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Friday 31 January 2020

"Back Country" Accepted into Juried Show

What a thrill this week when I received an email congratulating me on my latest art quilt's acceptance into the Juried Show at the International SAQA (Studio Art Quilts Associates)  Conference MoSAiQA held here in Toronto this March!

The show is called "Colour with a U" and the exhibition will be held at the Homer Watson House and Gallery in Kitchener, ON from March 13 to May 31, 2020. 36 works were chosen from 173 entries.
 https://www.homerwatson.on.ca/

The opening reception will be held on Saturday, March 21 from 1 - 3 pm. I am hoping to be there along with several other artists.

This exhibition will then be touring across Canada until March 2023.

Along with this show there is a sister show called "Colour with a U too" being held at RiverBrink Art Museum in Niagara on The Lake which runs from March 15 - September 5, 2020. http://riverbrink.org





Friday 24 January 2020

Photo Inspiration and 2020 Goals

I put together two fabric cards yesterday from photos that I took and thought you might like to see a bit of my process.


I love this photo because of the dramatic clouds and the sun bathed foreground. I wanted to do a layered look for the sky and I also wanted to use a somewhat complementary colour scheme of blues and yellow-orange. I rummaged through my fabric scraps and found a variety of blues and greys to use for the sky and I also found a great little piece of hand painted fabric that I had done that was the perfect colour for the foreground field and had round patterns on it that resembled round hay bales.


I began with the sky and cut curves in the blue and gray fabric to resemble clouds and movement and then layered them from bottom to top overlapping the edges. Next I took the yellow-orange field piece and put it down. Finding another yellow- orange fabric with a little textural detail in it, I cut it to resemble tree shapes and put it on last. Above is the card without any stitching.


To bring out details and a little more movement as well as to secure the pieces, I added stitch. I stitched the sky with white, gray and blue threads to give more dimension to the clouds. (The gold stitching in the sky was already part of the fabric I laid down there.) To make the trees appear darker, I over-stitched them with a sap green coloured thread and used the same colour to make rows in the field.


This photo was taken in Holland and it is a bit dark but I liked the windmill against the sky and the trees surrounding it. I wanted to make the foreground lighter and more interesting by using brighter colours and more texture.


I had a piece of fabric that had clouds and sky printed on it so I chose it for the background. Then I put the windmill building in place. Perhaps it could have been darker but I wanted the black details of the mechanisms to be visible. I stitched the blades with black thread as well as the wooden mechanisms. Then I found a variety of patterned green fabric and cut them to resemble trees and put them down overlapping their edges.


Further stitching was done to define the clouds in the sky and outline the trees.

Goals

Since the beginning of 2020, I have also been trying to figure out my goals for this year. I didn't want to have lofty goals that I could not complete but I did want to challenge myself a bit. Instead of writing them down on a list, I made a doodled manifesto that I could hang in my studio to catch my eye each time I was in there as a reminder.


Saturday 18 January 2020

New Art Quilt

I just finished an art quilt that took me only a week to complete! That is a record for me although I think I worked on it a bit every day. AND it is only 8" x 10" in size. Honestly the smaller the art quilt the more challenging due to the smaller pieces.





This design was from a sketch of a Clematis I had done. You can see how many little pieces there are! I wasn't sure I would be successful with this one but I was pleasantly surprised. I won't enter it into any shows but just putting it together taught me many things so the next one will be better.


To choose a colour pallet I went to my colour wheel and chose the complementary colours of purple and yellow green. I wanted the background to be plain but not boring so I chose off-white and beiges, some with a little pattern in them. When I designed the pattern I used the seam lines to draw the eye to the bloom.




Construction phase. Little by little the image is being revealed.



I used thread painting for the stems, quilted the outline of the leaves and the bloom and stitched yellow into the heart of the flower. I'm not sure if the background competes a bit with the flower but I think the purple keeps that from happening.

After I had completed Clematis, I realized I could have used it for either the SAQA benefit auction or the Spotlight auction, both are fundraisers for SAQA, but it was the wrong size for both. Benefit auction pieces have to be 12"x12" and Spotlight auction pieces have to be 6" x 8". Bad planning on my part. Next time better.

Friday 10 January 2020

Challenged and Inspired by Artist in Residence Programs

As I was planning my goals for 2020, I remembered coming across Artist Residencies in various places. I have never felt that I could be an artist in residence mostly because I am not a professional artist. By that I mean that I do not create art to sell it and make a living.

An artist in residence commits to researching and creating art in a particular location. Some galleries like the McMichael Canadian Collection in Kleinburg have an Artist Residency. Many Provincial Parks also accept applications for Artist in Residence Programs. They offer these programs to give the artist some notoriety and publicity but also to attract visitors to their location.

Each Artist in Residence Program has its own set of rules and regulations for acceptance so it is sometimes difficult to find a good fit. When I found out about them I was really interested in them especially the ones in the outdoors like Provincial Parks. They give the accepted applicant the freedom to explore and research, sketch and photograph their area while camping or staying in a facility there. The artist must supply their own equipment, food and art supplies and must work to completing a body of artwork to display or exhibit at the location of the residency. There is usually a time frame after the residency in which the art needs to be completed. As well, there is a commitment to engage the public in an art related activity, talk or demonstration at some point during the program. Timelines and times of year also differ from program to program.

One of my goals for 2019 was to do something outside of my comfort zone. I had planned to apply to an Artist in Residence Program at Algonquin Provincial Park. That did not happen due to the fact that I took a trip overseas at the time of the residency so I did not apply. However, I am planning to apply for the residency this year. The 2019 Artist in Residence Program was held in September.

I don't know if I will be chosen, but if I don't apply, I know that I won't be chosen. In order to apply, I will have to come up with a plan of action to send in about what I will spend my time doing and also a plan for engaging the public. I will also have to be prepared to work hard afterward to build a body of artwork from my research and sketches. It's really exciting even though a bit daunting to me.

There is also another Artist in Residence Program I'm planning to apply for which will happen in 2021. I'll blog about that another time.

The Algonquin Art Centre, in partnership with Algonquin Provincial Park, is excited to launch its Artist in Residency program, which allows artists working in various areas (visual, literary, media arts) to spend time in the heart of Algonquin’s beautiful wilderness working on their projects, collaborating with Park researchers, and participating in art-outreach opportunities at the Visitor’s Centre and/or the Art Centre.

Friday 3 January 2020

Sketchbook Skool Greeting Card Exchange

A few weeks back I blogged about a greeting card exchange I signed up for and posted the cards I had made to send out. It was so cool to receive hand made cards from complete strangers! These are people also involved with Sketchbook Skool and very talented. I love hand made cards!



This was drawn on watercolour paper with the background painted and the wings and tail of the dove were detailed with ink.


This was done on black card stock with a white gel pen and pencil crayons. I was really intrigued by the envelop which was a page from a catalogue folded into and envelope.


This one came from Great Britain and is a cross stitched card. I love cross stitch!


This one was also done on black card stock with white gel pen. The calligraphy on the envelope was beautiful too.



I threw this one in as well. It is a hand made card done by my sister in law. It's watercolour on watercolour paper.

I love these hand made items because there is a little bit of the person who made them in each one. Just the fact that someone took the time to plan and execute it to give to someone else is meaningful to me.