A Special Finish Line: Road to California Showcase 2019

I never tire of showing off my students’ quilts in these Finish Line blog posts. It’s my small way of recognizing their hard work and the inspiration that they in turn, give to others.

Recently, however, some of my students were recognized in a big way: by being accepted into the Road to California Quilters’ Conference and Showcase. Six of my former students (that I know of) showed quilts that had been started in one or another of my classes.

My thanks for alerting me to this lovely occurrence goes to Judy Crotts who announced the acceptance of her quilt on the private Facebook page for my Patreon supporters. Laurie Lile and Randa Mulford chimed in that their quilts had also been accepted. I quickly asked the three, who were going to attend the show, to get some photographs so I could include them in this post. That’s them above (left to right: Laurie, Judy, and Randa) in front of Laurie’s quilt “On the Edge.”

I then remembered that another student, Joanne Hannon Shaw, also had a quilt accepted. And when Judy, Laurie, and Randa got to the show, they spotted two other student works by Pam Hadfield and Roxanne Nelson bringing the total to six.

All six quilters are certainly deserving of the honor of being in the Road to California show, as you will see below. They’ve done some wonderful work. I’m very proud for lending a hand in helping them on their way to earning such recognition.

I’ve chosen to feature them in alphabetical order. I have provided links to the blog posts of the class where they started their quilts. Each sent me a few notes about their quilts, from which I have selected extracts. The smaller images can be clicked on to be enlarged.

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“Through Corbin’s Eyes” by Judy Crotts

Judy started this fabric collage quilt of her grandson at an Empty Spool Seminar in March 2018. Judy picked a pose of his that spoke to her. It was in part because of this close connection to the image that Judy persevered through the challenges she faced with this, her first fabric collage quilt.

Who could resist those eyes? I surely couldn’t. In trying to find a subject for Susan’s 2018 Empty Spools Seminar, I had narrowed it down to two photos of my grandson. One photo was a profile and the other was a full face with those eyes. Susan had suggested if you wanted to do a portrait chose an adult, profile and no hands. Well, that was three strikes, but those eyes. Susan explained the challenges of both photos and said she would support me with whichever one I chose. I wonder what she really thought when I showed up with those eyes?

I think one of the hardest steps is just getting started. Having no idea even what colors I wanted to use (I think I brought half of my stash), I just started placing light fabrics in the highlighted areas and dark fabrics in the shaded areas. Soon the fabric began speaking to me. “I look like hair. I look like contours. I look like shading.” I love the thrill of finding the perfect piece of fabric for the perfect spot. Slowly Corbin’s face began to take shape and each additional piece of fabric seemed to bring him to life. The initial colors did change over the course of the project. I’d discovered a new fabric that was perfect and that would cause a change in ear color.

With the face nearly finished, I now needed to find fabric for the carpet he was laying on and the shirt. These kinds of decisions seemed to paralyze me for weeks. I wanted these areas to compliment and not compete with the face. The carpet fabric came to me in the middle of the night, “That piece of Kaffe fabric resembles a Persian carpet.” Perfect. The shirt fabric took weeks of auditioning. I kept trying shades of the colors used in the face and nothing was working. Finally I tried something completely different, a piece of shirting material I had. I still wasn’t convinced it was perfect, but as I started adding the highlights and shading, I liked the way the light blue complimented the other colors.

Susan supported me through the many self-imposed challenges and encouraged me to push on and the result was “Through Corbin’s Eyes”

 

I’ll be back at Empty Spools this May with Susan again, ready for more inspiration. Maybe I’ll try a dog this time?

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“KoKo” by Pam Hadfield

Pam Hadfield started this quilt at Empty Spools in February 2017. I featured this quilt in a previous Finish Line as well.

When I was looking for a project to do in her class I found the image of a clown I liked which reminded me of my cousin who was a rodeo clown when I was a little girl. I still have vivid memories of watching him from bleachers in a rodeo arena in Star Valley, Wyoming. Great memories great fun. This image came from a Suzy Pal design which I did get permission to use her image and have sent her a picture of my finished project. I submitted it to Road to California quilt show and was fortunate enough to get juried in.

This was such a fun project to make. It’s far different than anything I have done in the past. It’s such a fun process I would like to try my hand at this again.

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“Berrylicious” by Joanne Hannon Shaw

Joanne Hannon Shaw is a longtime, repeat student. She began “Berrylicious” in  my October 2016 Portland, Maine Advanced Retreat. She returned with the quilt the next year in my October 2017 Portland, Maine Advanced Retreat. But like many of my other students, she did much of the work at home, finishing it up and bringing it for show-and-tell to last year’s October 2018 Portland, Maine Advanced Retreat.

Congratulations to Joanne who took home the “Viewers’ Choice” award at this Road to California show!

I was totally inspired when I saw Joel Davidson’s photo of this bear and immediately saw a character lurking in the shadows. This was going to be my most challenging piece to date. Once permission was received, I dove right into my fabrics. With a few false starts behind me, gradually I began to hear its voice speaking and the character emerging.

Here’s is the progress Joanne made during the first class:

By the time she returned for the second class she had made good progress. Notably, she had worked out the branch that would hold the berries, but had a ways to go yet:

I gravitate toward jewel tones in my colour choices and also work in some detail as part of my process.

 

Susan’s book, Serendipity Quilts, started my journey of discovery and fabric collage. Her collage method allows me to not be totally committed which suits me perfectly and I especially enjoy finding those transition pieces of fabric to smooth the way from one colour to another.

Saturday mornings I sit back with a cup of coffee in hand ready to read Susan’s blog and on this particular morning was feeling a little disappointed because I had entered for the first time in a juried show and had not been accepted, or so I thought! Forgetting to allow for time change between coasts I was elated to see an email letting me know that “Berrylicious” was indeed juried into the Road to California Quilt Show 2019.

 

A big thanks to Susan for imparting on me her love of collage!

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“On the Edge” by Laurie Lile

Laurie Lile was in the same class as Pam Hadfield in Empty Spools in February 2017. Laurie took the class with her mom, Susan Lile, whose finished goldfish quilt can be seen in this Finish Line #6 blog post.

Here are some of Laurie’s progress photos from the class:

I felt like I accomplished a good amount of work during the class, but I set the quilt aside for some time after I returned home. I pinned it to my design wall, and that bighorn sheep stared at me for several months until I pulled out my fabric scraps again. Amid the drifts of fabric that enveloped my sewing room, bit by bit, I found the rest of the bighorn sheep and the rock ledge he was standing on. I painted the sky background and glued the collage to it for the final composition. I love the end result and I am excited to start my next collage project.

As you can see, Laurie did the majority of the work on her own once she got home to her studio. These next in-progress shots show her work during that home time:

Every piece presents unique challenges. For Laurie, one such challenge was the rocky slope on which the big-horn sheep is standing. In the private Patreon Facebook page, Laurie posted the photos below requesting feedback from other members. I think she nailed the rocks.

The asymmetrical balance that Laurie used for positioning that bighorn against the background is very effective. Just by leaving that vast expanse of empty sky, Laurie has told us (without having to show it) that that sheep is precariously perched way up on a cliff wall. I don’t know about you, but it makes me a bit anxious for him.

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“Samba Selfie” by Randa Mulford

“Samba Selfie” by Randa Mulford was begun in my class at Art Quilt Tahoe in November 2017, though I first met Randa the year prior at AQT 2016, where she began another large portrait, of a purple dog. I talk about that quilt “Winnie,” in this Finish Line #7 blog post.

I started this quilt in my second Art Quilt Tahoe workshop with Susan. She had warned me off attempting this image for the first workshop: one face is hard, two would be harder; faces straight on are harder than those turned somewhat; flesh tones would be harder than more fanciful colors. All this was still true for my second project, but I wouldn’t be deterred because I really loved this selfie of my daughter and her friend, costumed to participate in a samba event during their time as students in Chile.

Of course, Susan was right. Finding two sets (rosy and peachy) of low contrast, flesh tone fabrics (ideally batiks) was a challenge, as was using them effectively to “paint” the faces. My motto for the first face (on the right) became “When in doubt, stick a daisy on it!” When I finished the face itself, I thought “the hard part is over now”, only to discover that creating the contours of the neck, shoulders, and collarbones was no less daunting.

We won’t even mention all those little strips of fabric to make the bangs. I had them all pretty well glued tacked in place (too many too narrow strips to hold well with pins) when Tom and Susan suggested that the skin underneath the bangs needed to be darker. So I ended up gluing lots of narrow strips of skin between all the little narrow strips of hair—fun! (But of course they were right, it looked better with that change.)

I particularly like how the second (left) face came out, with green organza on the eyelids. For this face, the motto was “When in doubt, stick a paisley on it!” and that worked. Plus, the hair was easy, no bangs! I was really glad to turn my attention to the “easy” flowered headpieces after all that skin!

The background of the original photo was uninspiring (backs of other women getting dressed), so I created a scene of a time and place that we shared with our daughter during a visit to Chile. It was New Years Eve on the shore of Lake Llanquihue in Puerto Varas, Chile with the Osorno volcano in the background and fireworks over the lake. I even stuck in the Southern Cross constellation so it would be clear that this was the Southern Hemisphere.

I’m very pleased with how the piece came out, despite all the challenges. When the collage was all glued and finished, but before I quilted it, I had a high quality photo taken. I resized this to 18″ square (less than half of the original size) and sent it to Spoonflower, where I had two copies printed on cotton fabric. I quilted these for the girls as holiday gifts (above photo), so they could each have a “mini” copy of their quilt until I’m ready to pass the original along.

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“Technicolor Dream Parrot” by Roxanne Nelson

Roxanne Nelson started her “Technicolor Dream Parrot” in my 2018 Calgary, Alberta, Canada class.

A year ago I had the opportunity of a lifetime—the chance to learn from Susan Carlson, the inspirational quilter who I have admired for years. At the Calgary workshop I selected my favorite subject, a parrot, to learn her process of collage quilts. I love color and the parrot allowed me to say yes to every fabric in my stash. Susan helped me to find my artistic voice with words of encouragement that I will always treasure. I am sure that there has never been a student in her class that cut such tiny pieces of fabric.

Although I am a diehard fuser, in my current projects I use her pinning technique to audition fabrics before fusing. It allows me to place, view, walk away, reconsider, reposition without fusing until I am satisfied. I finished the parrot in early 2018. I entered “Technicolor Dream Parrot” into the Houston International Quilt Festival and was juried in. Recently, “Technicolor Dream Parrot” was awarded a third place ribbon in the Animals Category at the Road to California quilt show. Thank you Susan for your amazing kindness and encouragement.

The value of the workshop is incalculable. I generally work in isolation and the chance to work on a project for four intense days and to share challenges, laughs and tears with other quilters is something I will always cherish. It is through this type of workshop that we grow as art quilters as we are challenged to look at fabric in a totally new way and to have no fear—just glue it!

Congratulations to Roxanne for winning a third place ribbon in the Animals category at this year’s Road to California—and for the acceptance to last year’s Houston International Quilt Festival as well. And yes, she could also win a ribbon for using the smallest pieces of fabric in her image—and that’s saying quite a bit coming from me.

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Thanks again to Judy, Randa, and Laurie for taking the show photos and keeping their eyes out for other fabric collage quilts. If any other quilts begun in my classes were present, I’d be happy to edit them into this post. Just contact me through the contact link on my website.

And keep sending more finished quilt photos—I enjoy each and every one, and look forward to more themed Finish Line posts.