"Opening" - The Fiber Funsters Group's Reveal 1

The Fiber Funsters, my small art quilt group, met this morning at my home for our monthly meeting. Our group decided last summer to start doing a challenge piece based on a particular word every-other month. Our first word was "Opening" and we shared these pieces with each other in November.     Today I was able to photograph most of our pieces to share here!  

"Convento Santa Catalina" by Carolyn
Hitter

The first piece to the left, "Convento Santa Catalina" was made from a photograph that Carolyn took at a convent in Arcquipa, Peru.  Carolyn's technique includes the use of tulle to create the shading and shadows.  She built up separate parts of the landscape and then put the different elements together, doing a majority of the stitchwork before backing the piece and keeping the quilting minimal.

Opening by Rebecca Simmons

Next, Rebecca also chose an opening flower (as did I.)  Rebecca made her piece using Tsukineko inks, basically painting both the flower and background.  She uses heavy stitch to accent the petals edges and veins.  The center of her flower has Angelina fiber and beading.

"Opening" by Debbie Hiatt

Debbie's piece is abstract, using up "leftovers" - scraps of silks most of us would love to have!  She highlights the "opening" in her piece with hand embroidery stitches, while the curved machine quilting echos the shape of the opening.

"Australia Rock" by Sally Simmons

"Australia Rock" in Narooma, Australia has a natural opening that Sally remembers vividly from her trip there. She used one of her photos to complete this piece, adding shading with tulle and very realistic looking greenery with threadwork.

Charo Lopez's "Open to Love"

What would this theme be without a piece that really opens?  Charo's heart stays closed with a bit of velcro, but you can also open it to see what is inside... the great loves of her life, her pets.  She says that Devon, the black cat, is her only pet at this point, but the others are waiting for her in heaven.  Charo used a template of hearts with glitter, paint, and rhinestones at different places over the piece, as well as lots of buttons (surrounding the main red heart both outside and inside, giving a real depth to the piece, and little heart buttons interspersed on the front.)  She printed photos on fabric of two of her animal loves, as well as having different charms to represent some of her pets.

"Open to Love" by Charo Lopez with heart opened

Close up of the inside of Charo's heart

Marylee designed this cute piece with "openings".  The little round balls seem to be rolling down the planks and through the openings like a pinball or pachinko machine, only to end up being gobbled up by a "Pack-man" shaped object.  Guess this dates me that I know pinball, pachinko and packman, huh?

"Opening" by Christina Fairley Erickson

I've shown the piece I made called "Opening" previously on this blog.  It is all machine embroidered.




While some of our newest pieces are still works in progress, I'll share them soon!

Thanks for all the inspirational projects at Seven-Alive! and Sincerely, Paula.


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