The Finish Line: The Fabric Collage Quilts of Joanne Hannon Shaw

This post is the second in a series of three “Finish Line” posts featuring students who excel at fabric collage. The three I chose—Darlene Determan, Joanne Hannon Shaw, and Marilyn Davidson—are all long-time students. They continue to come to my classes mostly because it gives us all a chance to see each other once or twice a year and share our love of this art form.

As you will see from their work, they are all three accomplished artists. I give them pointers and encouragement still, and they tell me the value of my insight into their work, but at this point any improvements they make to their technique will be more a matter of their hard work than my guidance.

Enjoy these three consecutive blog posts featuring each one of these three fabric collage artists.

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Joanne Hannon Shaw is from Toronto, Alberta, Canada. She attended one of my Maine Quilt Retreats with a friend in 2012. She’s been crossing the border back to Maine ever since.

Like Darlene Determan and Marilyn Davidson she took to the technique immediately. From the beginning she studied the image of her subject very closely, picking out details and trying to recreate them. That often is the hardest thing to teach: to truly see, not what you think you ought to see, but what is really there. Through the years Joanne’s ability to see true has only improved. As she became more confident and more proficient, I have had to point out details to her less and less frequently.

In fact—and I say this with affection—Joanne is one student who asks for my honest opinion then decides whether or not she’s going to take my advice. She has such a strong vision of how she wants a piece to look that she will often overrule my guidance and make it work her way. All roads lead to Rome, they say, and there are just as many roads to fabric collage.

In previous blog posts I’ve talked about working in drafts. First, second, third draft, each adding more detail and polish. As you may gather from her in-progress photos below, Joanne tends to skip the first draft and work toward a second or third draft straight away. I suppose she would call them first drafts, but they tend to be more finely-tuned than what most people would consider first drafts. That’s just her way of working.

You may—or may not—notice that Joanne is quite a fan of Kaffe Fassett fabrics. She uses lots of his bright, large, often floral-motif fabrics. It’s fabric you’d immediately recognize when used in larger amounts, but Joanne breaks up the motifs so that they aren’t as recognizable and therefore less distracting. They all work together with other bold prints—often printed batiks—to create a cohesive image.

As usual any of the smaller images can be clicked on for a larger view.

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River Cruising (2015)

“This was my first project with Susan. The original photo was taken on a 25th Anniversary trip with my husband Ric, to Europe in 2012 and I remember thinking what a great memory of our trip this would be. Also, I was about to travel to Harpswell, Maine in a couple of months time to try fabric collage with Susan. It never occurred to me that perhaps starting out simpler would be a better thought. This piece took two years of figuring it all out but I was captivated by this collage process. This method of temporarily glueing fabric in place allows me to be noncommittal and that suits me very well.”

 

Crowning Glory (January 2016)

“I found this image on morguefiles.com, a web site that allows artists, teachers, and students to use these as a reference as long as they are not exact copies of the photos but rather an adaption in part or whole of the original image. I was attracted to the mantle of the ram’s horn, hence I named my second effort “Crowning Glory.” In this piece I decided to cut the image out and place it onto a hand dyed fabric that felt perfect for the background. The background felt calming and showcased the ram in all his glory.”

 

“Purr…fectly Russian Blue” (July 2016)

“This piece began with a Northcott Fabric challenge to be showcased at an outdoor Quilt Show held every year in Toronto, Canada called “Quilts at the Creek.” I had five blue fat quarters to be featured in this piece and had thought of using an image of a Russian Blue cat.”

“Collaged backgrounds are challenging for me but I definitely wanted to try it for this piece. Susan suggested diagonals and my dear friend Marilyn, suggested a garden setting, so I went about creating the background with these starting points in mind. The compliment of blue is orange which worked so beautifully behind the cat.”

 

Berrylicious (August 2018)

“When I saw this image taken by my photographer friend and Joel Davidson, I could immediately see the possibilities to create a whimsical character with fabric collage. I asked him for permission to use his image and he graciously agreed. This would end up being my most challenging piece to date.”

“There were several false starts! Eventually, I settled with a fabric pallet and began my process. I often walk away for periods of time and return to a lightbulb moment! Every piece is a learning curve but that’s what I love the most.”

“In my stash I have several pieces of hand painted fabrics by Mickey Lawler and one of these would turn out to be a perfect setting for a background of this bear, as he was originally photographed up in a tree. The next crucial decision that I made was to not quilt this one with my domestic machine. Up to this point, I had quilted my own pieces but I now have come to the conclusion that quilting on a long arm machine is better suited. I knew how I wanted the background to look reflecting a forest of trees and simple curved quilting on the fur. I found a wonderful quilter who was willing to try this even though she had not done a non-traditional quilt before this project. Rose Bell did a superb job! Berrylicious was juried into the Road to California Quilt Show 2019 and received the Viewers Choice Award. It has been selected as a semi finalist for the Spring 2019 Paducah Show.”

 

Turtles (in progress: 2018 to present)

“Currently, working with this sketch from a family photo. I recently pulled apart the last four turtles on the right to begin again. I am expecting my calendar to become clear in the month of May so that I can properly dedicate the time necessary to properly focus on this once again.”

I look forward to when I next have Joanne in class—and I’m pretty sure I’ll be seeing those turtles again. Whatever she chooses to work on, it will be bright and bold with touches of subtlety thrown in, a lovely reflection of her own personality.