Where do I start? That’s a fair question to ask if you are making your first (or even your thirty-first) fabric collage quilt. Let’s assume you’ve chosen your subject and … Read More
Back at the beginning of this summer, at the end of June—which somehow seems both like yesterday and a year ago at least—I taught a Live Online class focusing on … Read More
Over the next two Saturdays in your regular posts, I’ll be revisiting my latest Live Online class, a portraits-only class held at the end of June. This brought to mind … Read More
Welcome to the memorial page for our parents, Bill and Meta Carlson. We are their daughters, Susan and Heidi, and have compiled photos, videos, recipes and more for this page—most … Read More
From my husband Tom: Okay! Change of plans. We were supposed to have a new post this week. Instead we’ll have one more week of my favorite posts while Susan … Read More
From my husband Tom: Okay! Change of plans. We were supposed to have a new post this week. Instead we’ll have one more week of my favorite posts while Susan … Read More
From my husband Tom: Susan is temporarily handing over the keys to the blog post to me. I’ll see to it that you continue to receive your regular dose of … Read More
I chose “Gombessa” as one of my favorite quilts of Susan’s because of its story. Susan is always encouraging her students to create a “backstory” for the subject of their quilt. Sometimes, as with a portrait of a family member, that story is “built in.” Other times a story has to be made up. In this case, Susan’s inspiration came from a book that I recommended to her after reading it myself. The story of the re-discovery of the ancient coelacanth is a fascinating one. It certainly inspired Susan! Today’s post will give you the brief version of that story and tell how that story drove the decisions she made in the quilt’s creation.
The quilt featured today, “Peace, Love Tie-Dye, Save the Whales,” is a portrait of our son, Sam, at age thirteen. Susan has also completed two other portraits of —in very different styles—at age three and twenty-three. See him pretending to be a dinosaur in “Samuelsaurus Rex,” and as Susan imagined him as a crescent moon in “Earthshine.” As I said, these three portraits each represent a different style that Susan has achieved using fabric collage: “Samuelsaurus Rex” is done in dabs of color similar to expressionist paintings; “Peace, Love Tie-Dye, Save the Whales” imitates the pop-art style of Andy Warhol; and “Earthshine” is represents Susan’s attempt at magical realism, taking a fantastic premise but treating it in a realistic way. These varying styles underline the flexibility of the technique of fabric collage.
Today’s quilt, “Dixie Dingo Dreaming,” is a portrait of her beloved dog Pippin (yes, named after the Lord of the Rings character). Many of Susan’s quilts are intensely personal. In this case, the quilt now memorializes our dearly departed pup. As we say in the post below, “high” art tends to avoid the personal, the sentimental, as though those feelings cannot possibly have anything message of value to pass on. This isn’t true, of course. This quilt continues to speak to most who view it. The extended story connected to its construction, as you will read, only adds to the meaning viewers take from the quilt.