Hearts All Aglow

Here is a little 12" X 12" piece I have made for my Serendipity art group exchange. Our theme this time around was "Hearts All Aglow" , which is what I have named this piece. I chose a pair of lovebirds on a branch with a sun behind them because I love birds and anytime I can find an excuse to use them in an art quilt I do!

I used some striped fabric that I was recently given from my friend Linda (thanks Linda!), and other fabric from my stash. The branch is made by braiding rick rack, and the plants on the bottom are fussy cut from a large print fabric.



making pattern pieces



numbering pieces




A few posts back I mentioned that you have to enlarge your sketch to the finished size of your piece. Now I am going to describe the next steps that I take in creating a fiber art piece. Above you see the enlarged sketch for a black and white piece I have recently finished.  Using the full size enlargement I make pattern pieces from each part of the landscape. I first use a black sharpie to clearly delineate my landscape parts and then I number each one. Next I place freezer paper over the parts and trace them. The number is recorded on the freezer paper piece so I know where it goes after it is cut out. The upper photo shows some of the barrel cacti and road runner pattern pieces that I made for this art quilt.

Value Planning



value planning

 When I am planning an art quilt, I have to figure out what colors and values I want in my piece. Sometimes I do several thumbnail sketches and try out different colors using watercolor paints. Once I have the colors and values that I like, I use the thumbnail to select fabrics.

I have recently been working on a black and white piece, so instead of colors, I was planning to use different textures and black and white values to depict parts of my landscape. On the left is the value sketch that I prepared to give me a "roadmap" for where I wanted to go. I took this roadmap with me when I pulled out fabrics from my stash and when I went to the store to get more fabrics for this piece. It gave me a good idea of the percentage of black or white I wanted in each area. It was a bit more tricky than using color, but it worked!

Another point about making your initial sketch for an art quilt...

Yesterday I showed you how I come up with a drawing for an art quilt, then have it blown up to my desired finished size. It is important that you make your initial smaller drawing proportional to your desired finished size, or your blown up image won't fit your needs.

Of course if you don't have a particular size requirement for your finished piece, you can blow it up to whatever size makes you happy and go from there!

How I start an art quilt

When I start a new art quilt, I always begin with some sketches and drawings. I recently completed a desert scene, and this is the drawing that I came up with for it.

To come up with this drawing I looked at some sketches I had made from trips to the desert, as well as photographs. I decided which elements I wanted to have in the sketch, and then started to move them around to try out different layouts. This drawing doesn't really exist in one location. It is a compilation of several features found in the desert at different locations.

Once I decide on a layout, I redo the sketch on a piece of paper about 8-1/2" x 11" size. I darken the lines with a sharpie and take it to the FedEx store. There I get it blown up to the size of the finished piece.

This drawing is 30" x 52" and it is taped on a closet door in my art room.

Beading workshop photos

Cynthia Catlin giving some instruction

Here are some photographs from the beading workshop that Cynthia Catlin and I did at the Cerritos library. We both enjoyed the workshop and thought it was a success. We had good attendance and the opportunity to teach some techniques and give some examples of how to use beads on your fiber art pieces. Hopefully we will be able to do this again sometime!

Eileen Wintemute doing a demonstration



Beading Workshop

I am excited to tell you that I will be teaching a beading workshop with Cynthia Catlin tomorrow at the Cerritos Library. It will be from 1 - 4 pm.

I will show how to do various beading application and give tips to make your beading experience better. I know its late notice, but if you are in the area, stop by. The library is located at 18025 Bloomfield Ave, in Cerritos.

While you are there you can also see the Quilts on the Wall "Gates" Special Exhibit.