Summer fun with Indigo

A great afternoon exploring indigo dye and woad.
Straight from the Vat before oxidisation.

And afterwards! Magic to watch!

Lace dyes well, these belong to Ros.

And Ros was persuaded to dye her cotton cardigan too..

Thanks to Dee who provided the dyes and venue.

Spring Quilt Retreat

I'm at Belsey Bridge on retreat with an amazing bunch of buddies. Every so often someone hangs up a quilt for a little show and tell!
This is Julie Barnes's beautiful feathered star, which she has long arm quilted.

And this is a great star quilt in modern fabrics made by Mary Cunningsworth:

Contemporary Group

I decided at the last minute that I would respond to the pleas to make an A3 piece for the latest suitcase challenge. This is what I wrote to go with it:
Contemporary Group Suitcase Collection 2017
My Favourite Artist
I had a problem with this as my favourite artists are textile people: Yoshiko Jinzensi, Gwen Marston, Kathleen Loomis, Cindy Grisdela, and Erin Wilson. I spent an instructive half an hour online researching artists who use stripes and came up with 8 names whose work I found interesting: Annie Albers, Karl Benjamin, Paul Klee, Bridget Riley, Mark Rothko, Sean Scully, Frank Stella, Victor Vasareli.
Having looked at their work I thought I would put together some stripes where the Juxtaposition of colours interested me, so not really influenced by only one artist I’m afraid!
and here is the piece I have sent off:

January Journal

11"square this time, and we can pick our own theme so I'm doing improv which is what I like to play with.

Modern Quilt tutor box sample

Just finished this small quilt teaching sample for the Modern Quilt specialist group of the Quiilters Guild. This will be added to the others available for borrowing, with free instruction sheets, so that group workshop organisers can run some of their workshop sessions in house without the need to bring in teachers and pay fees and travel.
http://www.mqgb.org.uk/tutorboxes.html

Modern Crosses

Patchwork Patterns in Fijian printed textiles

There is an exhibition of Fijian artefacts at the Sainsbury Centre, an excellent museum at the university in Norwich. As there were few raw materials available to the islanders their skilled artisans made beautiful objects in wood and whale ivory, and textiles were made from plant fibres. Their barkcloth is beautifully stencilled and painted to produce large cloths which were used in ceremonies and given as treasured gifts. The patterns are geometric and there is lots of repetition..

There is a large bark cloth hanging in the reception area.

And a last piece that seemed to remind me of Diana Harrison's work.

Finishing

This year's first completion... Climate Change. My entry for the International Stash Challenge using four fabrics donated by a Dutch Quilter, and four of my own.