Painting WINTER in the heat of Summer

The final chapter in the series of annual "Season" art quilts touring exhibition is here to get to creating. Having now lived in the mountains of California for almost 5 years, I have become well versed in the challenges and length of living with winters with ice and snow, and seemingly never ending COLD! This exhibit launches tour annually at Road To California (Jan. 2012)
That said, in this years exhibition I chose to do something that represented that. I can't possibly imagine the challenges wildlife face living IN the weather with little to no shelter. I honor their strength and tenacity. I begin with a winter sparrow drawing placed beneath sheer white fabric (I like Hoffman's pattern 1377) because it is high thread count with skinny individual threads permitting me to easily see my drawing underneath.

I'm no different than most artists. Before I begin, I am a mixture of anxiety and anticipation. Paintings don't start themselves, so I begin with all those feelings carefully tip toeing into the most important parts... the birds head and eyes.

This is a near monochromatic palette... mostly grey, soft brown, near black... and value becomes critical. the upper part of the body almost feels like a paint by number effort to start. Once segments of darks were placed, a softer mid value dry wash was added atop.

The breast and lower body is soft short feathers and are represented with short and limited brush strokes. A wee bit of light value additional color (blue/yellow)is added for interest. Artists get to do that!!

So we have the birdie... but still have to represent the snow and nature which surrounds the sweet sparrow.

Textures on The ROAD surface

I love the versatility of these inks. Amongst other options, is the ability to use textured surfaces beneath fabric and do rubbings. I use anything I can find that creates the texture I want. While commercial rubbing plates will most often do the trick, sometimes 'found' surfaces do the trick. Here, I'm 'auditioning rubbing surfaces...

For this project, a sanding disc from the hardware store provided the texture I desired.

With the road previously ink'd in a cool gray and heat set with a dry cotton setting iron, I applied a dry brush rubbing in black. Always a bit of tweaking... but here's the end result yet to be quilted at home.

Please, check out the link on this exhibit..there are lots of preapproved for use photos included. We'd love to have you participate. Click here.

In Celebration

Of our country's independence and beginning in 1776...

Have a great day all and God Bless America.... Land That I Love!!!!!

Now looking UP

Who can go to Chicago without looking at the infamous Sears Tower... This tower stands 1454 feet tall ( 110 stories), houses 200 foot high antennas atop, and weighs 445 million pounds ( geez I don't feel so bad.) It held the world's tallest building reputation until the late 1990s. If you've ever been on the elevator that takes you to the top, you'll never forget it. It's FAST!

Honoring "THE LION" at the door

Then to add one of my favorite places on earth... The Chicago Art Institute flanked at the entrance by 2 spectacular lion sculptures... one added here. I chose this image of the lion because at this angle, he stands so proud, seemingly looking off in the distance, perhaps down the Mother Road. The patina on this animal is both an attention grabber and fresh. It's the way he is in reality!

Starting The Route

Some of you may know I am co curating an exciting traveling exhibit (just announced... see the link on top left or click here to go to http://www.route66quilts.blogspot.com . Check it out, you may want to play.. (We hope so!) It's time to honor Main Street U.S.A. otherwise known as "The Mother Road- Route 66" This exhibit will include 24" x 30" portrait or landscape orientation art quilt interpretations of sites along the historic route. First things first for me.. I needed to create the beginning ( Chicago, Illinois), while my co curator will create the ending ( Santa Monica, California) and participants get open range for spots along the 8 state route. The quilts are small enough not to make anyone crazy so let's get started.
You may have read previous, I am in Mexico at present. It's my annual journey to 'mecca' so to speak. I create drawings in advance, have the print shop enlarge them to desired size, and pack a suitcase full of art supplies including my inks, fabric, reference photos , etc.

Traveling with inks is easy and compact. Ink bottle lids insured to be 'tight' before packing into a hard plastic case...the case placed inside a plastic bag (as insurance).. bag taped shut and into checked baggage. In years of doing this, I've never had a spill. YEAH!

A few brand new bottles to be opened by finger tip release of plastic covering at perferated (?sp) tab on the bottom of the bottle.

Please...never use scissors or the like to remove the plastic... too easy to puncture the lightweight plastic bottle containing ink.

Use a sharpie to write on the cap the number of the ink. ( It's shown on the front of the bottle.) Do the same numbering on a clean blank fantastix and you're ready to go with the inks.

Next getting the drawing ready ... with plastic covering the work table ( as insurance the ink doesn't bleed thru to the mexican marble table, and off we go.

This process always starts slow... This image will include three points of interest in the beginning city of the historic highway beginning with... Wrigley Field ( home of the beloved Chicago Cubs baseball team) This being a more graphic piece, I'll use some fabric markers in addition to inks,

It will take a couple hours of painting for this to begin to take shape. The Cubs are loved by the entire nation. There is something special about this team, their undying spirit having fought for a World Series win for decades. I was ofcourse using a reference photo of the stadium, but chose to substitute the final score shown on the scoreboard with that of the clubs long ago world series win in 1908.

Lots of Cabo Projects

Hola all. We all have a bunch of UFOs as well as NEW stuff we want to start. We sometimes call this longevity insurance as we need decades to get to what we want done. When projects are not my favs... I try at least to learn something creating value for the effort. This one is a shared work block for a friend. Needle turn applique. I CAN do it but remember, I'm primarily a painter/quilter. This block a traditional flower basket where the originator provided the pattern, background and flower pot, with directions for participants to select flower and leaf fabrics. Given all were selected at the 11th hour when packing for this out of country trip, I think I did okay on flower fabric selections. I had very interesting varied green fabric for leaves and reread instructions here to require solid fabrics for green leaves. GOOD THING I had my inks with me. I had to make green fabrics using my plain white PFD as a base fabric. Seams it worked out fine.

A couple high fives for 2 new to me tools. While many of us have used glue sticks for holding applique pieces in place while needle turning, I must thank my friend Phyllis for turning me on to Sewlines new fabric glue pen. It's a small circumference glue stick in pen-like form. Easy to work with!

This glue goes on blue, dries clear, and is water soluble. IT's great! You'll note a strange looking toothpick in the above photo. Most appliquers have long known about the value of a toothpick in turning under the loose edge prior to applique...

The joy of the one in the picture is that it has a small bead on one end oddly enough making it much easier to hold and turn under fabric edges. This one came from a friends family in Turkey... but it wouldn't be a big deal to slide on a bead on a regular round toothpick.
I am so glad I brought my silk thread collection too. Much easier to hide stitches using skinny silk thread Yeah.. DONE! Now to move on.