Something About Nothing

I thought that once the Reclamation show was set up and off my plate I would be able to take a little time to catch up on blogging, however that doesn't seem to have been the case! If you only follow my blog you might think I have fallen off the earth.  But no, I am still here, working away. I have been working on getting things together for our guild's dye party in a couple of weeks, as well as putting together a Webinar titled: Printing Fabric with a Gelli Plate The webinar will take place on July 29th. Then of course there is the job of getting the teens here and there with one planning on moving out within the next couple of weeks.  When you are the parent of toddlers you always think they are going to be easier as teenagers when they can do things for themselves.  That is both true and false. Anyway. . . On Saturday, as I was driving my daughter home from work, we came across a yard sale that was closing up.  My daughter found lots of treasures: tea cups, ca

One of the projects I have been working on is co-curating an exhibit for the Utah Surface Design Group called: Reclamation. I had no idea how much work goes in to curating an exhibit when I accepted the assignment!  My co-curator, Anne Munoz, and I are very grateful to everyone who has made the job easier, especially everyone at Art Access .  They have been a wonderful gallery to work with! Yesterday I spent a couple of hours with the gallery executive director, Sheryl Gillilan, and  Anne Munoz , getting most of the exhibit hung.  Here is a before photo of the back gallery wall (there is another room behind it which will have some lovely art from another artist).  I also took a panoramic before shot.  In this shot I am standing up against the back wall (pictured above) near the post on the wall.  The photo makes the gallery look enormous!  We always do a group exhibit at our USDG shows.  This years group exhibit are pieces that are between 3 and 6 inches wide and 6 to 9 feet

I attended a SAQA meeting the other night which was held at the Handi Quilter offices in North Salt Lake.  I never realized just how many quilts were hanging at Handi Quilter.  It is a wonderful quilt gallery - traditional, modern and art!  Here is a little tour in case you can't go up and see the offices for yourself (they do welcome visitors!). This is a part of the warehouse floor where all the machines are made and tested.  The second floor of the building is filled with classrooms, a kitchen, meeting areas and such.  There is a room where videos are made.  Handi Quilter sponsors "Quilt it! The Longarm Quilting Show"  and it is filmed in this room.  This is the classroom.  Lots of lovely long arm machines!  As well as a nice area for sitting, learning and watching presentations. There are a lot of quilts hung upstairs but as usual, I got so caught up in looking at them that I forgot to take photos!  I did get a photo of Kaye Evans, and Brenda Groelz wi

My friend and mentor, Anne Munoz , recently had a show at Finch Lane Gallery . Anne is a batik artist and is the one who taught me how to dye and batik fabrics.  I absolutely love her work.  She is a wonderful person and I love getting to work with her in the  USDG. The pieces in this exhibit were inspired by the photo safari she and her husband took to Africa.  Each piece is a batik that she has then machine quilted, and some are also enhanced with beautiful hand stitching.  Here are a few photos of her work in the show:

What a challenge this month's Printed Fabric Bee was!  Queen Bee Leslie Jenison asked for Marks with Found Objects in neutrals with a pop of color.  Neutrals are always a challenge for me.  I work mostly in brights!  What was I to do?!?!?  I decided to mix a little Setacolor paint together and make a brown sun print for the background. Brown is a neutral, right? How was I to make marks with found objects in a sun print?  That part turned out to be quite simple.  I grabbed leaves, grasses and whatever objects I found on the ground  . . . . . .and put them on top of the watered down wet paint, and then left it all in the sun until it dried. I love leaving crinkles when I make sun prints.   They look beautiful! Next came adding more marks with pops of color.   I used my Gelli® plate as a paint palette by rolling out some orange Setacolor . . . . . . and then laying down a piece of window screen on the plate.  I rolled a dry brayer across the screen so it