Best of 2019

This year has been very productive if not overwhelming at times. I had a great start to 2019 with many art quilts for two Out of the Box (OOTB) textile artists group exhibition. That kept me creatively fulfilled until I over-did it. After that I enjoyed working on more traditional quilts and minis.

Art Quilts

I made 4 mini art quilts and learned a lot since they had to been seen as a particular colour and were mounted on canvas. It was tricky and my first one was very monochromatic, but they got better as I made more.

Peek-a-boo Red

Blooming Yellow

   

Green Garden Gate

Blue Moon

I also made a an art quilt based on the art piece, Ultramarine Blue by Ron Martin, which is at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. That was a really great learning experience.

My Blue Painting

My final art quilt of 2019 was Gaïa's Garden.

Gaïa's Garden

Blog Hops and events

This year I joined quite a few blog hops and other events. The first one was Dust off a Quilt Book Blog Hop. I made a Mola. It wasn't an impressive finish but I did learn a lot. The second one was All About Strings Blog Hop. I think that it's my favourite finish of the year. It had everything I love about quilting - improv, scrappy colourful piecing, free motion quilting (FMQ) and hexies!

Tries to Play Nice With Others

I also discovered Project Quilting and joined in the last week. That was both challenging and quick. I'm going to be participating for the full project in 2020.

Chocolate Cravings

For the second year, I participated in One Hundred Days of Hexies on Instagram. It's always enjoyable. I love making the hexies and going out on photo shoots. It's so lovely to see everyone else's hexies.

Beautiful hexies

Lovely creatures

Sewing Notions

Another Instragram project was the Summer Book Club Quilt-Along
It was so much fun making these book blocks. I made individual blocks and finished them as minis.

Bambi book block

The Earth is Not Flat book block

I also used the book block pattern to participate in the Nifty Novelties Blog Hop.

Paddington Bear book block mini

I now have two more colourful UFOs from the Summer Book Club event that are almost done.

Free Motion Quilting

Hosting the Free Motion Mavericks linking party with Muv has been a lot of fun and has made me practice my FMQ so that I have something to show on those days that I host.

My favourite FMQ finish is this Garden and Pond mini. There sure is a lot of thread on that baby😊

Free Motion Quilted Garden and Pond Mini

I also made a few FMQ gifts before the holidays. They were very both practical and a great way to practice FMQ.

FMQ Journal cover

FMQ basket

Second FMQ Journal cover

Second FMQ basket

Quilts

I finished one UFO quilt, the Epic Neutral Bow Tie Quilt as well as the quilt top on another UFO, Kingfisher Stitch Along Hexie Quilt.

Epic Neutral Bow Tie Quilt 

My Kingfisher Stitch-Along hexie quilt top is finished. I hope that 2020 is the year that I quilt it!

Kingfisher Stitch-Along Quilt Top ready to be FMQ

Linking parties

I am linking this post up to the Best of 2019 Linky Party hosted by Meadow Mist Designs. Thanks so much Cheryl for hosting this great yearly event.
Make sure that you go see what other quilters were up to in 2019! Off the Wall Friday, Friday Foto Fun, Can I Get A Whoop Whoop?, Brag About Your Beauties, Peacock Party, Oh Scrap!, Colour and Inspiration Tuesday, Put your foot down, Finished or Not Finished Friday,

Travel, Art and a DrEAMi!

This week I traveled to Montreal by train to see some great art, eat wonderful food and spend some quality time with my daughter.

Kent Monkman

Shame and Prejudice
A Story of Resilience

On Thursday, we saw Kent Monkman's exhibit, Shame and Prejudice - A Story of Resilience, at the McCord Museum. Kent Monkman is an amazing First Nation artist and storyteller. His work is funny, sad, colourful, provocative and socially relevant. I went through the exhibit twice - first by myself and then with my daughter, who answered my questions. It was great to be able to discuss this exhibit with her. If you're interested, check out Kent Monkman and the exhibit in the Related links below.

Montreal Museum of Fine Arts

Wire Mobile by
Alexander Calder

The next day we spent several hours at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. I've been there before to see special exhibits, but this was the first time that I took the time to go through the rest of the museum. 

The special exhibit was on Alexander Calder: Radical Inventor. Alexander Calder was an American artist who had a degree in mechanical engineering. He went to Paris during the 1920's and hung out with all of the artists, writers and musicians of the time. 

Calder metal mobile with a blue wooden background

A fun and colourful fish mobile
made of wire and glass by Calder

Silkscreen printed fabric by Alexander Calder (1949)

He was very versatile and worked with all kinds of materials, especially metal. He is well know for his circus pieces as well as the creator of mobiles

Calder even made jewelry and designed fabric. This is one of two silkscreen printed fabrics that he designed in 1949. The motif reflects his mobiles as well as the shapes that he used in his work. 

Isn't that fabric wonderful? It looks like a retro pattern from the 60s! His work may not seem like a big deal today, but he was a man ahead of his time.

Ultramarine Blue by Ron Martin

Ultramarine Blue at the
Montreal Museum of Fine Arts

There was some very cool art but the piece that intrigued me the most was Ultramarine Blue by Ron Martin. Ron Martin in a Canadian artist living in Toronto. This piece, acrylic on canvas, was created in 1971. He explored working with one colour for ten years, from 1971 to 1981.  It started with Ultramarine blue and bright red and then he spent many years working with black.

Although I'm not often attracted to monochromatic pieces, I just love the variations of the blue as well as the mouvement. It makes me feel happy and free. As usual with art that I like, I started wondering if I could use textile to create the same kind of effects.

Ultramarine Blue by Ron Martin

My Blue Painting

I started by trying to create these lines of mouvement  with thread. I used darker thread to make lines and swirls for the background. I created many parallel lines to get the impression of brush strokes.  

Creating the background mouvement using dark blue thread

I added lines of lighter thread but it became obvious that using parallel lines of thread just isn't the same since the brush strokes are full of paint, not empty. So now what?

Adding  lighter blue thread

I went to my stash and made wider brush strokes using bits of tulle and gauze. Again, I started with the darker background and then added the lighter fabric. I think that it's starting to look more like brush strokes. Unfortunately this is as far as I can go since I only had a little bit of light blue tulle. 

My Blue Painting so far

What I learned

• I love looking at art, but it's becoming clear to me that I'm always looking at it through my own textile lens. 
• For example, I liked the Alexander Calder exhibit but all I wanted to do was add bits of streaming fibres on those lovely mobiles. 
• It was great learning more about Ron Martin - turns out my daughter knew who he was! It's funny but as I looked at some of his work, there is definitely a textile vibe there, even if he works with paint.
• My Blue Painting is my DrEAMi! project this month - as in DRop Everything And Make It!, the linky party hosted by Sandra at mmm! Quilts. I've missed the last couple of link-ups, so I'm glad that I'm on time for this one :-)
• This week, between the Funky Square Flower Mola and My Blue Painting, I have two more WIPs to finish! I think that UFOs and WIPs are much easier to make than finishes 😊

Related links

• Kent Monkman, Shame and Prejudice - A Story of Resilience
• Montreal Museum of Fine Arts
• Alexander Calder and Radical Inventor Exhibit
• Alexander Calder
• Ron Martin - article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
• Ron Martin in the Centre for Contemporary Canadian Art

Linking parties

I will be linking up to DrEAMi!, with Sandra at mmm! Quilts and Free Motion Mavericks with Muv.  Don't forget to check the out as well as these other fun link-ups. Monday Making, Design Wall Monday, Moving it Forward, What I Made Monday, Wandering Camera, Tuesday Colour Linky Party, Midweek Makers, Off the Wall Friday, Finished or Not Friday, Friday Foto Fun, Can I Get A Whoop Whoop?