The Fabric Collage Finish Line: Online Submissions 14

Happy National Public Lands Day! Today, September 26, 2020, all United States National Park sites that normally charge an entrance fee will offer free admission to everyone. Hope you can get out and enjoy the outdoors today.

In Jane Kennedy’s portrait of her beloved Ginger (photo above), she celebrates the National Parks they traveled to in a very simple yet fun background—what a great way to tell Ginger’s story.

Enjoy all the following Fabric Collage Finish Line quilts. This week they come from quilters around the United States and from Australia (Good on ya, mate!). Ginger’s portrait is followed by a cat, a big cat, a big bird, and big dragon. Each is made with love and care and fabulous fabric. A reminder that all the photos can be viewed larger by clicking on the image.

If you have a fabric collage quilt you would like to submit for inclusion in a future Finish Line Post, please use the link below.

Submit Quilt for "Finish Line"

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Support the Blog and Learn Online with a Monthly Patreon Donation

As a reminder, our “thank you’s” to Patreon supporters have recently changed. Most importantly, I am now using Zoom to hold monthly Patreon Show and Share meetings. This past Tuesday was our first, and Tom and I are excited with how well it went. Three $20 per month supporters volunteered to receive feedback from me on their in-progress work. Special thanks to these brave souls: Juliet Sandquist, Leslie Dickinson, and Jane Munsell, though we apologize that the recording did not include the windows of you live, we can hear you, just not see your lovely faces (Tom has since figured out how to fix that!).

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The evening was such fun for me, we decided to open up and share September’s inaugural event and the resulting video—all hour and twenty minutes of it—to all of my blog readers. Here is a lightly edited version for those of you wondering what these monthly meetings are like and how I can possibly give feedback over the computer.

 

To register for next month’s Patreon Show and Share, new members will have to sign up with Patreon before October 1, 2020. This is because all Patreon accounts are charged only at the beginning of the month. Patreon supporters at the $5 per month level and up will be invited to attend the monthly meetings and ask any and all questions they may have. Video feedback is offered to supporters at the $20 per month level. The resulting recordings are then archived on the Patreon site to be viewed by any $5+ members at any time.

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Jane Kennedy

Jane Kennedy of Hendersonville NC first took a workshop with me in October 2019, where she says she fell in love with fabric collage. Her first quilt of Ginger can be found in this Finish Line post. In our recent Patreon Show and Share meeting someone asked how to handle whiskers on a cat (if you can’t find the right fabric print, you can always stitch them in), which led to a discussion of how to handle sparse hair like the hairs on a horse’s chin. Look at the inside of Ginger’s ears. See how the white pine-needly fabric works to create the fuzzy insides of the ears? Brilliant work, Jane.

From Jane:

This is my second quilt of ginger. The first one I did in class. Ginger was a pet I had, who died several years ago. We would travel in a motor home. I found the fabric of the national parks and thought this would be a fitting tribute to all the places where she went. This fabric collage technique is addicting!

Jane also submitted this quilt of a cat of her acquaintance. She says that once she starts one of these quilts it’s hard for her to do anything else. “These are so much fun! I was finally able to complete this quilt after attending the video background sessions from July (Thursday Night in My Studio Live!). They helped me become unstuck! Thanks!!”

From Jane:

My friend’s daughter has a cat named Harvey. He has a unique mark on his face, that gives him such character. He has such a great personality and is so lovable. When I took this photo of him, I thought it would be a perfect way to display him in a quilt.

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Cathy Smith

I thought this quilt by Cathy Smith of Jimboomba, Queensland, Australia, paired especially well with Jane Kennedy’s “Harvey” (above). Cathy made two quilts prior to this one using my book, Serendipity Quilts, then used the Fabric Collage Online Master Class for “Snarl!”

Cathy mentioned that it took her a few tries to get the “snarl” right. Well Cathy, you did it. You’re spot on with the entire scrunched and angry expression. I hope your son wasn’t too close to that fellow! Very nice use of the fabrics you challenged yourself with.

From Cathy:

The photo was taken by my son Danny on safari in South Africa. The group was told not to use flash, and someone did, just as Danny was about to snap his picture. He sent it to me in black and white, so the values were very obvious. Having previously used batiks, I based this quilt on Kaffe Fassett fabric, which was a definite challenge. The mane is mostly tone on tone. The snarl took me at least 6 tries to get something that worked.

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Susie Eaton

Susie Eaton from Farmington, Missouri, impressed me with this submission, her first fabric collage quilt. Her telling of the story of her journey to fabric collage, below, is humorous and touching. Susie has learned fabric collage strictly online, watching my videos, attending the Thursday Night in My Studio presentations, and using the Fabric Collage Master Class Manual.

This great blue heron collage seems otherworldly to me. Susie’s use of color, the use of value to indicate form, the addition of textural elements with cheesecloth and yarn—is captivating. Notice especially the difference in the wings. The light is coming from above so the top of the right wing is in highlight while the underside of the left wing is in shadow. Yes Susie, you have both aptitude and talent.

From Susie:

My retirement at age 70, five years ago now, opened the door to new possibilities that full time work had really suppressed. Art looked like it would be something fun to explore, so I dived in, not knowing if I had any aptitude or talent. What an exciting trip that has been! I was like a drunken honeybee in a world of flowers. One of those flowers was fabric manipulation, which I found early in 2019. I was widowed in August 2019.

 

During those first numb months it slowly dawned on me that the rest of my life could be whatever I wanted, not just a new chapter, but a whole new book to write. I happened across Susan Carlson on YouTube. Wow! Look at those colors! That joy expressed through fabric collage! Yes, please, I’d like some of that.

 

I read her blogs. I looked at fabric collage by so many talented artists, but I kept returning to Susan’s approach. So free, so exciting!

 

My good friend and I enrolled in the MasterClass in February 2020. I came across a photo, among several hundred photos I’ve saved for painting inspiration, and it absolutely made my heart expand. I’ll tell you why in just a minute or so.

I got the photo enlarged so I could make a pattern for a piece 36” x 48”. Go big, right? I traced my pattern, and pinned my first piece of fabric 3-23-20. We watched Thursday night live visits to Susan’s studio. We mulled over teaching points. We learned.

 

I applied nearly everything I had read about, watched, and studied and made every mistake possible while creating the first wing.

Working big means a lot of stretching and a lot of aching back muscles. My fingers became unwilling pin cushions. The pelican blade scissors are sharp enough to use as a scalpel, and I have the healed over slash to prove it. Bandaids joined my working supplies. I used way too much or way too little glue. (Yes, I glued right through to the felt cover of my foam board.) I soaked off bad choices. I covered up good ones. I ran out of straight pins. Twice. I fell victim to fabric addiction facilitated by online shopping. I’m not seeking a cure.

 

By the time I moved on to the body I was given to days of puzzled contemplation of the growing bird. I studied it by daylight, artificial light, daytime, nighttime, from near, from far, through narrowed eyes, through confused thoughts and finally with ruthless judgment.

 

I changed the background 4 times [see below]. I absolutely loved adding bling. More, more, more! The quilting was challenging because of my too generous applications of glue. I changed the needle nine times on my sewing machine and wore safety glasses.

I analyzed just why this bird made my heart sing. Now I get it. There she is, flying high and alone. She looks forward, not back. She charts her own course. Sometimes she works hard to stay aloft. Fatigue is real, gravity is heavy. But often, she is lifted, and held up by wind currents.

She rises. Like me, she rises.

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Nancy Semich

I first met Nancy Semich in a class at The Stitchin’ Post in Sisters, Oregon in September 2018, a half hour from her home in Bend. I noticed that Nancy has a great eye toward using the prints in her fabrics to create contours and gradation of values in her bird subjects. The next year, Nancy traveled to my home state for an October retreat in Portland, Maine. She brought along her finished quilt from Oregon, “A Tapestry of Quails” (photos below), and a very good start on collage #2, another winged creature, Meraki the dragon.

In January of this year, Nancy became a $20 per month Patreon supporter, entitling her to monthly feedback toward finishing. In the end, though, it’s Nancy’s perseverance and skill that got “Meraki” across the Finish Line at last.

 

From Nancy:

I have always wanted to fly over the mountains on a dragon—so I decided to design Meraki while recovering from a broken shoulder in January 2019. The imprint a bird left when it flew into our window was the inspiration for her wings (the bird was ok). Along with the desire to fly over the mountains, they were included because they are the view from our home. I wanted my dragon to rise from the mist and I think the lace gave that effect [in-progress photo above].

 

I enjoyed adding sparkles and tulle in various places to add some Bling ???? After all, what girl (even a female dragon) doesn’t like bling. The gray border was glued on after the quilting was done and serves as a picture frame for the quilt. The label for this quilt is a photo taken from my home and includes the definition of the Greek word Meraki. I absolutely love Susan’s method of fabric collage and am now on to my next project.