Metamorphosis in my studio

"One morning, as Gregor Samsa was waking up from anxious dreams, he discovered that in his bed he had been changed into a monstrous verminous bug."

 When I read that our first challenge theme for our new series was "Metamorphosis" my first thought was the book by Franz Kafka—required reading in a literature class in college. It opens with the sentence above. Though I loved the book, I wanted to think further about the theme. It struck me that what we do with fabric and a few simple tools is also a metamorphosis. Fabric scraps become something else—art. And just as Kafka's Gregor could morph into a monstrous bug, so could my fabric.

Hasu

Hasu means lotus in Japanese.
As I said in an earlier post on my blog, this project underwent many transformations but the lotus remained a constant focus all the way through. When Gerrie gave us this theme of "Metamorphosis", I first thought of Kafka and Ovid, for obvious reasons, and also of Buddhism because impermanence is one of the main features of life in Buddhist thinking.
Lotus being a very important symbol in Buddhism, I quickly found myself going through my photo folders looking for images of lotus. I chose a few pictures taken in Kyoto and Arashiyama during my last trip to Japan.
With this quilt, I wanted to show the beauty of the lotus plant with its roots in the mud and its ephemeral flowers almost open and rising towards the sunlight.
Here are two details...
More on my blog, here.

Sturt's Spurt: After the Big Wet

Early on in this challenge I decided I would like to focus on the transformative power of water on the Australian outback. In 2010 and 2011, Lake Eyre was in flood bringing with it invigorated bird, fish and plant life. From this starting point, it was not a huge jump to bring this piece into my wildflower series.

Sturt's Desert Pea, the floral emblem of South Australia,is notoriously difficult to cultivate outside its natural desert environment. The plant flowers from spring to summer, particularly after heavy rain. The Heyne's Garden Centre fact sheet notes:

The Sturt's Desert Pea generally grows in the hot, arid, sandy areas of Australia. Because of the unpredictability of water, this eye-catching annual takes advantage of rains by germinating, growing and seeding quickly. In its natural habitat it then dies, leaving behind hard-coated seeds which are slowly worn down and cracked by high temperatures or worn with sand abrasion in readiness for germination with the next rains.

This is a photo that I took in Kings Park in Perth but an online image search shows the brilliance of  Sturt's Desert Pea en masse with distinctive silver green tendrils.

As I wrote on my blog, in creating this quilt, I was hamstrung by a shortage of the brown background fabric.  I cut carefully and scrimped on seams and, after piecing and quilting, it threatened to be undersize.  I resolved this by adding a binding rather than facing the edges.  A serendipitous development as the binding complements the work.  I've really enjoyed working with these 20x12in dimensions and look forward to what Deborah sets for our next challenge.

Ponga Pounamu

I only started my metamorphosis piece this week. It took me two goes. This is my first attempt. It depicts the changing form of the New Zealand silver fern (ponga)from tightly wound spiral koru to gently draping elongated fronds, all rendered in green hand-dyed fabrics - the colours of pounamu (greenstone jade) a metamorphic rock that is used in beautiful jewellery.

More on my blog. I'm looking forward to our first 2012 reveal!

Inspiration Everywhere

I've finished my metamorphosis quilt, but the theme is still stirring about in my mind. In fact, at the library earlier this week, I checked out this children's picture book by Aracelis Girmay. At the time, I wasn't even thinking about our 2012 Series, but of course... it all fits together.

I love picture books with collage illustrations -- a true metamorphosis to turn various papers and images into new images. My favorite book of collage illustration is A River of Words.

This book is about a boy and girl embodying the world around them.

Honestly, the book and illustrations left me a little bit wanting... but the author's afterword was quite moving. She opened with this quote from Ovid's Metamorphoses.

As we move toward the reveal day, I've also been seeking inspiration for the next theme, which I will be choosing. These words did spark some possibilities.

Del Thomas Gallery

Friday night was the opening of the Del Thomas Gallery at Visions Art Museum in San Diego and I was so excited to be there.

Del is the Patron Saint of Art Quilts in my opinion, and judging by the crowd I'm not alone in thinking that. Several of the Twelves had pieces hanging in this show, and it was so great to see these familiar works hanging on the gallery wall. Del prepared a catalog with a little blurb about each quilt hanging and it was interesting to read her thoughts on her collection.

 Lucky me, getting a photo with the star of the evening.

Sneak Peek

Wow, I haven't posted on our blog in soooo long. I am really excited to see what the other Twelves come up with next week when we have the reveal of my choice of theme — metamorphosis. I went through several ideas.

A major happening for me last fall was cataract surgery which was a metamorphosis of how I see color again with more youthful vision. I was going to go with that as a theme. Then, I took an online class with Elizabeth Barton at Quilt University called Inspired to Design, and I came up with another idea.

You can see a sneak peek up there with one of my go to color palettes red, lime green and yellow set off by black. I have not done the quilting yet as I need to finesse the layout just a bit. I can't sew anyway because my artist daughter, Lisa, is visiting and she is using my sewing machine chair. She has some major illustration deadlines to finish this week-end. She leaves tomorrow so then I can get my chair back!! Then I have the conundrum of how to quilt this!

The Butterfly Effect

Now that I have dispatched my completed works to Manly Art Gallery & Museum for the forthcoming Regeneration: Contemporary Quilt Textiles 2012 exhibition (27 April - 4 June 2012), I am ready to focus on my Metamorphosis piece.  Tons of time, right?!

I've been contemplating the so-called butterfly effect.  First, there is the notion of a delicate flap of butterfly wings reverberating around the world in a hurricane crescendo.  How a short e-mail from Diane in September 2007 turned into this project, a blog, a website, a BOOK, and an international exhibition tour that has inspired  so many Friends & Followers.  Incredible!

According to Wikipedia, the butterfly effect is also "a metaphor for sensitive dependence on initial conditions in chaos theory".  In other words, the " phenomenon whereby a minor change in circumstances can cause a large change in outcome".  What if Helen had never alerted me to the presence of Diane's e-mail, which had been diverted to a spam filter account, and I have never replied yes, I want to play?!  How different my creative endeavours might have been over the past few years.

Then there's another case of synchronicity that has me wondering whether, in a Sliding Doors-esque moment,  I had left my sketches on the train in San Francisco and Kathleen Probst had found them as I slipped into an alternate universe.  Here's my sketch from late November and here's her mid-December blog post, spooky huh?!  Needless to say, I LOVE Kathleen's quilt (you can see the completed version on her website home page).

Since then, I have come up with some design ideas that have nothing to do with butterflies but I don't have anything to show you yet.  In the meantime, enjoy another Agaristidae Agricola Donovan dayflying moth that I managed to snap as it fluttered by.

Series

I am finished with my 2012 piece, and, in fact, since I decided to work in a series I have finished five of them. I found myself wanting to continue on after starting the first one, and for reasons that will become apparent with the reveal, five was a good number.  I'm not sharing what I did with the theme yet, but I will share some close up pictures.

I wonder if any of the other Twelves are working in a series?

2012 Year of the Dragon

23 January marks the start of the lunar new year and millions of people around the world are welcoming in the Year of the Dragon. Ever alert to tales of metamorphosis, I was fascinated to learn about the Japanese legend of a koi who manages to swim upstream, climbing a waterfall and is transformed into a dragon; thus overcoming adversity to fufill its own destiny.

As you can see in this image gallery, the koi dragon is a popular tattoo motif.  I wonder if a certain Twelve, who is celebrating 2012 with a tattoo soon, will choose a dragon design.  Either way,  happy Chinese New Year!

Detail from Overflowing by Deborah Boschert

From dandelion to lotus

I took a few pictures before cutting up my dandelion quilt.


I made a very quick sketch inspired by lotus pictures taken in Japan in summer 2010. As you know, the lotus flower is an important symbol in Buddhism.


With this little sketch, I just wanted to get a rough idea of the colour distribution on the new quilt.
I've posted more pictures, and more words, on my blog, here.

Twelve by Twelve in Patchwork- und Quiltjournal

Patchwork- und Quiltjournal (Patchwork & Quilt Journal) is a german language quilting magazine, published 6 times a year. In the current issue # 120, the magazine is celebrating its 20th anniversary with a special edition and look what's on the cover. Yes! it's a detail from Francoise's quilt  Passion & Colours from the Theme series.

Inside there is an article, with lots of photos!, about our exhibition at Festival of Quilt of Quilting in Birmingham in 2011:

In Birmingham habe ich Mitglieder der Gruppe "twelve by twelve" getroffen. Die Mitglieder der Gruppe haben zu verschiedenen Themen jeweils einen Quilt genäht: 12 Personen und 12 Themen. Das ergibt 12 x 12 Quilts, einer interessanter und kreativer als der andere. Wir freuen uns, dass wir Ihnen diese Quilts vorstellen dürfen.

Happy 20th birthday Patchwork- und Quiltjournal and thank you for sharing our project with your German readers.

Well, yeah, this is exciting!

Honestly, folks, I know we probably seem pretty full of ourselves at this point. So many extraordinary things have happened to our little band of hardworking stitchers, it is hard not to get excited when something more comes along. So, here we are—excited again. This arrived in today's mail.

It's the February/March issue of everyone's favorite art quilting magazine, Quilting Arts, with a 6-page spread all about the Twelve by Twelve project. As usual, Quilting Arts has shown our best sides and made us look far better than we ever dreamed.

The whole issue is about collaborative projects. We are so delighted to be included! We've answered a bunch of questions about what this project has meant and how it has impacted our lives and our art. I hope it inspires more collaboration out there. It is such a rewarding experience!

Check out another fun reveal...

Our friends the Tangled Textiles just revealed their fourth set of challenge quilts on the theme "Looking Up."  It's fun to see what each of them did with the theme -- go take a look!

Metamorphosis in My Yard

I made a start at my metamorphosis piece, and it didn't really match was I was hoping for in my head. The computer wouldn't save my work either, so I took that as a sign I was on the wrong track. Sigh.

However, as I was looking through my photos I ran across a metamorphosis softie project from a few years ago. I blogged about the project here. I guess some themes are rather timeless.


First, the caterpillar looks like bird poop. Then it changes to instar stage, which is fat and green. My ruched softie zips into a larger "instar" bag.


The instar is my favorite stage.


From the instar stage the caterpillar becomes a chrysalis. Our chrysalis is a patchwork bag that holds all the smaller components.


Out of the chrysalis emerges a beautiful butterfly. Ours has a little pouch on it's belly that holds a pompom egg so that the process can start all over again.

Enjoy a small slideshow of our backyard metamorphosis as well: