 

When you walked into the exhibit space, you were greeted by these see-thru pieces that hung from the ceiling, which was about 2 stories high.  It was breathtaking.

This piece was enormous, you can see how it goes from floor to ceiling.

Detail from above piece.




This blue and silver piece was stunning.  See how some of the blue spills onto the floor

         I loved the drapes and fold in this huge red piece.

Detail from above piece.

                 

                             This piece was so big that it wrapped around the corner.

             

He did several floor pieces made out the lids from tin cans of milk, Peak brand, and some of the pieces were named  "Peak".

   

These pieces could be displayed at the whim of the curators. We decided that this tubular arrangement would have been better if the tubes had undulated.

I loved the way the pieces draped and folded just like fabric.  But this "fabric" was made from metal strips, with holes punched and joined together with little pieces of wire.

There were three different videos showing his staff at work.  I found them to be fascinating and it took 

some of the mystery out of his creations.  If you go to the exhibit, be sure to watch all three.

The Brooklyn Museum of Art is a wonderful museum with five floors housing many, many exhibits and fabulous permanent collections including Judy Chicago's famous piece, "The Dinner Party". You can read more about the El Anatsui exhibit here. Be sure to watch the first video about how some of the installations were done.

       

It would be hard to choose a favorite, but this might be it.  You would swear that it was made from bronze, but it was just all black labels with touches of red.  Amazing!

The exhibit is there until August 3, so if you live anywhere within driving distance, you must go.  We drove about 2 hours each way and it was well worth it.  We also enjoyed the Joh Singer Sargent watercolor exhibit, which will be there until July 28.

Be sure to click on any picture for a bigger view of all.

Texture Magic, One More Time

One of the comments  on my last blog suggested that I try it with wool batting and I did.  The results were much better.  To make it a fair test, I used the same design, the same fabric and the same thread.
   

I think it definitely looks better and is much softer.  Of course it would have looked even better without the pink thread.  What do you think?  Does this have possibilities?  I'll have to try it on a piece of red silk.

Texture Magic

I bought this product, Texture Magic, a few years ago at a quilt show.  It seemed like a good idea at the time even though it was a bit pricey. You pin it to the back of your fabric,with or without batting, stitch, then steam from the back and it pulls up and give you texture, lots of it. It has been languishing on my pegboard and this project seemed like the perfect time to use it.

     

Here is my design drawn on the back with a layer of cotton batting between the magic and the silk Dupioni. You sew from the back.

         

This is how it looked from the front before steaming.  I used pink thread in the bobbin.

And this is what it looks like after steaming.  It shrinks by 30%.  I was so disappointed with the look.  It just looks like a bunch of puckers and you can't see the design at all.


     

So I tried the same design without batting.  I still don't like it at all.


     

This is just plain FM quilting with Hobb's wool batting. I like this so much better,  I will not use this design on the quilt, but will be using red silk again, although a different shade.  What I like about the wool is that it gives a lot of depth.  Whatever you don't quilt down really puffs up, almost as if you had used trapunto.  I have some designs in mind that should work well.

I haven't completely given up on Trapunto Magic, I just won't use it on this project.  I think it might work well in a purse.

More Texture

I read about this technique quite awhile ago on the And Then We Set It On Fire blog.  You wrap something round like marbles, as I used, or buttons or stones in polyester fabric.  It must be polyester. I used polyester Satin from Joannes's.  After making your cluster of marbles you put them in boiling water and boil for 30 minutes.  Then you take them out of the boiling water and plunge them into a bowl of ice water with lots of ice.  Take them out of the water when they are completely cool and unwrap the marbles. The fabric will keep the shape.

On the first try I used heavy red thread and that was difficult to work with.  On the next few I used string, better but it still had its issues.  I was told to try dental floss, that it holds tight and doesn't slip. If I decide to do anymore that's what I will use.

I'm not sure how or if I will use them in my red texture piece I'm working on.  I'm thinking of trimming away or tucking under the background and just using the balls like bunches of grapes.  It was fun to try even if I don't use them.

French Knots

I'm still working on the silk piece.  I tried stitching those circles I talked about in the last post, but they looked terrible.  Not sure why, maybe it was the silk, so I decided to try French Knots running along the outside row of each double-needle section.  I had some rayon embroidery thread that I loved for it's silky sheen, but it is nearly impossible to work with.  I wanted to make the knots big, so I was using six strands of floss and then I just couldn't pull it through the fabric.  I tried splitting the thread into three strands and doubling it, but trying to separate the strand was a nightmare.  Tangle, tangle, snarl, snarl.  So I switched to cotton.

        

I also tried different colors, knowing that the red wouldn't show up that much against the red silk. I tried black, purple, orange and turquoise, thinking that I might use those colors elsewhere in the quilt, but none of them looked right and I stuck with the red.

 I took this picture with my iPhone and the color came out very purple.  I tried adjusting it in Photoshop Elements, but every time I went to resize it, the color correction would disappear and go back to the purple. I finally fiddled with the color in iPhoto before taking it into Elements.  I recently bought the latest version of Photoshop Elements and I'm having so much trouble with it.  My old version 4 was so much easier to use, but this new laptop won't support it.  I have signed up for the  One on One lessons with Mac and they are terrific and a fabulous bargain, but they only work with their products and Photoshop is not one of them.  I have to look for a Photoshop teacher.

Texture

In between gardening and getting the deck ready for summer, I've been doing a little sewing.  My FiberWorks group's challenge for the year is Texture.  I've been thinking about it a lot and keep changing my mind about what to do. A few years ago while making a tree trunk for a piece, I used a double needle on brown fabric backed with flannel.  I used a fairly narrow double needle and after stitching I washed it in hot water and put it in a hot dryer and liked the texture I achieved.

For this piece I used a piece of red Duponi silk backed with cotton batting.  This time I used a double needle that had the needles 1/4" apart.  I was thrilled with the results.  It looks like I have cording in it, but I don't.  I did four strips of stitching on the one big piece of silk, thinking that I would cut them apart and piece them into other fabrics. Now I'm not so sure.  I like the look of it as a whole piece.  Since our finished work is to be 30 inches square and this piece measures about 23 x 19, this would take up a major portion.

This picture shows it redder that it is, but it gives you an idea of how the silk shimmers and shines

This is more true to the color.

And here is a detail. I used two different shades of red thread for the stitching.

This is how it looks from the back.  There is no zig-zag involved.  You stitch with a straight stitch, but since there are two threads on top, the bobbin thread zigs and zags to catch both threads.

I'm not sure what I want to do in the blank spaces.  I used this technique last year on a quilt and I really liked it.  I used heavy jean's stitch thread and think that I may try this on the red, but I'll make some practice runs first.

Be sure to click on any picture for a bigger view of all.

Quilt National

This past weekend I spent in Athens, OH with three friends attending the opening of Quilt National, the Holy Grail, the Mount Everest, the US Open, the Grand National, the creme de la creme of art quilters everywhere.  I have been several times before and it is always an awe inspiring event for me.  This year there were 85 quilts chosen from the 850 entered, sort of like trying to get into Harvard. I have only entered twice and was rejected twice.  I spoke to Charlotte Ziebarth, who finally got in this year after 9 rejections.  That's 18 years of trying since it is only held every other year.  She got the "Persistence Pays" award for the person who finally gets in after trying the longest.

We usually go in the middle of summer and are in the gallery almost all by ourselves. I wondered if we would enjoy it as much with the throngs of people who were in attendance. We did!  It was wonderful talking to the artists and hearing the inside information on how or why they made their piece. We were also there for the SAQA conference where we got to hear from the jurors and their insight as to why they chose what they did.  And we had plenty of time between talks to go back and look at the art up close and personal.

I didn't think that photos were allowed so I didn't even bring a camera, but people were snapping away left and right. So I got out my iPhone and joined the crowd.  Since I had purchased the catalog, I mostly took details.  My FiberWorks group's challenge for this year is "texture" so I was interested to see how other artists achieved that goal and that is mostly what I took.

 I was fascinated by Deirdre Adam's quilt, Tracings III, which was painted after it was quilted.  This is a technique I had tried before and now after seeing hers I know I want to do some more.

Detail of Tracngs III

I was mesmerized by Paula Kovarik's  "Round and Round It Goes" on which she did the most incredible stitching on a round cotton tablecloth.

I took several detail shots.  It was one of those quilts that you could look at all day and keep discovering new things. What an imagination and impeccable stitching!

Brienne Elizabeth Brown's, Moonset was of a similar vein in which she did fabulous stitching on silk. the silk was the same color throughout, but she changed thread color very effectively to demarcate the circle and the band below.

Detail of Moonset  Look at all the critters and creatures.

The texture in Luanne Rimel's "Enigma with a Flower" was brought about by hand stitching.

Detail

                                       

I only have a detail shot of Charlotte Ziebarth's "Reverberations: Yellowstone Waters". What wonderful texture!

                             

Shin-heee Chin's "Florence Nightingale" won "The Most Innovative Use of the Medium" award.  It was made from coiled fabric and paper tubing using basket making techniques. It was amazing!



                             

                                                     

Detail of "Florence Nightingale"

.

I don't have a full picture of this Best of Show winner by Brooke A. Atherton, "Springfield", which was texture to the extreme.  She used maps, glass, found objects and much much more to achieve her goal.  It was a very large quilt at 97 inches wide. There was so much going on, that I could have taken dozens of pictures.  I just show you two here.

I was going to show you some more, but I'm getting tired of writing and you are probably getting tired of reading.  Suffice it to say that it was a wonderful show.  Get the catalog to see all the quilts.  Of course it's nothing like seeing it in person and QN is open all summer.  Go if you can.