In November, I went on the road with teaching stops at two retreat centers—first at AQT on the shores of Lake Tahoe in Nevada, the second at Woodland Ridge Retreat in Wisconsin. I’ll be covering those workshops in this week’s and next week’s Saturday posts. But before I get too far with my AQT class, I’m putting out a call for fabric collage “Finish Line” submissions with a sun/moon theme for a special Solstice post on Saturday, December 21, two weeks from now.

In both my November classes, my sun and moon patterns were popular choices for student projects, as they have been through the years. In my Tahoe class, my returning student, Anita Liberman-Lampear (above) took a combination of the two patterns to create a nestled pair which she has already titled, “Flaming Affair.”

If you have created a finished sun or moon fabric collaged portrait, based on my patterns or not, and would like to share them on the upcoming Finish Line: Solstice post, please click on the submit button below. The deadline to make sure your quilt gets included is Wednesday, December 18—with a special invitation to my most recent celestial students from NV (pictured above and below—scroll over photos for their names to pop up), and WI (in next week’s post). It’s always helpful to have a deadline!

Submit Quilt for "Finish Line"

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I’ve taught at Art Quilt Tahoe twice before, but in a different building—both impressive, airy and open structures. This year’s classroom could be viewed from a third floor lobby balcony, which I took advantage of to get these overhead photos below. What an interesting vantage point.

These photos were taken on the fourth and final day for most of these students. One feature of my AQT classes is that students have the option to stay on two more days for an extended session. Six students stayed the extra days and were able to get farther along on their projects. In the case of Bev Agler with her green rhino below, she put away her blue Ugandan Shoebill collage after the four days and took out her lime green rhino collage. She began that one earlier this year at Empty Spools Seminars in CA, and was now ready to begin contemplating a background for the fellow in the remaining two days.

Another returning student from past classes, Candi Smith, brought back her sea turtle begun in this Empty Spools class, and has the turtle just about finished after this week’s work—see him in the background of the photo below, and in the student slideshow a little farther in the post. Candi also brought back her matching sea turtle pincushion (above). I included that little guy in my “traveling pincushions” post of earlier this fall, and here he was again!

The landscape around our classrooms even viewed from inside was inspirational, with towering trees, giant pinecones everywhere you look, and the great expanse of Lake Tahoe always close by. In the photo below, my classroom is up the hillside on the left—those are “our” windows. The week was quite lovely weather-wise, and as there’s quite a bit of walking involved getting around to the various buildings of the retreat center for classes, dining, and lodging, the sunny and mild days were appreciated.

One particularly beautiful day, I made some time for a mid-day stroll out the boardwalk and took this photo. I also took many, many photos of the sunlight dancing on the rocks below the water—like curling ribbons of rainbow. It was hard to edit them down for the post. I’m sure you’d be as mesmerized as I was. But have no fear, I only included three of them in the “scenics slideshow” later in this post.

On my way to lunch, I took the photo below as the resident paddleboat took a spin around the lake. Looking at the photo later I noticed that I caught three of my students enjoying their lunch break.

All-in-all, I had eight returning students in this class. Some finished work was brought back for a show and tell—Jenny Satterthwait’s buffalo and a nearly-finished pup portrait (above left), and Andrea Van Voorhis’ giant macaw and cat trio (above right). Aside from the pup, the other three have been featured in past Finish Line posts—click on the above links to see and read more about these quilts, including close-ups. I had only seen them finished via photos before this week, so what a treat it was to see the finished work in person. Thanks for bringing them along, Jenny and Andrea!

My AQT Ladies of 2019, left to right: front row on grass—Valerie Michael, Nancy Thibodeau, me, Judy Bilardello, Jenny Satterthwait, and Brenda Bacon; middle row standing—Jane Frank, Toni Shattenberg, Renea Rambo, Anita Liberman-Lampear, Glenda Mah, Judy Morganthall, and Debra Heltzel; back row peeking over shoulders—Pamela Carroll, Bev Agler, Monica Kaseman, Karen Johnston, Candi Smith, and Laurena Grabert; towering majestically above us all—Katie Phillips; regrettably absent from class photo—Andrea Van Voorhis and Lois Hunter.

It’s not often that I have someone in a class that gets their subject(s) collaged and has the time to move to the background, but such was the case for Laurena Grabert and her guinea fowl above. It was quite fun for me to see this collage develop.

I get immense satisfaction from the progress of all my students, it’s why I’m still doing what I do. Putting together slideshows like the one below, I see the step-by-step progress of each project and each person, and I’m proud of every one of them—great job, ladies—and thanks for sharing. Enjoy the show everyone.

Student In-Progress Slideshow

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As you can see, this was one big class to wrangle and it was a good thing I had a helper for the week, Marylee Drake (pictured with me below left). She clocked in a few miles the first couple days especially, searching out extra tables and pinning boards, then rearranging said tables and boards. And the irons, and the classroom keys, and…. Thanks Marylee.

One student, Karen Johnston, chose a dragon as her subject, above right and below. Dragons are one of those subjects that could be “anything goes” as they’re mythical beings—though Tolkien (and others) may have said otherwise. In any case, Karen based her creature on historical drawings from centuries old texts, and pinned copies of those prints along her board as inspiration while she worked.

We’ve posted a few blogs on copyright, and what Karen shared are good examples of where to find images for our creations, a recurring question from both my students and blog followers. A couple of the books below are from Dover Publications. These books have compiled images, many from the 19th Century and earlier, drawings and prints that have long since aged into the Public Domain and are therefore copyright and royalty free. I fell in love with Dover books and their illustrations for artists and craftsmen back in high-school and long before the internet, so I have a quite a few of their books that I still like to cuddle up with and draw inspiration from.

Karen’s dragon, however, came from the digitally cataloged page (above and below left—also in public domain) from an 1801 illustrated nature book by Friedrich Justin and Carlo Bertuch. The book is described as a, “Picture book for children: containing a pleasant collection of animals, plants, fruits… accompanied by a statement appropriate to the mind’s powers of a child.” They certainly didn’t underestimate children a couple hundred years ago. Having just now tried to track down the Heidelberg University source material to provide a link for you, I kinda ran out of time, but you may have more time or luck if you’re interested. If you click on any of these photos, you’ll get larger versions with relevant info for the source material.

When not inside a classroom, there’s plenty of beautiful scenery to take in and absorb. The photos below are examples of the retreat center itself, the view out my bedroom window (not too bad), and one of the building that housed students and a couple classrooms.

The Art Quilt Tahoe retreat includes classes by quite a few instructors, and two that have become friends over the years are Sue Benner and Katie Pasquini Masopust (a.k.a. Katie PM). Here we are on our early morning walk—time to catch up, take in the fresh air, and oh yes, get some exercise.

We try to keep a steady pace, but photo ops do give us a break once-in-awhile—a few are included in the slideshow below.

Lake Tahoe Scenic Slideshow

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Part of the retreat atmosphere is a quilt show that hangs in the big meeting/dining room which includes quilts of past AQT student work from all different instructors, yearly challenge quilts, and teachers’ quilts. Below is Sue Benner with her two self-portrait quilts that were on exhibit and so different from her usual artwork. I had seen photos of them, but nothing like the real thing—so fun to see in person, they made me smile as much as she does.

On the left: Self-Portrait as Bride, 62 H X 45 W in, 2017, textile collage on cotton sheet with Mira Fujita image. On the Right: Self-Portrait Age-Progressed, 62 H X 45 W in, 2017, textile collage on print of Self-Portrait as Bride: by Sue Benner

After every lunch and dinner, one of us instructors gives a short talk. Sue included a bit of the story of her portrait quilts—her thought process for making these images, observations of life and hairstyles. You can read some of it and see a short video, plus many more amazing quilts of hers at this link.

One evening, there was a surprise visit by Joe Cunningham who will be one of next year’s AQT instructors. I’ve only met Joe once before (in Australia of all places), but he lives relatively close to the Lake Tahoe area. I enjoyed his talk and seeing him again—he’s quite funny, and musical too. His quilts are full of color and imagination and really make you think about what you’re looking at. I can’t remember the title of the one below, but it’s something about marriage. It gave me a laugh and I snapped the photo. Click here to see more of his quilts in Joe’s website gallery.

Both Sue and I have teaching ensembles that are fun to wear. For me, they’re like power-outfits to encourage my students to “cut loose and let go”—why not add a little more color and pattern? Sue, however, has a more sophisticated style. Neither of us, though, could outshine Katie’s extracurricular creation, Dolores the river otter, decorated for an artist auction next year to benefit a local river conservancy near where Katie lives in California.

I got the photo below as Katie arrived at the retreat, with Dolores strapped in as travel companion.

After the grand unveiling at Katie’s lunchtime talk, people thronged up to see fabric-collaged and lacquered Dolores, who was on display for the retreat duration in the pop-up fabric shop. When I get some more info about this mid-2020 otter event—location tour and auction—I’ll send out an update!

I’m going to close this post with a very small sampling of the many AQT participant quilts that were on display—three of these four quilts just happen to be made by former students of mine (always proud of them!), though not begun in any of my classes. You can click on the photos to see the quilts larger and to read the write-ups each artist included—interesting stories all of them.

Patricia Smith’s collage quilt, “A Brave New World,” was included in AQT’s 21-year Anniversary Challenge: Freedom. Patricia and her ostrich chick went on to win the vote for Best in Show! I met Patricia three years ago in my Tahoe class where she began a colorful and expression-full cape buffalo named Albert, who can be seen in this Finish Line post.

“A Brave New World,” by Patricia Smith

Dorene Beck (and her sister Jackie Lehto), took a class with me two years ago at Woodland Ridge Retreat in WI where Dorene made a beautiful (multi-colored) white swan. In her submission to this year’s AQT Challenge, Dorene combined techniques learned from multiple classes she had taken. “Jumping for Joy” was voted 1st Place in the Challenge quilts!

“Jumping for Joy,” by Dorene Beck

Paulette Hawkins was in my AQT 2017 class  beginning a sweet memory quilt of her dog Sir William. Later his portrait quilt was included in this Finish Line post, along with another of Paulette’s quilts. Paulette came and said hi when we were both at Empty Spools Seminars this past spring and showed me this elephant collage, almost ready for quilting—how fun to see “Pachyderm Packs a Lunch” finished and to read its story.

The AQT quilt show included many fine quilts, but I was attracted to this quilt by Carole Frocillo by her use of color and texture and sentiment. “After the Fire” won 2nd Place in the Challenge quilts and is created with a variety of textural fabrics, netting, couching, and beading to illustrate resiliency and perseverance—in Carole’s words, challenging us to “… step forward with the freedom to imagine the possibilities of a new day.”

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