Exhibition Closed

 My exhibition called Of Land and Sea that was on in Warburton closed a couple of weeks ago. I went up before it closed to catch up with a bus load of quilters from the Westernport group. They were a lovely group of women and I had the chance to answer all their questions and have a lovely catch up.

I took a photo of some of them, not all wanted to be in the photo in case I put it on Facebook.

Westernport Quilters

Then I asked someone to take another photo so I could be in it as well.

The curator Bronwyn, said it was the most successful exhibition that they have ever had! They had so many positive comments from visitors.

The good news was that I sold one of my quilts to Elenna.

I got a photo when she came to pick up the quilt after the exhibition closed. She was in her gardening clothes because she didn't expect a photo opportunity, but I didn't mind, I just wanted to be able to remember her.

Elenna and I

She bought Life on the Reef.

Life on the Reef

That was a positive experience and I thank all involved in the Yarra Ranges Gallery group, especially Warburton.

Bye for now,

Linda

My Exhibition in Kyabram

I am having a solo exhibition in Kyabram in March this year. My crazy quilts, applique quilts and Coral Reef series will be on display.

The Kyabram Town Hall Gallery is in the main street of Kyabram and the exhibition will be on during everyday of March except Sundays.

Kyabram is approximately 2 and half hours north of Melbourne, beyond Bendigo. Kyabram is a lovely country town that has a great cafe across the road and a quilt shop called Catharina's Country Collections a couple of doors down from the gallery.


Here are some of the quilts that will be on display.

A Time for all Seasons

Crazy about Ballet

6 Pack Shame

Magical Coral Reef

I hope people will make the trip to see the exhibition. I will not be staying up there for the month but if people let me know that they are going, I'll make the effort to be there.

The Gallery is attractive and spacious and my exhibition is in one room and there will be two other exhibitions in the other two rooms.

I have made some flyers to advertise the show.

I hope you can make it to the exhibition in March 2020.

Kyabram Town Hall Gallery
Allan Street,
Kyabram
Victoria
Australia

10am to 4pm every day except Sundays.
Admission is $5

It is a great place for a mid-week day out with some quilting friends.

Bye for now,
Linda

Be Creative with Workbox Magazine

There's a great magazine called Be Creative with Workbox from the UK. I am a subscriber now but I used to borrow copies of the Workbox magazine years ago from the Embroiderer's Guild library. I assume that Be Creative and Workbox combined into one magazine but I could be wrong about that, they might have just changed the title.

The magazine comes out every two months and it is crammed full of creative textile and embroidery techniques and interviews with artists.

How exciting to find that one of my quilts is in the current issue!

There is an article about the A Matter of Time Exhibition because the quilts are going to be exhibited at the Festival of Quilts in Birmingham on the 10th-13th August 2017.

Here's a copy of page 1 and 2 of the article and that is my quilt on the far right.

Here is the 3rd page of the article.

I was thrilled that my quilt was one of the quilts chosen to be featured and super thrilled that my quilt is travelling to Birmingham. The exhibition is also travelling to the New Zealand Symposium on the 4th-10th October 2017 and the Houston Quilt Show on the 28th-5th November 2017.

I wish that I could travel to all those wonderful places and see the quilts there in person.

Here is a better photo of my quilt called Life on the Reef.

If you would like to read more about this quilt, please read my post from January 26th 2016 called Making Life on the Reef


If you are interested in a creative and inspiring textile magazine I highly recommend the
 Be Creative with Workbox magazine. Click on the link to order a subscription. I actually found the magazine in the newsagent a couple of months ago but it was in the art section not with the patchwork and quilting magazines. It is the only time I have ever seen it in Australia though.

Bye for now,
Linda

Present for Liz

Earlier this year I was told that Elizabeth Dubbelde had sold her quilting shop in Berry NSW and I was asked to contribute a block as a goodbye present. I met Liz when I taught at her retreat a few years ago in 2012.

Liz has not left the quilting scene; she just wants to take things a little easier by concentrating on planning her retreats and quilt show without trying to run a shop as well. You can see her new website here.

The block had to be 8" square and I had just finished my Life on the Reef Quilt and so it was easy for me to use the fabrics and supplies that I still had out.
 Here is a photo of my Life on the Reef quilt.

I cut out a background fabric and fused on some fish and plant life.

It came to life when I added the hand embroidery.

I have heard back from Liz and she was delighted with the block that I made. She might make a fabric book out of all her blocks.

Speaking of my Under the Sea quilt, it was on display in the Matter of Time Exhibition at the Sydney Stitches and Craft Show last week. Lisa Walton of Dyed and Gone to Heaven lives in Sydney and sent me a photo of some people admiring my quilt. Thanks Lisa.

I am looking forward to the exhibition coming to Melbourne next month for the Australasian Quilt Convention (AQC) where I can see my quilt again and more importantly have a closer look at how the others in the exhibition interpreted the theme Time.

Bye for now,
Linda

Making Life on the Reef

I am still so excited to find out that my latest quilt Life on the Reef was chosen to be in the A Matter of Time  exhibition which has been curated by Benda Gael Smith.

As I mentioned in my last post I only had 3 weeks to make this quilt and so I spent every spare minute on it. It did help that I had made a quilt with an underwater theme before so I wasn't starting completely from scratch.

I started by placing some rock fabrics over a suitable water fabric.

I didn't take a lot of progress photos because I had so little time to make the quilt but after I had my rocks in place I started to make the coral using hand embroidery and machine thread painting.

When I thought I had made enough coral I started placing it on the rocks.

I realised that I would have to make a lot more coral to fill the space.

When I had most of the coral in place I started to make the fish but the quilt wasn't working and it took me a couple of days to realise that my fish were too big for the quilt. Reef fish are usually tiny little things flitting in and out of the coral.
The next photo shows you how the big the Blue Tang fish were in the beginning and how much smaller I had to make them.

Here is a photo of how I made the small Blue Tang. I cut out the fish shape in a blue batik and then used a black Fabrico marking pen for the detail.

I stitched around the outside of all the shapes to hold them onto the background and then I had to start adding all the hand embroidery.

You can see what a difference the embroidery makes by comparing the next two photos.

Without embroidery

With Embroidery

At least I did finish the quilt the day before the deadline and cannot wait to see the exhibition when it comes to Melbourne in April. I have seen a few of the other quilts that were selected and they are so different to mine and so creative and there are so many different interpretations of the Time theme.

The A matter of Time exhibition also has a Facebook page and an Instagram page.

Here is a photo of the entire quilt, remember to click on the photo for a larger view.

The quilt measures 40cm x 100cm or 16" x 39".

Bye for now,
Linda

A Great Start to 2016

Well here it is nearly at the end of January and I am finally doing a blog post for 2016. Believe it or not I have not been away on holiday or just putting my feet up doing nothing. I have been working flat out on a new art quilt.

About 18 months ago Brenda Gael Smith announced the theme for her upcoming exhibition and the theme was A Matter of Time- exploring the fourth dimension. As the months went by I thought of all sorts of ideas of quilts I could make that explored the theme. Some ideas were too obvious and others seemed too hard to tackle. I even spent a week working on an idea last October but it didn't work out and certainly didn't look anything like the idea I had in my head. To my disappointment I decided that I would not be making a quilt for the exhibition.

On Christmas Eve I thought of making a quilt about how old the coral reefs were. Bear in mind that this was 3 weeks before the deadline. The only way I could possibly try and get it done on time was because I had made an underwater quilt earlier in the year. I had still kept all my inspirational photos and fabrics in a box on their own. You can read all about my quilt Under the Sea here.

Once the idea took hold I was off and running. The size was the same as my previous quilt but I didn't want to make the same quilt, in fact there were lots of things I didn't like about the first one.

Here is my quilt named Life on the Reef and I finished it the day before the deadline! If you click on the photo it enlarges.

I was so busy trying to get it done that at times I thought I would run out of time, which was ironic seeing as that was the theme.

Here are a couple of detail photos.

The entire time I was making the quilt I was wondering why I put myself under all the pressure, but even though it was a lot of pressure I was also having fun. That's why we do it I suppose, it's because we love it.

Last week I found out that my quilt was selected to be in the exhibition!! I was absolutely thrilled because it is an art quilt exhibition and even though I dabble in art quilts I am known as a traditional quilter. There were 104 quilts entered and only 32 were selected. I have seen some of the quilts that were not accepted and they are fantastic. Brenda must have had such a difficult job to choose the quilts that went together to make a cohesive display.

You can see the other people who were selected by clicking onto Brenda's A Matter of Time Blog, she also has a dedicated Facebook and Instagram page for the exhibition.

The quilts will first be displayed at the Stitches and Craft Show in Sydney and Brisbane and then they will come to the Quilt Convention in Melbourne (AQC) before travelling to other locations. I can't wait to see the exhibition.

Bye for now,
Linda