After part one of Prism Play, I’m sure you’ll be grateful that I have much less to say about the creation of this piece!

This piece was a testimony to trying new things. It was also a testimony to moving forward and not taking time to stew about it when things didn’t go the way I had conceived them in my head! Let me tell you, that is not my norm. Usually when I run up against stumbling blocks, I put the piece aside and think about it until a potential solution occurs to me. Actually, it’s probably more accurate to say that I think through multiple potential solutions so that I have backup plans in place in case the first several don’t work out! That has taken anywhere from two weeks to over seven years. I stay in my head a lot. Fairly unproductive! Working on changing that!

One fun aspect about this piece was having the opportunity to play more with Photoshop and add to my fairly minimal skills. I loved being able to use many of the texture photos I’d taken over the years for backgrounds. Altering the color of each of the squares, changing the shape and color of the found stick. Taking a photo of a stamp I’d carved and reproducing that in different sizes so that it ghosted through the sheer. 

This piece was just giving myself permission to play without overthinking it.

Again, closing with the artist statement:

Yellow is the color of hope, optimism and creativity. That is the theme of this piece. It made me continually ask “what if?” 

Yellow also shows up in nature to catch our eye. This stick caught my eye when I was on a walk. The lines, texture, and the way light played on the surface made me want to play with it in a “fun-house mirror” kind of way. What would happen if I started large and the image faded out and got smaller? Could I float the image? Did I want images ghosting through the piece? Could I mirror the twists and turns of the stick adding texture to the piece? This piece mimics the structure of nature along with the playfulness and sense of joy.

Interesting times call for interesting challenges! A regional call for art inspired the next two pieces I’ll be talking about. The call was for monochromatic pieces measuring 15 inches wide by 45 inches long. The accepted pieces will be displayed in prismatic groups. 

I signed up indicating that I was interested in making some pieces for this call and was assigned the colors red and yellow. I was sent color cards from the Ultimate 3-in-1 Color Tool by Joen Wolfrom. And then, the suffering began! This was truly difficult for me! No white, no black, only shades of the color you were assigned. The size and colors felt constrained and limiting at first. I started so many ideas that ultimately just weren’t suited to this format that I had to set aside for another day. In retrospect, I think it’s now one of my favorite sizes and really want to make other pieces with this aspect ratio!

Both of these pieces were challenges for me – primarily because I made them difficult!

I have a lot to say about my red piece, aptly named Seeing Red. 

This isn’t what I originally started working on. The original idea was one that just wasn’t suited to the size restrictions. Once I set that aside, I came up for air and was thinking about the protests that were happening during all of 2021 which led me to thinking about other protests and then to the history of protests in the United States. I totally fell down the rabbit hole in looking up all the protests/riots/marches that occurred since what we consider to be our nation’s original protest – the Boston Tea Party. 

I knew that I didn’t want to make up signs but wanted them to be historically accurate. That meant I needed to find actual pictures of the signs/flags/banners whether they were photographs or artist illustrations made to record the events – usually for newspapers. That was tricky! I wanted to try to represent signs from every decade but had to keep that as a guide, not an achievable goal. 

While researching signs, you could see that there were times when materials to make signs were scarce, so they were limited. Also, it seems to me that there was for a period of time almost an etiquette to some of the protest marches where the only signs or banners they carried were ones that looked professionally made. As disposable materials became more readily available, the signs started changing and definitely showed more individuality of expression.

While making list of possible protests, I was also looking up images of the Boston Tea Party that were copyright free. I found the perfect image at a site advertising a lecture from 2011 at the American Antiquarian Society in Massachusetts. The image was obviously from a book but was uncredited. I ended up contacting their associated library and their Library and Program Assistant Brianne Barrett was amazing. She looked through just about every book she could think of and then some with no luck. As we couldn’t determine the copyright status at that point, she offered me the use of two other images. Unfortunately, I’m stubborn and the other two just wouldn’t do. On a whim, I looked up the speaker from 2011 that this image was helping to advertise and was able to locate him. Benjamin Carp is an Associate Professor of American History at Brooklyn College. Amazingly, he responded within 30 minutes of receiving my email querying the origins of the piece. He told me that it was the frontispiece of Tea Leaves: Being a Collection of Letters and Documents relating to the Shipment of Tea… by Francis S. Drake written in 1884. No credit is given for the engraving used. It was in the public domain! I was then able to go back to the ever patient librarian and let her know where to find it. A week later, I had a glorious image from the library and was ready to go! I can’t thank these lovely people enough for helping me out for such a seemingly small thing!

The research and creation of each sign truthfully took an exorbitant amount of time that hardly merits this size of a piece, but it was fascinating and so worth it! I learned so much – some good and some incredibly sad. We as a nation have a long history of protesting, rioting, of destruction of personal property, and of violence against others in the name of keeping our country safe/pure/substitute whatever rationale you’d like here. Since 1773, not a decade has gone by without at least one racially motivated or anti-immigrant riot/protest/march. It seems like we should have progressed beyond this by now. 

A little about the color red and its link to the United States. Charles Thomson who was the Secretary of the Continental Congress talked about the colors chosen for the seal said that the red was for hardiness and valor. I think it’s more important to note that they deliberately chose the same colors that were in the Union Jack – the flag of England. In looking into why the Union Jack used the color red I found that the flag combines three separate flags. The red happens to be from the flag of St. George, the patron saint of England. The red cross on a white background was chosen to identify the English crusaders so the color red has a long history of being used to “march.” I just found that fascinating.

The gorgeous piece of gradient fabric was custom dyed for me by Vicki Welsh of Colorways. Her work is just stunning. I had sent her the red color card and we talked about the range of colors we wanted in this piece. I thank her so much for this great piece of fabric!

For those interested, here is the list of protests that are represented in this piece:

I’ll close with my official artist statement for the piece:

Red, the color of passion, anger, and sometimes blood. The United States began with the Boston Tea Party and we continue to protest, riot, and march down the long road of time to make our voices heard and to effect change. Beginning with one ship, there are 506 signs, flags, and banners selected from 51 marches/protests/riots spanning 248 years.

As a nation and a textile, these are imperfectly woven together with frayed edges and loose threads. As citizens, we fight the same fights year after year with seemingly very little improvement. Since the Boston Tea Party, no decade has gone by without one or more anti-immigrant and racially motivated protests/riots. The protests often involved violence, destruction of property and personal violence. 

Red also can symbolize love. That gives me hope that someday we can do better.

Once again, it’s been a long time between posts! Like everyone else, the lockdown has been making me assess the way I approach everything and I’ve been learning how to focus on what’s important day to day. With restrictions slowly lifting, a few nice things have been happening and I want to let you know about them. 

On the Other Side, one of my more recent quilts, was accepted into Quilt National ’21. It’s currently on display at The Dairy Barn Arts Center, an amazing center and gallery in Athens, Ohio. Quilt National will be on display until September 6^th and then will be touring various parts of the country. Keep an eye out as it’s well worth viewing these amazing pieces in person. 

Along with that, many of the artists being shown in Quilt National have artist talks available on YouTube. You can view mine by clicking the link. I give the background of the quilt, the naming story, and the button/bead count. Always fun to know! Each of the artists talks about their piece in the show and their creative process. Most are approximately 5-6 minutes long and well worth the time!

One more thing coming up with Quilt National are the Artist Talks, Q&A Sessions being held each Friday from 11am – 12:30pm EDT. Preregistration is required and it is free to register! (Although a donation is requested.) I’m scheduled to be part of a group of four artists to answer questions on July 16^th. Click on the link above for more information and to register.

On June 24^th through September 19^th, my piece Liberty Marches will be part of Art Quilts 2 on display at the California Heritage Museum in Santa Monica, California. If you’re in the area, the museum is open Wednesday through Sunday from 11am – 4pm and admission is free on Fridays.

I’ve been slowly trying to work on my website. One addition I’ve made is asking people to sign up for updates. If you follow me at all, you know I don’t post that often, and this new addition will only send you emails if and when I post something new. Make sure you don’t miss any! Go to my website and sign up! (Thank you in advance!)

Work on some new pieces is proceeding (slowly). Hopefully, progress photos will be posted in the future!

Another year, another author’s day at my friend Amy the librarian’s elementary school! I’ve mentioned her before in the March 14, 2017 and the November 2, 2017 blog. She’s an amazing person and an incredible resource for very special books and authors!

Last year as she was just starting to think about potential authors to invite, she mentioned really wanting Katherine Applegate to come and speak but didn’t’ think it was going to be possible. I admitted that I had no idea who she was talking about and shortly after that breakfast, I had two books delivered to me – The One and Only Ivanand Wishtree.  Being the procrastinator that I am, I put them on the pile of books to read by my bed and there they sat. Amy had told me that much to her delight Katherine had agreed to come to the school. That jogged my memory but still the borrowed books sat. The holidays came and went and the new year began and I remembered those books with just a bit of embarrassment (sometimes Amy is far too forgiving and patient). I finally pulled out Wishtreeand couldn’t put it down. It’s a very special book. 

For author’s day, a 15” by 15” art piece is created celebrating one of the visiting author’s books and the author signs the piece commemorating the visit. The framed pieces are hung in this beautiful library. I called Amy as soon as I had finished the book and asked if I could do the artwork for the book. She said yes! More accurately, I believe I said, “That book is mine!”

If you haven’t read the book yet, stop here, go get the book, read it and then come back to this!

If you’ve read this, read on and I’ll tell you a bit about the piece.

I chose an image of a red oak that felt sheltering and protected. Red shelters and protects the animals, humans, and history for his neighborhood. With Amy’s help, some of her students created the cards along with some of my friends and family. Those were put onto the branches using Photoshop. I wanted the image to be in daylight – things coming to light, exposed. I decided to print this out on two colors of fabric and sew it together using the traditional block called crossroads. This particular block was thought to have been used in the Underground Railroad to signify Cleveland, Ohio which was one of the main crossroads with many routes to freedom. I also love the definition of crossroads and how it pertains to this book – reaching a turning point where a choice has to be made. I had to give a nod to Red’s best friend Bongo on the mat. I took a photo of a crow from my husband (Curt Bianchi) and made a screen print. 

When I met Katherine at author’s day, I became every bit a fan-girl and hopefully didn’t embarrass myself too badly! She was absolutely lovely and really liked the piece! Woo hoo!

Rest assured, I did read the other book and have returned it. I now have a stack of all Katherine Applegate’s other books on the top of the pile next to my bed! She has officially joined my shortlist of author’s works not to be missed!

Last month our quilt association decided to have “Summer Camp” instead of their usual meeting. They asked seven members to repeat 18 minute presentations four times each as the membership walked from station to station. I was lucky enough to be one of the presenters and demonstrated how to use tissue paper in art quilts.

I started using tissue paper in 2014 when I made Sunflower Pilgrimage. It seemed the perfect way to print the fractured sunflower and then fuse the sections to different colored fabrics to mimic different exposures of the image.

I had been inspired by seeing Annie Leibovitz’s Pilgrimage exhibition. I love her layered photos and the one that really knocks me out every time I see it is the photograph of Marian Anderson’s gown that she wore when she sang on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in 1939. I mean, wow. Just wow

The translucency of the tissue paper and what color fabric you put it on has the power to change the photo – making the image crisp and clear to subtly diffusing it. I also love the texture it adds to the quilts. It makes it look a little like leather without being heavy.

After the sunflower, I followed up in fairly quick succession using it in If One a Day is Good… for the apples, I’m Flying… for the ride structure, and Along the Forest Trail for the Columbia windflowers.

I’ve also used it to make postcards out of public domain vintage images online. Very nice for holiday cards!

Four years later and the opportunity to share tissue paper insanity with my quilt association gave me a reason to return to it and make some more samples while exploring some new possibilities on how to use it. That led to three small pieces.

Circuitous Path was made by taking a photo and running it through an App. I wanted people to see what can happen with a saturated image on four different colors of fabric. The two images side by side tell you which image is fused to which fabric – very subtle differences. I had to come up with a way to join these four sections without them being too close to each other because in using this technique, there is no way the edges easily match up. The nice side effect of separating the four pieces slightly is that your eye corrects for any imperfections.

Still Life was created by applying Inktense inks to the tissue paper and then collaging it to make a simple image. I like that you can get an intensity of color with the inks and yet it still retains a translucency.

The seed pods piece is still in progress. I ran a photo through an App and then played with it in Photoshop. I also played with applying watercolor to the tissue paper before printing on it. I really like how the collaged background shows through the torn edged tissue paper while it floats in the middle. I also ended up putting water color on the fabric background.

That, so far, is the history of my tissue paper journey! Hope you enjoyed it and really hope that you start including other materials in your quilts just because you can and it’s fun!

This is way after the fact, but I was thrilled to be selected for first ever artist member show at the San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textiles last fall entitled Juncture.

When presented with some challenges (all right, MOST challenges), ideas are slow to evolve. I was really having trouble coming to a satisfactory idea. My husband and I were on our way to a Giants game in San Francisco when I looked up and saw all of these wonderful connecting cables for the electric trolleys that run in the city. Talk about junctures! I grabbed my phone and quickly snapped a few photos before the light changed. Let’s face it, not a particularly good photo, but enough to work with!

With some judicious cropping, removing the background and then playing with color to emphasize some of the interconnecting lines, I printed the image onto the fabric. I liked the idea of giving the colored sections a little depth and decided to paint harsh shadows onto the piece with Shiva paint sticks. Finish the piece off with some quilting that gave the feeling of tension – of being pulled in many directions, and I was almost there.

With approximately an hour and a half until the entry deadline, I was putting the binding on. I decided to glue baste so that I could get the pictures taken and sent in. Piece of cake, right? Evidently my brain decided to take a holiday and I forgot how to do binding. A frightening mess ensued and I ended up having to cut and glue the corners to make it “look” acceptable in the photos and just send them in THEN rip it all out and finish it correctly – all done the next day when I was somewhat sane again. Frightening how the simple things can defeat you sometimes! In any case, this is my piece Choices.

After taking a bit of a hiatus from posting anything new, I’m back! I’ve created a few new things over the past six months or so that I’ll be getting around to posting slowly! Life of late has been more focused on family, but I’m still finding time here and there for artistic pursuits!

One of the more recent quilts is Seaside Succulent. A friend of mine moved to Aptos last year and a visit to her led to walking around her new neighborhood. Being a succulent junky, I fell in love with a bed of them near a beachside cliff. I loved the colors and took tons of photos! None of the photos were fabulous, but with some judicious cropping, rotating, and color adjustments, I really like the final image. Hope you do, too!

I had taken a fair amount of progress shots while working on it and decided to give an animated GIF a try – don’t get motion sick from watching it!

I’m currently in the process of trying to replace those negative voices in my head that tell me I can’t do things and that I’m not good enough with those voices that will cheer me on…loudly! I recently had one of those moments when a friend cheered for me in such a moving way, I was reminded that she needs to be one of the primary voices in my head! Here’s the story.

I’ve written before of my quilt Liberty Marches. It recently came to the Bay Area with the rest of the Threads of Resistance exhibit at the Pacific International Quilt Festival. A dear friend who is a fan of this quilt came to the show to see it in person as well as all the other quilts in the exhibit. We marched together at the San Jose Women’s March so it is especially meaningful to both of us. She wanted to surprise me the next day with a trip to a bookstore for a book signing, but I was still working the quilt show and couldn’t make it. The other morning at breakfast I was presented with a signed book, complete notes and photos from the book signing, along with a moving letter from her.

The book is freaking amazing and I highly encourage everyone within hearing distance to GO GET A COPY!!! It’s a children’s book entitled Her Right Foot by Dave Eggers with art by Shawn Harris. And, yes, it’s about the Statue of Liberty!!!! I’m not sure I can adequately tell you how much I love this book!

What’s even better is that is that both the author and artist signed the book telling me that my quilt was beautiful, inspiring, and incredible – kind of nice to hear, but my response was, “What did you do?” This lovely librarian friend went armed to the book signing with images and the write-up of my quilt for each of them as well as other copies “just in case” and handed out those, too.

Who does that? I’ll tell you – someone who is passionate, supportive and loving! She promoted me the way she promotes a book or an author that she knows is special – by telling everyone she knows and giving the book to as many people as she can! She has a faith and a commitment to what moves her that is inspiring and I’m incredibly grateful for it! Not only for her support of me and my work, but, my God, she’s turned me on to so many amazing books and authors!

Thank you, dear friend! You are now officially the leader of the voices in my head!

As the catalog for the touring exhibit Threads of Resistance came out recently (available at Amazon), I thought I’d give you a little background on my piece Liberty Marches that’s included in the book and exhibit.

I heard about a call for fiber art started by a group of artists I really admire called The Artist Circle. Threads of Resistance was their idea for a touring exhibition of fiber art that reflects artists’ viewpoints in response to the 45^th president. I knew I wanted to participate.

Trying to process the results of the election and what that said to me about our country was a difficult time for me. A friend was trying to process her feelings as well and put her hopes and wishes for peace into a quilt. I decided I needed to do some art therapy as well, but was in too dark a place and couldn’t think of an idea for a piece that I wanted to work on. And then came the Women’s March on January 21^st.

My husband Curt and I thought it was important to attend our local march. We connected up with groups of people we knew – people from up north that we had worked on a campaign with, friends and neighbors, fellow League of Women Voters members, quilting and museum friends. We were part of the 25,000 that marched in San Jose that day. It was a day filled with positive energy – peaceful, loving, and determined to advocate for civil liberties. I got home from the march and the ideas started to come!

Now, for the ridiculous part of creating anything – those unrelenting voices that tell you, “If it was a good idea, someone else will have already come up with it and will do it better than you ever could.” I managed to just let the voices wail and “nevertheless,… persisted!”

I found a public domain image of the Statue of Liberty and then, after altering it slightly, used Photoshop to tattoo her with replications of over 100 Women’s March signs that were carried around the world. I learned even more about Photoshop doing this project! Harking back to the skills we used in grammar school, the idea of weaving this image appealed to me from how it would look as well how it reflected on the meaning I was trying to convey.

I had four shades of gray fabric in mind for the printing and when I went to treat the fabric to prepare it for printing, I discovered there wasn’t anywhere close to the amount I needed. Argh!!! I whipped out the computer and did a search for gradient gray fabric, and in less than five minutes I found a gorgeous piece with the quantity I needed to print the image twice. I wanted it to be gray, both to refer to the gray winter morning on January 21^st and to have her marching into the darkening sky. I found this piece dyed by Vicki Welsh that is perfection.

The printing was challenging this time as I had to try a new heavier freezer paper to stabilize the fabric due to the length of the strips I needed instead of the cardstock I normally use. After some frustrating attempts (and my husband’s help) it worked.

A friend pointed me towards looking at some bargello quilts to get some ideas on cutting the widths of the strips to weave. A great idea! While looking nothing like a bargello quilt, varying the widths of the strips gave me the movement I needed in the finished piece.

To finish this off, here’s the artist statement for Liberty Marches (also written with the help of my husband and a friend):

On January 21^st, 2017 the Women’s March took place around the world in protest of the character and policies of the 45^th president of the United States of America. Women and men marched in support of many issues including liberty for all human beings.

 The symbol of our country’s freedom commonly known as the Statue of Liberty is actually entitled Liberty Enlightening the World. Libertas carries a torch in her right hand lighting the way forward, a tablet in her left inscribed with the date of our declared independence, and a broken chain at her feet symbolizing abolition.

 I imagine her on January 21^st wanting to march but knowing how much more important it is to hold high the symbols of freedom. She invites over 100 marchers from all over the world to make the signs they march with a part of her. Emblazoned with their words, she re-enlightens the world.

 We can help. The fabric of liberty is imperfectly woven together. Sometimes it frays and unravels and hangs by a thread. We can strengthen the cloth. Working together, marching together, we are liberty.

 Be sure to check out the tour dates and locations near you!

So much going on but, instead of trying to jam it into one rambling, lengthy post, I’ll spread it out over a few days and make this a rambling, lengthy post about one topic!

The quilt I’m sharing with you today is the latest of my quilt mosaics entitled Morning Light. This is another close-up of a succulent – an echeveria – one of my absolute favorites! I love the ruffles, the undulating lines, the deep shadows, and brightly lit edges. It’s from an early morning picture and the colors make me happy.

Morning Light was a commission piece that was a dream from beginning to end. I received an inquiry at the end of last year asking if I’d make a piece for a family. I said that I would be interested and that we would talk after the first of the year. I asked that they think about size, subject matter, color preferences, etc. – all the normal stuff. We picked our date in January and talked after the holiday craziness had calmed a bit. The conversation was one of those wonderful, easy connections you make with people sometimes. I was entrusted with information about the family that gave me a sense of who they all were and I felt a real emotional connection to each of them. After a bit, I was told that they had decided they wanted me to choose the subject matter and color scheme. They wanted it to be truly from me.

Talk about nerves hitting. I played around with a few ideas and images. But this is the one I kept coming back to. So with a due date of May 31^st, I started.

Some painting and some dying of buttons did happen, along with a little more purchasing but more than that, I thought about each member of the family while I was sewing. I felt like they were involved with its creation. This quilt actually debuted (unfinished though it was) at the Santa Clara Valley Quilt Association’s biannual quilt show where I was one of the two featured quilters (Mel Beach was the other). I got to share my process and even had some kids help lay out buttons.

In spite of going to an out of town conference and a family reunion trip to celebrate my mom’s 90^th birthday, I managed to finish the piece and have my husband Curt photograph it for me.

Now the nerves truly kicked in. I sent the photo off to the family and had to wait for approval. They did approve it and I sent it off, still a bundle of nerves wondering what their reaction would be to the piece face to face.

I knew it had been delivered, but didn’t hear from them until Saturday. It was received in a way that was beyond my expectations and I was and still am so moved. The one line I’ll share with you, “I told my kids that this is our family heirloom.” I can’t express how honored and incredibly grateful I am that they let me create something for them! What a wonderful family and a wonderful experience.