Susan’s quilt selected for 2011 QA Calendar

My “Candy Corn” art quilt has been selected for the 2011 Quilting Arts Calendar! Hmmm... I wonder what month they will use it?

It is painted on white fabric (Pimatex by Robert Kaufman, my favorite fabric for painting because it is very fine and tightly woven). The photo below shows the heavy thread sketching I did on this piece before I quilted around the individual candy corn candies. 

This is the third year that my work has been selected for the calendar, and I am no less thrilled this time than the other two years. Yippee!!! Just wait until you see some of the other pieces Quilting Arts has selected. (If you are a member of the Quilting Arts community, you can see some of them in the photo gallery section.) They are really spectacular, and I am honored to be in their company.

– Susan Brubaker Knapp

... and now for fiber arts beyond quilting!

The Red Sky Gallery in Charlotte is showing a collection of Janet's beadwork! Click over and search for Janet Lasher on their search tab!

This collection of beaded brooches using large cabochons, Austrian crystals, semi-precious stones, and pearls.

Each piece is unique designed to accentuate the cabochon stone. These vary in size from about 2.5" to 4" across. Janet starts with the special stone and a small collection of beads, crystals, pearls, and stones - beading a bezel around the stone to hold it firmly in place, and then begin to embellish the piece until it feels done. Then each is finished up with a beaded picot edge and back with coordinating deer leather.

She says that this work is a labor of love working in this small scale playing with repetition and color. One bead at a time.

Natural Turquoise, coin & baroque pearls, Swarovski Crystals

Chinese Chalk Turquoise, coin, baroque and rice pearls, glass mirror, Swarovski crystals

Chystaphase, glass mirror, baroque & fancy pearls.

She is expanding the collection of brooches that started using small divine feminine faces- like this one worked on this past fall.



Janet teaches beading in her studio and online at Joggles.com

-janet

"Save Our Signs" Show

A Post from Debbie -

For many years, Charlotte (NC) had the reputation as a "tear down" city. We tore down homes, factories, trees - if it was old, it was gone. And we made room for the new: big box stores, strip shopping malls, steel and concrete office buildings, and lots of parking decks. But over the last decade or so, things have begun to change.

We still have plenty of new development. Two fabulous examples are the breathtaking Bechtler Museum of Modern Art and the inspiring Havey B. Gantt Center for African American Arts + Culture.

But the good news is that we're also starting to protect and celebrate the old.

This weekend I'm participating in "ARTevation: Save Our Signs," a show celebrating Charlotte's vintage painted and neon commercial signs. These are the iconic symbols of old roller skating rinks, Mom and Pop restaurants, full service garages, and neighborhood hang-outs.

artEVATION: Save Our Signs

May 7th, 2010 4 - 10PM (South End Gallery Crawl)

May 8th, 2010 10 AM - 4 PM

Atherton Mill, 2000 South Blvd.
Charlotte, NC

The show is sponsored by the Historic Charlotte, Inc., a non-profit organization that works to promote and protect the region's history, as part of its National Preservation Month celebration.

From what I've seen, it's going to be a spectacular show. Plenty of great photography, painting, and a really amazing ceramic artist - all focusing their work around the sign theme. I'll be the only fabric artist, so that's exciting. The signs have a way of getting into your psyche; some of the artists moved away from the city years ago and still find themselves returning to those images for inspiration.

I'll be showing thirteen pieces. Four of them come from my "Queen Charlotte" photomosaic series. From a distance, each piece shows a different view of the Queen Charlotte statue in Uptown Cha rlotte. Here are two of them:

Close-up, the viewer sees 1/2" x 1/2" photos of Charlotte people, places, and events...and of course the vintage signs. They're printed on fabric and then pieced together to make up the larger image.

The other pieces focus primarily on the signs themselves....such as this one, of the JFG coffee sign (photo: Brandon Uttley).

It turns out that the removal of the JFG coffee sign, a longtime and much beloved Charlotte landmark, was the catalyst for the "Save Our Signs" movement. This has become a joint venture between Historic Charlotte and the JFG Coffee Company (they're putting up to $15,000 towards the effort to help save and restore some of these vintage signs).

For those interested in historic preservation, at least one happy ending is coming soon. The JFG sign is being restored and the company is about to announce the sign's new Charlotte location.

Watch for an update on (and pictures from) the show. And, of course, if you're in the neighborhood be sure to stop by and enjoy the artwork.

Cheers,
Debbie

PJ's Quilting Arts "Stitch This!" Entry

Susan mentioned this challenge in her blog some days back and I decided to use this as an excuse to practice more photo-to-simplified piecing. The challenge called for "plenty of visible machine stitching", so I chose built-in machine stitches as embellishment. Here is the photo to be used as inspiration.

I liked the lines of the head and neck, so I cropped the photo to this. Using Quilt Assistant software I created a simplified piecing pattern.

Here's the final piece, with some detail shots of embellishment using built-in stitches on my Pfaff Creative Vision.If you are a member of the Quilting Arts community, you can see all the entries and vote for your favorite, starting Monday, May 3, on the Quilting Arts site in the “Stitch This!” photo gallery. Voting closes on Monday, June 28, 2010, at 12:00 PM EDT.

To vote for this entry, use this link http://quiltingarts.com/media/p/17984.aspx

Susan’s work featured in SAQA ad

I got word last night that my work Red Coleus is featured in an advertisement for the SAQA Auction! SAQA, or Studio Art Quilt Associates, is a group of fiber artists, and this auction of several hundred small art quilts donated by its members brings in a lot of money each year. The money raised goes towards SAQA’s exhibtions, education, and outreach programs.

The ad will run in Fiberarts, Surface Design Journal, Selvedge, and American Craft magazines. Here is the whole piece:

If you are a fiber artist and don’t know about SAQA, you should! SAQA offers so many things for fiber artists who are serious about their art. There are great professional development opportunities, including conferences and programs, exhibitions, online galleries, and publications. You can join as an active member, professional artist member, or as a student member.

– Susan Brubaker Knapp

500 Art Quilts

500 Art Quilts: An Inspiring Collection of Contemporary Work

This luscious publication, by Lark Books, featuring art quilts from 363 artists and an insightful Introduction by the juror, Karey Patterson Bresenhan, deserves a place beside an easy chair for reading page by page. Art lovers and quilt lovers will both relish this one. I find a cup of tea and my legs up make for a relaxing stroll through the pages of this 8 inch square book.

In the essence of full disclosure, I am one of those quilters, with two of my recent works in the book on pages 325 (Spring Rhapsody) and 406 (Summer Split). Each has been given a full page and details. I couldn't be more pleased with how well they made my work look. While chock full of wonderful pieces by artists from around the world, the book fits easily in the hand and is the size I love to pick up and browse through time after time.

Karey has chosen a wide variety of work that well represents the breath of work seen today.

Karey's introduction places this work in context with her statement: "Quilts created as art, destined from their inception to be displayed on walls, began to be noticed and acknowledged during the last quarter of the twentieth century. These art pieces are made with needle and thread instead of paint and brushes, but their creators' kinship to the painters of the past is as strong as their connection to women who hand-sewed traditional pieces in order to keep their families warm. Today's quilters draw from both sources. They've established a new genre of art." Emphasis mine.

The book can be obtained from Amazon and from other major book stores.

This would make a lovely Mothers' Day present.

Let me know what you think of this little book.

Nancy

From UFO to FO

Every now and then I get the urge to do something with one of the many unfinished objects that seem to accumulate in my craft closet.

Here's this week's completion: from last September's Barbara Olson Jumpstart your Creativity class. Like normal, I bent some of the class rules and only used a portion of the pattern she provided, as well as doing fusible applique instead of the turned version she prefers.

Now I need a name. Any suggestions?

-PJ-

(For more on Barbara, see http://www.barbaraolsonquiltart.com/)

Bollywood Update....

A Post From Debbie:

A while ago I wrote about my recycling venture with a cloth rice bag (empty of all its rice), a few strips of stash fabric, and some beads. Well the finished product has been finished for quite some time...but life intervenes and it's only now that I've come around to giving a little blog update.


My favorite part of the piece is the avalanche of seed beads coming out of the basket being held by the lovely lady that I've come to think of as "The Rice Princess."



Of course, when I started beading, I thought I'd be doing just a few lines of beads...mostly as an accent to what was actually printed on the cloth.

Ha!

Several lines into the beading, the whole thing seemed a bit sad and anemic looking.

And so I added a few more beads, and then a few more, and then a whole lot more.

I became intrigued with the way the beads piled up as more and more beads were closely attached to one another on the surface; And now, in its completed state, I like the elevated look and the bumpy, smooth feel of the beads.

The trick, of course, has been to stop myself from beading the entire surface...

So after beading the water (behind the Princess)...

And after beading parts of the Princess' outfit...




...and around the "Premium Quality" banner....







not to mention some of the top...


...I decided to call it quits (at least for now).

However, If truth be told, my fingers itch a little bit each time I pass the piece and I hear my box of beads calling out to me from time to time.

Sigh....


Best to all, Debbie

SAQA Auction Donation

I recently sent in my quilt for the annual SAQA Donation Auction. This is SAQA's biggest fundraiser of the year.

Many small, 12" x 12" works from a wonderful list of fiber artists (including a few from this group) will be available to don your walls come September.  My donation, "Amidst the Fire" is below. You can see more pieces here.

I can't wait for the frenzy in September to begin and the joy that comes from owning a small piece of art.

--Grace

Susan's work on the cover of Quilting Arts

My art is on the cover of the next issue of Quilting Arts magazine! I made this peacock feather piece called “Vanity” to demonstrate how you can use thread to highlight the element of line in your work. It’s featured in the second installment of my thread-sketching series, which will run through 2010. 

You can pre-order the April/May 2010 issue of Quilting Arts right now by clicking here. It will be going out to subscribers in the next few weeks, and on newsstands (including Barnes & Noble) soon after that.

Pretty Little Mini Quilts - Review

Pretty Little Mimi Quilts

At a posted request from Lark Books, I volunteered to do book reviews. This little 144 page book arrived along with 500 Art Quilts in my mail last week. Books are second only to chocolate in my list of things to love, so the opportunity to get free books to review was met with eagerness.

Pretty Little Mini Quilts, by Ray Hemachandra, is an enjoyable and easy read that feels good in the hand and is refreshing to read. It is well designed to intrigue the beginner to want to learn about quilting and to tackle a project.

There are 31 different projects that range from fairly traditional to very artsy. None of the projects require extensive knowledge or equipment to do. All are designed to be accomplished with minimal time and monetary investments - a boon in this economy. No quilt is larger than 36 inches.

Breezily written to inspire, it is not a detailed "how to" book. An experienced sewer will recognize missing details that may cause a problem for a beginner.

I could easily see a quilting grandmother using this book to introduce a grandchild to quilting. Another good use for the book would be a beginners' quilting class at a fabric shop. The projects are tempting and feel very doable.

In summary, this little book can help increase the numbers of new quilters, especially younger ones. It will not answer all the questions, but may help at least get a younger generation trying to find out some of the questions about quilting. And goodness knows, we do need to help the next generation discover the wonderful world of quilting!!

Enjoy.

Nancy

Susan will be on Pat Sloan’s Creative Talk Radio

Guess what? Pat Sloan is interviewing me and Pokey Bolton, editor in chief of Quilting Arts magazine, on her internet talk radio show on Monday, March 8 at 4 p.m. EST! Pat will be talking to me first, about my traditional quilts, and how I got started in art quilting. Then Pokey is scheduled to join in, and we’ll talk about different fiber art/quilt art techniques and materials.

You can tune in then and listen live online by going to Pat Sloan’s Creative Talk Radio. If you miss the live show, you can simply download it and listen later. (Remember, you can’t listen to my interview until Monday… But there are other fun interviews to keep you busy until then.)

We are also giving away a copy of my book, Appliqué Petal Party; a copy of my Piñata Purse pattern; and a set of my orchid series notecards! To enter the drawings, simply go to Pat’s blog on Monday, and leave a comment after her post about the show. Leave your comment on Pat’s blog by Friday, March 12 at noon EST.  

If you missed my mini-interview with Pat on my blog back in January, click here.

Pat’s a live wire, so this is bound to be bunches of fun. Please join us!

Exhibitions this month!

Nancy and Janet both have work in gallery exhibitions this weekend and next! Here are details:

“Barnes Studios: Gallery Opening”

Featuring fiber art by Nancy G Cook
Friday, Feb. 27, 5:30 to 9 p.m.
and Saturday and Sunday, Feb. 27-28, noon to 5 p.m. 
Barnes Studios
Foxcroft Gallery (by Ben & Jerry's next to Barrington’s Restaurant)
7820 Fairview Road, Charlotte NC
704.534.0577

“charlotte ARTery: 3rd Visual Art Exhibition”

An exhibition by Charlotte Artery artists, including Janet Lasher
Feb. 20 and 27
Hair Klaudt
1318 A8 Central Avenue
Plaza Midwood, Charlotte NC 28205
http://CharlotteArtery.com
704.942.4790

Hanging the “Sensuality Stitched” exhibition at DSBG

By Susan Brubaker Knapp



Today was an exciting day! We hung Fiber Art Options’ show, “Orchids: Sensuality Stitched,” at the Daniel Stowe Botanical Garden (DSBG). The photo above shows us almost done with hanging and arranging the pieces.

Here’s how we started (see photo below). We put all the pieces on the floor, and moved them around until we liked the pairings. All the pieces needed to be hung on this one hall, which is directly off the main entrance area. Some of the Daniel Stowe folks came by to admire and offer their opinions on what should hang where:



Here are some of the signs I designed that will hang with the exhibition. They will introduce the idea behind the exhibition, tell about the group, and explain the techniques we used.



P.J. Howard was our primary ladder climber (and doesn’t that light right over her head look like a little halo? She really is very angelic, but with a wicked sense of humor!). That’s Grace’s piece behind her, which references the bassist for the band KISS (Gene Simmons’) tongue.


Here’s Nancy Cook filling out a commission form (below). All of the pieces in the exhibition are for sale (the range is between $100 and $2,500) and the forms are an agreement between DSBG and the artists.



After all of the pieces were up, we stood back and decided if anything needed to go higher or lower, or be moved to a different spot. We tried to mix up the pieces (so that they were not grouped by artist) and to ensure that their placement complimented each other. Here is (from left:) Deborah Langsam, Grace Howes, and Nancy checking out the placement.



And here is the hall, almost done:



After that, we moved out into the main area to arrange the seven smaller pieces. Each one of us had done one 12 x 18" piece based on the same orchid species, a white Phalaenopsis with pink stripes. It was amazing how different each of these pieces were. Again, all were placed on a sheet on the floor and moved around until we found a pleasing arrangement.



Then came the measurements and the math, trying to place everything up on “the cube,” a moveable display. That’s Cynthia Klemmer, DSBG’s Director of Education, on the left, in purple. She stayed with us until we had the whole show up, and has been incredibly helpful and great to work with every step of the way as we got ready for the show.



There are even live orchids in the hall with our work!



For more information on our pieces, our processes, and our hanging systems, please see previous posts. Nancy has more great info and photos on her blog here: http://nancygcook.blogspot.com

And come see us at DSBG this weekend, Feb. 6 and 7, from noon to 4 p.m. each day. We’ll be doing walk-throughs of the exhibition and demonstrations. We’d love to see you!

Want to go?
Feb. 6 through March 14, 2010
Daniel Stowe Botanical Garden
Belmont, NC
704.825.4490
www.dsbg.org

Happy Jig and Hanging System Variation

by Nancy G Cook

Happy Jig, Happy Jig, all four orchid quilts are finished down to being signed, labeled and hanging systems completed. Sneak previews are available on my blog at http://nancygcook.blogspot.com.



Here is how the finished backs of my 4 orchid pieces look. My DH gave me some time, creativity, and skills to devise the hanging systems this morning.

Hint: You may want to stop reading here, if you do not want the full details of the hanging system.

The quilts hang from a non stretching cord that goes through a supporting form core which goes into a full sleeve. The full sleeve covers the back. The sleeve is sewed down to the top facing and the sides. The top of each sleeve side is left open for the first 4 inches and has a 1/4 inch tuck for ease. The bottom of the sleeve is hemmed and left open in order to insert the foam core.


Cord Cut at Angle and Glued to Stiffen

Cord is stiffened with glue to ease threading it through small openings in the foam core.


Wood Reinforcement for Foam Core

To keep the foam core from tearing, my DH cut, drilled and glued thin wooden reinforcers to each side of the drilled holes in the foam core. My DH is a wonder. He created this nice piece of engineering.


Close up of Wood Reinforcement and Cord

This photo shows the sleeve being pulled back to reveal the cord and reinforcement. We found that the quilt hangs better if the cord enters from the front to the back of the foam core The cord was threaded into the front of the foam core and then wrapped around the side of the foam core to the front to cross to the other side of the quilt. That leaves the knots next to the sleeve not the quilt as is seen in the photo.


Safety Pins Reduce Slack in Cord

When the widest quilt was hung we found that the cord showed above the quilt, so I used a hint from PJ to take up some slack with safety pins. The pins could be moved around until we removed sufficient slack.
Great idea PJ!!


Foam Core Details and Quilt Label

This photo shows the bottom of the quilt back showing the full sleeve, the quilt label and the information on the foam core.

Each foam core has the quilt title, my name, sizes and my telephone number. Each quilt has a label with even more contact information and a photograph of the inspiration.

Hope this explanation is not too confusing.

The Back of a Piece

I thought I'd show the back of an orchid piece, with the hanging mechanics that seem to be working for me. Here's the top of the back with a few notations. The hanging "sleeve" is essentially an upside-down pocket handsewn onto the back facing. A piece of foam core (cut to size and edges taped) is slid up into the sleeve. The hanging wire passes through 2 holes in the lower corners of the foam core, about 2" up & 2" over from the corners. I used coffee stirrers to reinforce the holes. The wire runs through these and is twisted together and taped down on the backside of the foam core. Small gold safety pins hold the wire to the sleeve so the piece doesn't flop forward when it's hung.

On the bottom of the back, there are 2 triangular "pockets" into which a narrower piece of foam core (again with taped edges) is slipped. This overall piece is a little under 24"x36", which means a 20"x30" piece of foam core isn't quite wide enough to be used as is. By cutting the top piece of foam core to about 23"x17", there was enough leftover to cut the "weight" for the bottom. -- PJ--

4th Quilt Finally Finished

Orchid Rhythms: Stems and Leaves

Wow, it has taken a while but I have finally finished the fourth quilt for our upcoming exhibition Orchids: Sensuality Stitched.

The photo above is a detail preview of one of them. For other previews, see my blog at: http://nancygcook.blogspot.com/


Fiber Art Options met last week and we got to see several of the pieces that were ready for the show. I am really delighted to be in this great group. Lots of variety, lots of different styles and the quality is high throughout. A real honor to be among such great artists.

We deliver the work this coming Thursday. Hope the roads have cleared of ice and snow by then. Opening of the show this coming Saturday and Sunday will feature many of us doing talks, walk throughs and demonstrations from 12 to 4 both days.

Nancy