Art Every Day, Thursday, Aug 8, 2013

Good Evening,

Here is today's new piece.  I taught the first part of an introductory free motion class this afternoon and it got me jonesing to do some myself.  I mentioned the other day that I didn't have any stuff at home to make my dailies with so while straightening up at the studio Tuesday I selected a bunch of scraps from my bunch of "uglies" (I pretty much get the stuff from the dye pot that is damaged, ugly, or unsaleable for what ever reason) and took them home with me to bone up my supply there.  My little stash included several pieces of fabrics with stamped designs along with a bunch of left over blocks that I made when putting together a free style pieced quilt a while back.  So, you'll be seeing some of those leftovers over the next few weeks.  I've been really busy at the studio during the day, so like yesterday, I made this piece at home.

Now, on with the critique.  I began with the three leaf stamps and ripped them so that there was as little background showing as possible.  I ripped three pieces of contrasting fabrics to lay beneath the stamped blocks then ripped a piece of background fabric.  I layered the green background on top of green batting then "scattered" the darker blue and violet rectangles then placed the stamped blocks on top of those, sort of kattywampus. 

 The leaf prints are stitched along their outline and down the center vein then the blocks are outlined and so are the blocks behind them.  All of this was done with a medium blue green tone of thread (remember that tones go well with a mix of colors).  Then, I went a little overboard on the quilting in the green negative space.  I repeated the two motifs that are contained within the leaves; squiggly lines and swirls.  I like the quilting, but even though it's done in a thread color that is just a bit darker than the fabric, it's so decorative that it begins to overwhelm the quietude of the drifting leaves as it pulls the background into the mid ground.   I knew this was going to happen, but I wanted to quilt it decoratively anyway.  I wanted to serve myself with the pleasure of free motioning more than I wanted to serve this little quilt!

Till tomorrow,

Heather