An Art Quilt That Keeps On Giving

In 2001, I made an art quilt I named Dunescape. Dunescape is 43" x 53" in size.

I entered this quilt in our local Crystal Coast Quilters Guild annual show, and it won Viewer's Choice that year. It now hangs on the wall in our bedroom, and it's the first thing I see every morning.

In March 2008, I started two online shops at Etsy. (There are links to my shops on the right side of this page.) Paper Press contains notecards made from my artwork, including my art quilts. Dunescape is featured in one of the notecards, full-sized (without the border), and in another card that features a detail of the quilt. Since I cropped the picture of the art quilt to get the detail image, I decided to "crop" the name of the quilt too, and the name went from "Dunescape" to "Dunes." I also included Dunes in a notecard set, By the Sea, with four other beach-related images.

My second Etsy shop features my art quilts, and a wide variety of colorful ACEOs (Art Cards, Editions & Originals) and prints with images from my fiber art, paintings, and photographs. Dunes is an ACEO in that shop.

One might think that would be enough exposure for the poor quilt, but I just drafted it for a Reader Challenge at one of my favorite magazines, Cloth, Paper, Scissors. The theme for the contest is "Life's a Beach"! How could I pass that up?

For the Reader Challenge, I had to actually create a new piece of work to submit. Since there are size limits for the challenge, I decided to make a small art quilt and mount it on a painted 8"x10" gallery-wrapped canvas. I started this project by printing out Dunes onto a piece of cotton fabric, using my inkjet printer. I made a quilt sandwich and added new nubby fabrics in the sand and dunes areas. After the piece was quilted, I mounted it on the painted canvas. Then I embellished it with lace, yarn, guinea fowl feathers and reindeer moss. Here's a picture of the final project. (Click on the image to see an enlarged version.)


If you compare it to the photos above, you'll see that the main differences are in the embellishments.

Now maybe Dunescape itself can take a break and just rest on my bedroom wall for a while!

Weaving Fabrics for Art Quilts

Butterfly Garden

The idea of weaving strips of fabric together to make backgrounds for art quilts intrigued me. The first art quilt I constructed with this method was Butterfly Garden, which I made in 1999.

The two shades of green in the background are hand-dyed batik fabrics which I cut into strips and wove together. The technique is to cut one of the fabrics into vertical strips and the other fabric into horizonal strips. I made a point of cutting curved strips because, surprisingly, they weave together beautifully and are more interesting than straight cuts. I used silk flowers, bumblebees, and frogs to embellish this art quilt. Here's a detail image from Butterfly Garden. You can click on any of my images to see an enlarged version.

This technique of weaving fabric strips was also used in "Purple Flowers" (2003), and for the clothing in "Picasso's Harlequin" (2000).

Purple Flowers

This was an interesting art quilt to do because it started out to be a watery landscape. (Don't ask!) It began with a blue and pink batik fabric. I sliced that fabric into vertical strips and wove it with two other fabrics - cut into horizontal strips - a pink batik on the top half, and an aqua batik on the bottom half of the background.

If you look at the detail picture, you'll have a close-up view of the flowers I used. As I was cutting them out of the fabric they were printed on, I noticed that what I had left over was also shaped like a flower, but in the negative. That was intriguing, and that was when I decided to try for a vase of flowers instead of that watery landscape. I fused on leaves from another fabric, and finished the quilt with some buttons for the centers of a few of the "negative" flowers.

Picasso's Harlequin

This quilt is an adaptation of the Picasso painting. Old clothing from the thrift shop was used for the fabrics. The harlequin's outfit was made from strips of two fabrics that were woven together. The figure was constructed separately and then attached to the background. The pieces of lace were the cuffs and collar of an old blouse. The "hair" is from a black velvet bolero jacket.

I enjoyed weaving fabrics for these art quilts, and was really pleased with the effect produced. May do it again sometime!