March 2008

Another meeting and more pictures.

Christine Marcum - Road Rage

Dianna Callahan -Sharing

Lilly Kerns - Sunbonnet Su: Extreme Makeover

Lucy Silliman - Interweave

 Lucy Silliman - Lionfish

Maureen Ashlock - Summer Spendor

Add comment March 23rd, 2008

Lettie Blackburn’s Trees

Yesterday I was at the Driskill Gallery taking down my show, when Lettie Blackburn started to bring in her new work for her solo show that opens tonight. Her newest piece is very dense, covered in stitching, and I was interested in what Lettie had to say about this:

“I decided to write on it with the sewing machine…my personal thoughts and experiences with trees, starting with my grandfather’s saw mill, and my other grandfather’s love of carving.

I am writing on it with the machine in a spontaneous way…just writing what I am thinking of at the time…It is very hard to see because I am using variegated thread, so I have to stop every once in a while and write the words down on paper. It is a very personal writing, and will not really be visible to anyone else…but I do want to remember what I said. A very deep approach when compared to other work I have done…but very satisfying.”

Add comment February 15th, 2008

Waverly House Reception

On Friday evening a reception was held for the opening of Uncommon Threads exhibit at The Waverly House. Following are some snap shots of various members and their work.

Lettie Blackburn

Cathy Jeffrey

Christine Marcum

Dianna Callahan

Maureen Ashlock

Merrilee Tieche

Pam Rubert

Maureen and Diane Steffen

Emmie Seaman

Just thought you might like to see what some of the artists look like. We may not win any beauty contests, but we had a lot of fun and even sold a few pieces.

Add comment February 6th, 2008

New Work for January

Lettie Blackburn showed a new piece with an unusual color scheme for trees. This piece is covered with multiple layers of quilting in variegated threads.

Trees And The Infinite Sky
Lettie Blackburn

Another intriguing work was shown by Carol Borman. Though difficult to see in the photo, this is a three-dimensional photo collage, embellished with machine embroidery.

Carol’s Life in the United States Along Route 66
Carol Bormann

And a new, huge multi-panel work by Susan Leslie Lumsden. Please, go to Susan’s blog site to see it in it’s entirety. It’s beautiful and it’s enormous.

Detail of Slip Stream
Susan Leslie Lumsden

Add comment January 20th, 2008

Nov. 2007 meeting

This meeting was mostly about photographing art quilts, some old and some new, that might be used on the invitation for our upcoming exhibit at Waverly House, Feb. 1-29, 2008.

Carol Borman Route 66

Cathy Jeffery Southwestern Night

Christine Marcum Fractured Aspens

Christine Marcum work in progress

Dianna Challahan Night of Many Moons

Lucy Sillman A River Runs Through

Lucy Sillman Sentinal

Maureen Ashlock Art Speak

Susan Leslie Lumsden back of work in progress

I’m don’t have a photo of the front of Susan’s piece. There were a couple of corrupted files on my camera. You can see how I think I’ve resolved the problem on my blog. Go to Susan’s blog to see the front and all four panels as she works on them. Because of the camera, I also missed Arleta’s piece, so we’ll get it next month, along with more work to be photographed.

7 comments November 21st, 2007

2007 Journal Quilt, Lily Kerns

I’m one of those that ran out of time for photography, but this is the central portion of my 2007 journal quilt.  It is printed on a prepared fabric with pigment ink.  I had prepared printed borders to go with it around a small accent border, but when I got ready to sew it together, the quilt simply refused to have them next to it.   Sounds weird I know, but I learned long ago to listen to  a quilt when it becomed adamant about something….

It is quilted fairly simply to accent the shapes, with a bit of gold foil added.

The design is computer generated from a photograph of nuts and pinecones and is only one of many possibilities I had to choose from from that photograph.  The border pattern is a related image and was modified and reflected in PhotoShop to create a border.  I loved it on the computer, but not on the quilt..

7 comments November 3rd, 2007

Remember Me

Lettie Blackburn sent the following pictures of a quilt block and a description/explanation of it creation.

My Mom lives in an assisted living place here in my home town of Walker, MN, about 14 miles from our cabin. The place where she lives, May Creek Lodge, is planning on building an Alzheimer’s unit next year and naming it the Memory Cottage. The owner asked the residents and staff of May Creek Lodge to participate in making 10″ quilt blocks for an Alzheimer’s memory quilt which will hang in the new building. My Mom has made about six blocks, all embroidered with cute things, (not an easy task for someone who is paralyzed on one side)..anyway, Mom was after me to make a block…embroidery is not my thing…so she said, “just make one like you make your art quilts.” YA!

After a couple of weeks of procrastination and pondering, I decided to make a scene with trees and a moon reflecting on the water. I wanted it to also reflect the Alzheimer’s message, so I chose the phrase, “remember me,” which I feel has so many levels of meaning for the victims of that terrible disease and their loved ones. I fused the pieces of the block and started free motion stitching the phrase, “Remember Me,” all over it; readable, and not, right side up, upside down, and backwards. Finally I took some metallic thread and wrote the phrase, smaller and more legibly several times over that, as the symbol of hope.

Backside detail

Rightside detail

2 comments September 26th, 2007

Sept. Meeting

A few pictures from the meeting,

Arleta Johnson with a twin size quilt made for a young man in college. On the back she has used his school colors and date of graduation.

Cathy Jeffery’s un-named “ORB” approx. 12″ x 18″

AEOLIAN approx 36″ x 48″ Merrilee Tieche

I hope she will post a detail of the eagle. The feathers are fantastic.

1 comment September 20th, 2007

Keely’s Quilt

Carol Bormann just sent me this photo of her granddaughter Keely, who also happens to be named for her “nana. ” Carol was inspired by the stripes and circles painted on the Keely’s bedroom walls and made the quilt for her using a combination of piecing and appliqué with machine embroidered butterflies. And this amazing photo was taken by Nick Bormann, hand-holding a camera above the scene using a wide-angle lens.

Sleeping on a quilt like this — we know Keely’s tiny head must be filled with happy dreams of color and art!

4 comments September 14th, 2007

August Meeting

Some photos from the Uncommon Threads’ August meeting: Carol Borman showed lots of stages of experimentation with a cropped photo from the summer retreat. This variation is made of cut out solid-colored fabrics fused to a black background.

Diana Callahan shared several framed pieces that she will be exhibiting at the Waverly House this fall.

This powerful eagle is a work-in-progress by Merrilee Tieche, inspired by a photo she took with abstracted trees in the background.

Another wowser by Diana Steffen — fuschia flowers. We made her turn it upside-down just for the heck of it and to satisfy the non-gardners in the group. But it wasn’t the same!

And Lucy Silliman show several new pieces where she’s been experimenting with the Line as a core element….inspired maybe by the upcoming 2008 show that will be hosted by Uncommon Threads called “ThreadLines.” More on that soon!!

Add comment August 30th, 2007