How Can You Tell When A Design Isn't Quite Right?

     Have you ever finished a piece but then looked at it and thought something wasn't working? I finished my wildflower piece and was sort of happy with it. It came out as I intended it. I hung it on the design wall for a few days and showed it to my art group. I didn't ask for a critique so I didn't get any. But something was bothering me about it.
     So there are a few tricks I knew to do. One is to take a photo and look at the photo on a small scale. That way you just see the shapes, colors, and values. When I did that, I could still tell that something was off, but I couldn't pinpoint it. The next thing, was to look at it upside down. When I did that, I immediately saw what was annoying me. My ammonite fossil was both too small and it was facing in the wrong direction.
     Luckily, it was an easy and quick fix. I cut another fossil from prepainted fabric I had and free motion sewed it right on top of the old one. I ripped out the old seeds, which I didn't like anyway for two reasons. I didn't like the shapes I chose and I didn't like how they ended up on top of one of the rectangle shapes of fabric. Now with the fossil facing the other direction, they were in open space and I could redo the shapes better. Then I added another chain of embroidery to connect to the fossil and all was good.

old version

The Seed Bearer

     So now I declare it finished. I'm still not crazy about it. There are parts of it I like but still I'm bothered about something. Enough time spent here so I'm moving on to other projects now. Maybe someday, I'll see what I'm missing. I'm in the mood to go monoprint some fabrics. Poor cats will be locked out of the studio for a bit. I've got some big news next post. I'm linking this to Off The Wall Friday where you can find other art quilt blogs. Please make comments on their posts so that they know you stopped by. Thanks for visiting.

How Do You Switch From Sketch To Fabric?

     Is there a favorite way you switch from sketch to fabric? I vary in my ways. This time, I painted my sketch here first. Then I painted a set a fabrics. I put plastic over my cutting table and set out all of my paints, fabric medium, sponge brushes, dishes for mixing, tub for putting the painted fabrics, bowl for water, and put the three cats out of the studio so they wouldn't get paint on their paws because some of the paints might be toxic. I forgot something so I quickly went to get it and left the door open a crack and came back to find this.

Opus snuck in to help

After I locked him out again, I painted my background fabric. But when it dried, it was way too blue and too saturated of a blue. I loved the color, but it wasn't the color I wanted for this piece. So I decided I could either save it for the back side or for another art quilt. I painted another large piece of fabric, and it came out a little more green than I had planned, but I decided to go with it. Then I painted the other pieces. All came out as planned except that I couldn't get the large rectangular rust piece dark enough. I'm going to repaint that one.  Here are the painted fabrics.

Painted fabrics lined up

The one on the left came out lighter than intended but looked alright when first pinned up on the design wall on top of the background fabric. I even painted some whited eyelet cotton fabric thinking that might come in handy since this quilt is about wildflowers. In the layout above, I included a piece of fabric I rusted a few years ago.

     Next, I cut the fabrics as per the sketch and pinned them onto the background on the design wall and made some changes. This is what I have so far. The girl and window are digitally printed. 

in-process

     It's a little boring, but it's on its way. A main part of the design is a group of wildflowers that I want to put in the bottom right. I had thought I would machine stitch outlines of them there, but I need some good photos of some flowers to get the outlines from. I know I can always find copyright free photos online, but I prefer to use my own photos so today, I visited a wildlife refuge looking for some wildflowers to photograph and I got a nice surprise.

     I wanted to place a piece of white paper behind each plant I found for each photo so that I could isolate the lines of each plant. Then I could sketch it later from the photo and from the sketch do a stitching onto the quilt. Here's how I set up the first photo.

taking photo of wildflower

     But what I noticed was not the plant, but how great the shadow was! So for all the photos I took, I set up photos of shadows of plants.  This next one is one in particular that I love.

plant shadow

I took that photo and played with it later using the App Snapseed and got the next photo that I may use for something, maybe on this quilt somehow.

photo from App

I took about ten photos that I think I can get good outlines from so I'll play more with those tomorrow. The fabrics need more oomph, too.
     As I was deciding how to do the wildflowers I came up with all sorts of ideas. Some were very interesting and elaborate. But then, I realized I should stick to the processes that I find fun and that I'm good at so I abandoned most of the other ideas. The answer to the original question then, for me, this time, is to get the fabrics ready first, layout the design, then figure out how to add texture and alter colors to make it more interesting. All fun for me. Opus (and Andy and Rosie) are glad the painting is done so that they can be back in the studio to play with me. I'm linking this to Off The Wall Friday where you can find other art quilt blogs. Please make comments on their posts so that the artists know you stopped by. Thanks for visiting.

When Is It Time To Switch From Sketching To Fabric?

     When you use a sketchbook to plan your art quilts, how do you know you are ready to to get out the fabric? I've been working on a series of sketches to prepare for a quilt about wildflowers using my niece as one of the focal points. In it, she represents a force in the Universe. In the series, she is always manipulating an ammonite fossil. This time she is spreading seeds with the fossil. In previous posts, I've shown some sketches. Here is how I've painted them in succession trying to see how I could interpret the image in my head into fabrics.

The Seed Bearer 1

In this one and the others, I was influenced by my trip to Croatia and used the image of a ruined window and aging walls and walkways. I like aspects of this one, but it definitely has a way to go.

Seed Bearer 2

In this one, I used shapes that I would cut out of various fabrics. I like it better, but it is out of balance. It made me notice that the first one didn't have enough of value contrast.

Seed Bearer 3

     In this version, I taped extra paper to the bottom of my sketch page. That's why there is a line there. I like this one the best, but there are changes that are still needed. I took this photo and put it into the Art Studio App and played with the hue of the blue green shape and made it more of an olive green. That seems to work better. Also I made the rust shape longer at the bottom. And I made the yellow orange shapes thinner. 

     Getting back to the original question, I think I need to paint up some fabrics and get to it. The textures and patterns on the fabrics will determine what is needed at this point. The requirement for the exhibit is that it is exactly 20 inches wide and at least 30 inches long. So after Christmas, I'll get out my Gelli plate and paints and see what I come up with. But the sketch has given me a good starting point. 

     Speaking of Christmas, I showed you the Christmas art quilt I planned to have printed into cards here. I'm very pleased with how they came out. I used a card template that came with my Mac. I put the image of my quilt on the first page. I put separate text boxes for each word and bordered them with dashes (so that it looks like stitches) on the third page and I put "Art by reginabdunn.com" on the fourth page. I put that on a flash drive and gave it to my local printing company. Here is the result:

Front Page

(the watermark is not on the card... I only put it on this photo for the blog)

Third page

Fourth Page

I hope you all have a Very Merry Christmas. Thank you so much for reading my blog. It means so much to me. When I look at my statistics and see followers from so many different countries, it makes me so very happy that I can reach you.  Peace, Everyone.

I'm linking this to Off The Wall Friday where you can find other art quilt blogs. Please make comments on their posts to let the artists know you stopped by. Thanks for visiting.

How Addictive Is Small Sketching?

     Is sketching this way in choosing a background format and keeping the same element in the foreground addictive? Well it turns out I look forward to it each day. I not only think of which compositional background I want to use, but I also try to think of a pun or fun title to use with it. This is probably the last post in which I'll share the sketches with you. I'll continue on with them in my weekly sketch group and modify them as I go and move on to other types of sketches in the future when I get tired of these. Here are the ones from this week. If you haven't been following my posts, you can see my previous post here if you want to see the other ones and the types of background formats. I think (again) that my watercolor techniques have improved. It really is true that you do have to get in there and practice.

strata format

                                                   (I had to do one with a rock cairn.)

grid format

bridge format

radiating lines format

So there it is. In my art quilts, I usually stick to the grid format. Now I have an idea of more backgrounds to work with and by doing these with the lamp, I've come up with a way to make quick designs.

     And now for some good news. My art quilt, Contemplation, was juried into the show Sacred Threads. 

I've wanted to be in that show for several years, but didn't have a piece that was appropriate. I'm very happy that Contemplation will be exhibited alongside works by artists I admire. The show is at Floris United Methodist Church in Herndon, Virginia from July 10 - 26. Here is a link about Sacred Threads. http://www.sacredthreadsquilts.com/  

I'm linking this to Off The Wall Friday where you can find other art quilt blogs. Please make comments on their posts so that the artists know you stopped by. Thanks for visiting.

What Is The Value Of Working In A Series?

     How long should I keep on working on my watercolor sketches of my oil lamp? I asked myself that this week. I was starting to miss sewing and there isn't time to do everything. I decided to do a few more sketches because they are small (about 4x6)  and quicker than pieces that I can sew. I want to improve my watercolor technique because I thought that would improve my painting technique on fabrics. Secondly, I want to free up and get more creative with ideas on ways to include the oil lamp in the sketches because that would help me come up with creative designs for my art quilts. And thirdly, I want more practice using the compositional background formats I learned in the class I took that I blogged about here. All of these couldn't but help improve the composition of my art quilts. That's the plan anyway. (But I do now have plans for a series of art quilts and plan to start sewing some small samples this week.) They have nothing to do with oil lamps, though.
     To keep on the creative side, I decided to put the lamp in places that a lamp wouldn't fit. And use some humor, too. Here are my sketches from last week. And here are my sketches for this week.

The S-Format

The Cruciform Format

The T-Format (sort of)

The last one was for Earth Day. So I think I'm discovering the value of working in a series for me is that I'm working more quickly, I'm coming up with ideas faster, I'm less afraid to try things out, my technique with watercolors is improving, and I'm developing a style with watercolors.  I'm linking this to Off The Wall Friday where you can find other art quilt blogs. Please make comments on the artists' posts to let them know you stopped by. Thanks for visiting.

How Long Can I Go Without Sewing?

     My sewing machine is back in its spot, but can I continue with my short term goal of practicing sketching and painting? Last post I wrote and showed some formats of how to set up backgrounds to anchor compositions. This seemed to be particularly geared well to art quilts in laying out fabrics. I thought I would try it out with a sketching/painting series about an oil lamp I have. This would help with my drawing and painting skills, my composition skills, and my creativity. Here's the oil lamp that I bought in a small town in Italy one summer.

small lamp about 5 inches across

     I decided it had a lot of mystery to it and I would play that up and have fun with it and morph the lamp in each of the iterations. I started with a simple pencil sketch.

L shaped background

     For the next one, I used watercolors.

Triangular background (sort of)

     Then, I went to the hairdresser and I took off my eyeglasses. As I was having my hair cut and seeing everything in a blur, I noticed a yellow round thing on his tabletop that was surrounded by dark blue and I was thinking it reminded me of a moon in a dark night sky. That sparked the next idea. (When I put my glasses back on I saw that the yellow thing was actually a metal award he won.)

Circular background

     I'm having fun with this series, but I need to get a handle on how to use watercolors. I'll take a look at some YouTube videos this week and keep going with the series. But I may start some sewing, too (I do miss the touch of fabric.) I'm linking this to Off The Wall Friday Where you can find other art quilt blogs. Please make comments on the artists' posts to let them know you stopped by. Thanks for visiting.

From Photo To Sketch To Fabric

      My art group, ArtsEtc, meets once a month except for July because that meeting falls on the July 4th weekend. This past summer, a small group of us decided to meet at my house that weekend and take a walk at a local park and take photos for inspiration. I came away with photos of Spanish moss hanging from large live oak trees, and close-up shots of beautiful textures on leaves and bark. The sunlight of the early morning left wonderful patterns peaking through the foliage as we walked down the shaded path towards the lake. Suddenly, the trees opened up before us when reached lake and this is one of the many photos I took as an osprey sat on one of the piers as it fed on a fish it recently caught that morning.

early morning on the lake

     I knew that I wanted to capture this moment in my art somehow. It was very quiet. I could hear the water lapping against the piers. I could hear some birds in the distance. No traffic noise at all. No wind. None of us spoke.

     So at my sketching group, I made a few sketches with this photo as the focal point. Some were more realistic. Some were more abstract. I eventually settled on one that I liked a lot that is a stylized landscape.
     I got out my monoprinted fabrics from here and some older ones and started laying them out on my design board to fit into the sketch background. That was the easy part. The harder part was to figure out how to translate the lines I had drawn on the sketch into fabric. I could couch them on with fibers, I could do bobbin work with thick thread, or I could try to paint the lines on. In the end, I decided to put two black threads in the needle at once and then free motion stitch as normal. To do this, you thread one spool as normal, and then put the other spool on the other thread holder and thread as normal but through the other tension disk. (Both threads go through the same and only eye of the needle; size 90 universal needle.) I had no problems with thread breakage or thread tension.
     I sketched out the lines onto the yellow quilting paper first and pinned it on top of the fabric and then sewed (with the double threads) on top of the drawn lines on the paper. Then I ripped off the paper. Here's a photo that shows some of the stitching done and some of the paper still on with the sketching on the paper.

in-progress stitching

If you think the fabric with the piers is lighter in color than you saw from the link above, you are correct. That's because I decided to use the reverse side of it. I felt that the "right side" was too dark and saturated for this quilt. Here's a close-up photo of part of it.

with paper and sketching waiting to be stitched

     The color inside the piers was added with Shiva Paintstiks. Now I have the stitching done and am down to some more difficult decisions. How to do the bird and how to add Spanish moss. I've made three birds already. One that I printed onto cotton fabric from a photo, but it just doesn't fit with this style of art. One that I painted onto fabric and just doesn't fit, either. And one that I printed onto sheer fabric and it is too faint. I have a few more ideas to try out for the bird.

     For the Spanish moss, I thought I was going to use painted cheese cloth, but the texture doesn't fit with this quilt. Neither does some wool roving that I have. I need something smooth and flat to go with the lines I stitched and the flat look of the painted piers. I have few ideas to try for that, too. Time to put on the creativity hat. I'm linking this to Off The Wall Friday where you can find other art quilt blogs. Please make comments on their posts to let the the artists know you stopped by. Thanks for visiting.

The Eyes Have It

     In my art group, ArtsEtc., we start our meetings with a 10 - 20 minute sketching warm-up exercise to get the creative juices flowing even though we are really a fiber art group. Last month the exercise was to look at a photo of an eye and draw it lightly with pencil four times on separate card stocks. Then, at home, on one of them, with pencil, sketch it very accurately. On the second one, develop it with ink. On the third one, develop it with colored pencil. On the fourth one, develop it with vine charcoal (I skipped this one because I don't plan on working in this medium.) The purpose of the exercise is to compare the different types of media. It was a valuable exercise for me, although I really don't enjoy doing something more than once. Here are my sketches.

Photo and sketches in various media

     And then, I got the idea, since I had eyes in my head, to add eyes to my hand sewing project from the class I'm taking on-line from the Spirit Cloth website. Since the rocks fell into the river, I embroidered eyes in the river to symbolize having the spirits of the rocks in the river.

Still in-progress

It's not laying flat because the river is quilted and I haven't yet quilted the area around the river. I think I'll add some more eyes in the river, too. Then I have to quilt the rest and more fabric at the bottom and quilt that, too. I'll decide the edges later. I'm linking this to Off The Wall Friday where you can visit other art quilt blogs. Please make comments on their posts to let the artists know you stopped by.