Landing Patterns

I was not going to participate this month--too much already on the schedule--but I made the mistake of looking at the challenge description.  Andrew Goldsworthy is way up at the top of the list of artists I admire and I had to do something.

This is a real experiment.  Last year I had harvested some stems to see if I could figure out a way to use them on a quilt but never got around to trying them and thought this would be a good opportunity.

The background is inspired by leaf litter in the late fall when frost is turning some of the leaves icy blue.  I ended up piecing the background--fusing would have been a lot faster.  The more structured--rhythmic--pattern of the sticks was meant to contrast with the randomness of the background.  Now that I know I can work with these stems on a quilt I am planning on doing some more experimenting with them--as soon as my schedule clears a bit.  The quilt is small, 14 x 18".   

Great challenge, Lisa.  Comments appreciated.

Challenge 54 Observations on a Goldfinch

As I began to think about this challenge, I found myself watching some goldfinches at the birdfeeder.  They are just beginning to show a hint of yellow as they begin to lose their winter gray.  There are a lot of them around in the summertime and they explode from the farm field edges as I walk up our road.  So my version of this challenge is an attempt to capture the colors and energy of the goldfinches in a curved format.

It's about 25" square.  I tried a machine reverse applique for this rather than fusing, and I will probably tweak the quilting some more.  Although I usually face my quilts, this one seemed to look better with the black binding.  Originally, I had designed the "bird" to be "flying" toward the upper right corner, but decided I liked the above orientation better.

I'd appreciate critiques, even though this is late . .  . again.

Challenge 52 River

When I first read this challenge, I knew I wanted to do something because I love so much of this kind of art.  I immediately went to my sheers but didn't have enough of the colors I needed and so let the holiday activities take precedence for a while but I kept coming back to the idea that nature was a theme for many of the color field artists. So I started looking for colors among my hand-dyed fabrics and playing with shapes until a piece emerged that also fit in with a current theme in my work:  connections in nature.  I think my edges are too hard to fit into the color field category, but I decided to post this anyway.  It's about 21" x 29".

It is not quilted or faced yet.  Yesterday I finally had to accept that something is seriously wrong with my sewing machine and it will have to be repaired so this would be ridiculously late if I waited for its return.

Any comments will be appreciated.

With the Flow by Madalene Murphy

I am very late with this.  I shouldn't have read the challenge in the midst of preparing for a show and for the holidays, but I was intrigued and I hadn't entered a challenge for a while.  So I started working on it between all the other things that needed to be done.

I came up with a shape I wanted to play with, printed it in a variety of sizes, and then began laying them out in various configurations, trying to keep the final design abstract.   I machine appliqued the shapes, machine quilted the background, and used pearl cotton on the shapes themselves.  I may play more with the quilting and I need to finish the edges.  I'm not sure about the final result, which is about 32 x 20".

It's probably too late--and too near the holidays--to get many critiques, but am appreciative of anyone who takes the time to comment.

Challenge 41 "Viewpoint" by Madalene Axford Murphy

Was going to skip this challenge but I've had an idea for a long time of making a quilt looking through a dragonfly's wings and I got an idea, thanks to some fancy organza I bought, of how to make the wings and had to try it out. I fractured the field below the dragonfly, but I lost track of the color requirements for the challenge. My original colors were just three: red, green, and yellow, but as I was working I decided I had to add some blue for our farmpond that the dragonflies love.

I haven't worked a lot with transparencies, but used Carol Taylor's method of satin stitching the edges although I did not fuse it. I have also been using pearl cotton more and more in my work and didn't have time to use it for all the quilting but did add some.

Would love to hear what you think of it.

Challenge 40 Pause by Madalene Murphy

This is the first challenge that I am entering, and I almost didn't make this one, but I found the use of product packaging colors intriguing, and after looking around my kitchen, chose one fairly quickly--a box of one of my favorite teas.  These were much        quieter colors than I usually work with but I loved the rich red brown of the edging, a brown I had actually tried for in my dyeing this summer for another project.  I also cheated a bit and chose to add the teal from the teacup on the top of the box.  So I went through my hand-dyes to see if I could come close with the colors.



My quilts also tend to be more abstract so the still life/plant requirement slowed me down a bit until I decided on abstract simple shapes with the leaves as contrast.  I played with the composition a bit  and came up with what to me is a very restful piece--like sitting down for a cup of tea.

This was great challenge.  Made me realize even packaging can be source of inspiration and made me take a whole new path to creating a quilt.  Thanks, Rhoda!

Please comment.