Rayna Gilman tagged me to participate in this tour around to discover how others create.

What am I working on?

Right now, I am finishing up two large quilts that will be entered in my local fiberarts guild upcoming show, What’s Blue to You? I have to do the mundane work of sleeves and labels and traveling bags, just in case they get in.

I went off on a bit of a tangent with my two pieces. When I was a child, my grandmother used the term sky blue pink quite often – simetimes to describe the colors in the sky and sometimes just for fun. I had several pieces of fabric that had been snow dyed and dyed in a class I took with Judy Robinson that reminded me of sky blue pink. I made a collage of them and made a piece of hand stitched cheesecloth the centerpiece. It seemed unfinished until I added some fused flying geese. It is called Flight Through Sky Blue Pink.

Here is a detail of the cheesecloth and flying geese.

The other is an enlargement of my Picasso Woman. I made an etching of this years ago. Recreating her in this large format was a major undertaking. I dyed blue fabric and printed blue fabric with copper highlights for her hair. She is now Blue Picasso Woman.

These are both quite large – 2 ft by 5 ft.
How does my work differ from others of its genre?

Since the work I do comes out of my crazy brain, I hope it is unique. I rarely use commercial fabric. I start with a blank slate of white fabric and then paint, print or dye to create what I want. Some times I create fabric for a piece and sometimes, a piece of dyed fabric tells me what it wants to be. I do not do much piecing. I love the freedom of fusing fabric. It is much freer and more painterly that when pieced – at least for me.

Why do I write/create what I do?

I recently went through downsizing and moving to a condo. I had to give up studio work during that time – about 6 months. When I got set up in my new studio and sewing area at our home, I was so happy. It made me realize how critical a creative life is to my well-being. I love fabric. I love how I can manipulate it, add new surfaces to it and stitch on it.

How does your writing/creative process work?

I often work on projects in what seems like a last minute kind of way. But I do a lot of my process work in my head, thinking about it on walks, when falling asleep and when waking up. I sometimes make sketches, but more often than not, I love just throwing fabric at the design wall, shifting and folding as I come up with a composition.

I recently wrote a new artist statement. In part, it says:

I spend my day observing and photographing the sublime and the quirky scenes around me — a shadow on the deck, a group of trees, the graffiti on a building, architectural details or the juxtaposition of shapes. These scenes become inspiration for the textile art that I create. I distill the scene down to the essential elements, often in abstract form. I love the serendipity of transforming a piece of fabric with paint or dye and using the resulting creations in my textile art.

I have tagged 2 artists for next Monday’s Creative Blog Tour.

Helen Conway was one of the Twelves in the 12 x12 collaboration. I have so enjoyed watching her growth as an artist. I think you will enjoy visiting her blog.

Susan Lenz is one of the most prolific fiber artists that I know. I was honored to be part of one of her past installations about choices we make.

I will try to remind you to visit these blogs next Monday.