Get In Line

 

I was lucky enough to get to take a class with South African quilt artist and teacher, Rosalie Dace. It was all done online through the Mancuso Brothers Quiltfest Virtual Schoolhouse. On a tech level it worked really well, she was presenting from her home studio so I had to get up quite early (for me) to attend, but that was fine as I didn't have to drive anywhere. Title of this post will end up being an upcoming quilt title.

This was Rosalie's class called, "Line Dance - play with Line and make it work in your quilts". It was more of a presentation/lecture than an interactive project sewing class which was just fine with me. Some of the other students asked some good questions. I just really enjoy her style of teaching. She's so very thought-provoking and inspiring. There were many new ways of thinking about Lines that still have me pondering several days later. Great stuff.

She suggested that we make a grid page with various lines as she talked through all the options. This is mine up above. I loved the ideas that were generated and the real world technical options to get them into your own quilt that she showed us. It was very fun to get see super closeup pictures of her beautiful work. It's very layered and complicated, to me that's one of the best things about art quilts.

If you ever have a chance to take a class or listen to a lecture from Rosalie Dace, I say go for it. You will at the very least be entertained, and she always shows beautiful, amazing pictures from her travels and her local area. 

Here's a complaint having nothing to do with this class in particular. After all these years of using Zoom and other platforms, there are still inevitably several people who don't mute themselves, it's very frustrating. I really don't need to have the instructor interrupted to hear someone complaining to someone in the room with them about how hard it was to login to the class. Honestly, just pay a little attention please. Are these the same folks who are interrupting in live audiences? Probably maybe? I think I'd be a terrible online teacher because I'd be mean or exasperated with people who did this during my class. It's disrespectful to the teacher, and to your fellow students. 

One of the things we did make during the class was to try out her Skinny Strips technique. This is the one that I had previously learned in the class that  I took with Friend Jaye at the Sisters Quilt Show back in 2018. It was good to re-visit the technique, and a reminder to use something that I've already learned. I had kind of forgotten the secret method that she uses (go take one of her classes!) because it really works.

Uncovered Designs

I'm always fascinated by what's left behind on the walls of old brick buildings when they're uncovered, like when a neighboring structure is taken down to make a parking lot. I noticed this wall in San Diego and took several pictures. 

I've cropped them so that the walls are the focus, try to ignore the trees, parked cars and lamp posts. 

I think these color combinations, textures and shapes would make a pretty great starting point for a quilt.

Especially once you play around with editing the color so it's not so sun-drenched and washed out. A further thought, what if I turned this design 180°? Then it could be a similar shape/size that I worked with for the Prism Play triptych quilts, 15"w x 45"h. This may require some sketching.

Look Down Sometimes

I was sitting at Costco the other day, waiting for my son to get his Covid booster shot (yay! we're all boosted now!) so I had the chance to notice the floor. Usually in Costco one is focused on the *stuff* that you're wildly throwing into your gigantic cart and avoiding running into other people (or being run into). 

I've seen the floor polisher thing in action before, but it does make quite an interesting surface. And quite shiny given the glare of the lights way up above.

As usual the cracks were the most eye-catching and interesting. I would love a fabric that had the depth of colors and texture that this floor has. It's different than the granite ones, more random and a lot more layers I think. This might be one to try having printed at Spoonflower...

And then of course, I had to try looking at this photo in Percolator, and some of these would be fabulous as fabric (or quilts) also:

Color Percolations

 

Here's my Instagram-based 2021 Year Of Color, well actually, it's really Year of Colour with a u. But my spellcheck is set on American lingo of course. This app goes through all of your Instagram photo posts and pulls out the main colors that were represented in your shared images. It's pretty fun to get the results after a year of posting.

And here's the latest photo in my worktable color studies series:

It makes sense that there would be a lot of overlap, as I'm usually sharing photos I've taken in and around my studio. But--still it's fun to see a visual representation of it in front of my face to be re-inspired by. 

This second photo seems like it would make a pretty good quilt design. I put it through that new app I was exploring, Percolator and got these two ideas: