Curated Quilts is a quarterly journal on quilting that I found just this last fall. Many of the quilters I respect and follow have gotten quilts into issues. I saw some of their entries for the "Improv" issue just as the deadline was closing. Wish I would have seen it earlier, but decided to watch for the next. And I missed that one too!
So I signed up for the email news and in early December received the call for entry of the "Curves" issue. A great palette, a mini quilt challenge and time to enter... this was my chance.
So I signed up for the email news and in early December received the call for entry of the "Curves" issue. A great palette, a mini quilt challenge and time to enter... this was my chance.
My list of Christmas gifts to make was decreased to one. That gave me creative time to work on my entry. I sketched 3 pages of ideas, refined 4 ideas, and ended with 3 solid designs.
Holding On to Her Secrets
I was excited for this challenge because I've been working with large improv curves (2 to 3 foot!) on a series of quilts for the last 1-1/2 years. This mini challenge made me refine my curves much more than expected. I started with the white curves and added the various colors/prints. Last I curved in the fuchsia fabric. Once I laid it together, it was more than 23 inches wide! I re-cut and stitched the fuchsia several times in several areas before it was small enough for the challenged size.
The binding had to be fuchsia and the quilting followed the curves in a matching fuchsia.
The binding had to be fuchsia and the quilting followed the curves in a matching fuchsia.
My Pockets are Full of the Lines of All the Songs You Sang to Me
This entry began square, with the fabric curves all running horizontal and a strong resemblance to a landscape painting popular in the 1970's suburban Midwest! Ugh!
So I turned it sideways, added the fuchsia corner and still it lacked something. I couldn't un-see the landscape, so I picked up my rotary cutter and added another curve: I sliced off the corner. And I have to tell you, that felt GREAT! And now I saw pockets instead of landscape.
Quilting was done in teal or fuchsia thread.
So I turned it sideways, added the fuchsia corner and still it lacked something. I couldn't un-see the landscape, so I picked up my rotary cutter and added another curve: I sliced off the corner. And I have to tell you, that felt GREAT! And now I saw pockets instead of landscape.
Quilting was done in teal or fuchsia thread.
Mother
This is another quilt inspired by the Yayoi Kusama show I saw at the Cleveland Museum of Art this past summer.I was familiar with her infinity rooms before the show, but not the paintings and sculpture and cotton-fabric-painted-polka-dots. Wow!
The quilting is a combination of big-stitch hand quilting on the foreground shapes with free motion machine quilting of the background.
The quilting is a combination of big-stitch hand quilting on the foreground shapes with free motion machine quilting of the background.
I like all three enough to enter all of them. So I did. I am thrilled and proud to let you know that Holding On to Her Secrets was accepted! I can't wait to see it in print. I am in very good company!