Exhibition Struggles and Design Wall Weekend #6

This is being a tough month.  It's not like I didn't expect it... but here I am in the midst of it and I'm feeling a little in overwhelm.

First, as most of you know, I'm share the head of exhibitions for the Contemporary QuiltArt Association and we have our "Salsa!" exhibit opening Memorial day weekend.  Our jury met on April 28 at my home... you'd think that once the pieces were picked out, it should be smooth sailing, right?  Wrong.

One of the wonderful things about the venue we're going to be in, the Mighty Tieton Warehouse Gallery, is that they're going to print a catalog of the exhibit. So, as soon as I know the juror selections, I needed to get the photos of accepted pieces to their printer, which meant I had to download 114 photos (a full and detail shot of each piece) from the place where the artists had submitted them.  However, I soon found out that not every artist had sent high-resolution photos.  This meant I had to contact those artists who had sent low-res photos and help them get high resolution ones to me.  I even ended up taking photos for one artist!

Once the photos were sent over, I had to start working on compiling all the information for the catalog... artist's statements, sizes of artwork, materials and techniques used, photographer, price of piece, year completed, as well as artist and title of the piece.  We have 57 pieces in the show, so that's quite a bit of info to put together.

On Saturday, we pick up the pieces at our CQA meeting.  We're working on figuring out a way to best hang the works... the gallery has a wire hanging system.  At this point, we're planning on using a heavy-duty fishing line to attach the quilts and art cloth from the wire.  However, we will need to tie the fishing line onto all the hanging sticks and haven't fully worked out how we will adjust the length of the fishing line to make sure each piece is at the right level and even.  My husband and I have even gone to a couple hardware stores to try and see if there was some sort of hardware that we could put the line through and pull it and it would catch and not slip.  At this point, it looks like we're going to just be adjusting it by hand and tying it off.

On the 20th, we head over to Tieton (about a 2 and a half hour drive) to hang the show.  I'm not sure how long it will take considering the tying aspect.  Then our Opening will be on Saturday the 25th, so another long drive that day (I may stay overnight for that one since it goes from 12-5 and there is an artist celebratory dinner afterwards!)

Oh, did I forget to mention that my two-year long program at the Gail Harker Center for the Creative Arts starts this month too?  I will be going up to La Conner from May 14-19 for my first class. We'll be meeting approximately every three months and have a good deal of homework in between each session.  However, as you can see from the photos here, Gail's student's create some amazing fiber artwork!

All this said, I've decided to back off of my initial goal this year to create a 5 x 7 piece each week.  I'm a little disappointed, but I am working on my artwork daily, so I suppose that's the real goal.  Since I'll be staying up at our cabin on Whidbey Island next week while I go to classes in La Conner, I plan to bring my freemotion quilting sampler quilt that I'm working on for Leah Day's Craftsy class to work on in the evening.  Having six days away from my husband and kids to just work on my art will be a real vacation!

Speaking of Leah's Craftsy class, she has just released "Freemotion Fillers Volume 2."  In celebration, if you go to her blog, you can click a link to get 50% off any of her three Craftsy classes (click here to get the page with the 50% off)!

OK, let's get going with Design Wall Weekend:

Design Wall Weekend #6 -- What do You Have on Your Design Wall?

What kind of blogs should link up?

I think that it's best to have content that matches the content and interests served with the blog that's hosting the party, so please only link up if your blog post is about any of the following:

• Quilting and fabrics 
• Fiber art of any kind
• Hand & machine stitch or embroidery
• Mixed media art
• Book-making, art journals, and sketchbooks
• Tutorials for any quilting, fiber, mixed media, sketchbook and other arts
• These can be works in progress or finishes

Anna's hummingbird from my sketchbook - Acryllic paint, watercolor pencil, silver ink

Rules for the blog linking party

• Mention Fiber Artist Journey in your post, either with a link or button-use the direct link to the specific post - not just your main blog website (this helps with your search engine position.)   If you have buttons on your sidebar that works great, please just at least mention something in your post, for example "I'm linking to Fiber Artist Journey, see my sidebar for their button."  If you need help on how to add your link, read this.

• Please take the time to visit other links, everyone loves new visitors and comments!  Try to comment on at least two other blogs in the party.

If you would like to add a button to your blog you can copy the code which is below my buttons and add it as a gadget on the layout page of your blog. Here is a tutorial on how to do it.

Other Great Blogs to Link Up with and Check Out!

Nina Marie Sayre's Art Quilt Blog

Confessions of a Fabric Addict

Balzar Designs - Art Journal Every Day

Richard and Tanya Quilts

Quilt Matters

Sew Many Ways

Beginning to Exhibit- Tips to Manage Showing

I've been a bit over my head in preparing for the Salsa Exhibition that's coming up next month.  I'll be hosting the Contemporary QuiltArt Association jury at my house this coming weekend, to go through all the slides of entries and make decisions about the show.  Furthermore, I've been contacted by three other venues (two which I'd sent information to and one that was unsolicited) about potential shows for our group in the future.  More on these when I get them scheduled!

For those of you interested in showing, I have a bunch of management tools I've made to help me.  You might want to think about how you can incorporate similar tools to help yourself organize for exhibitions.

• I have a spreadsheet of all my quilts/art with their sizes, descriptions, the materials and techniques used on each, completion date, any awards or prizes it has won, the price, and whether there are dates that it is committed to be at an exhibition.
• I have a page of links to all the places I go to find potential exhibitions
• I have templates for the labels that I make for my quilts (which I print on fabric) so they have a consistent look.
• I have a list of the shows I am interested in showing at, have sent submissions to, and where I have work currently showing.  This includes links to the call to artists, the contact person and address, entry dates, when the quilt is due, the show run dates, and when the quilt is expected to be returned by.
• I even have a database of my library of fiber and art books (OK, this may be overboard, but I was raised by a librarian!)

"Rhapsody in Blue" by Ilene Rae Sorenson
Hard Core Kumihimo braiding, satin cord, mixed
yarns, wooden dowels, wire, wood frame $2400.

I think you probably get the drift.  I guess one of the challenges for me is to not get so caught up in making systems that I don't actually spend my time in the studio.  But, you can see that if you have multiple pieces going to various shows, making sure to track all this information can be critical.

Here's another wonderful piece from the Whidbey Island Surface Design Association's show.  This striking piece by Ilene Rae Sorenson is using a traditional Japanese braiding technique.  She collaborated with a local woodworker to design and build a specialized table for the braiding process.  

"Rhapsody in Blue" detail

I'm always thrilled to see a different type of fiber art... particularly those which mix the traditional with contemporary.  Although the monochromatic color scheme has very little light colors, there is enough differences in value and particularly texture to give a great deal of contrast, creating interest.  The long vertical cords create repetition and the curly ends crossing the columns breaks it up, creating movement.  I think this piece is very successful and beautiful.

I'm getting back to my 5 x 7 challenge this week... I'll have something to share soon.



You Might Also Be Interested In:

Complex Threads 1

"Journeys" Show 
at SeaTac Airport

Designing for a Theme

Stashfest 2013

Barbara O'Steen, Marylee Drake, and Rosalyn Duffy at the
Contemporary QuiltArt Association's (CQA) booth

This past aweekend I enjoyed going to Stashfest, the fund-raiser for the La Conner Quilt and Textile museum.  As a contributor in several ways for this event, it was exciting to see it come to fruition.

The biggest effort I was involved in was in making fabric with the Contemporary QuiltArt Association (CQA), as a vendor for Stashfest.  I got an early entry and have photos to share of all the fantastic unusual fabrics that were available at this event.

Donna DeShazo from CQA with more of our handmade fabrics

Ice-dyed and other hand-dyed fabrics

More of the CQA collection

Annie Lewis with her fabulous hand silk-screened fabrics

Hand-dyed Kona Cottons

Hand-dyed Kona Cottons

Vintage Kimono Silks

Margot Myer's NW Batiked Cottons

Barbara Kanaya (of CQA)
working at Mary Ogwell's booth

Mary Ogwell's West African cottons

Patricia Beleya's Japanese Yukata fabrics

Early-bird shoppers get a spring on all the unique fabrics!

Patricia Beleya's incredible Yukata fabrics

Rack of "insider visits" for sale- studio tours
of NW Quilt Artists (mine on top!)

Business starting to pick up as doors open

I'll be getting some photos up soon from a new fiber exhibition that I went to last week, as well as my finishing my Salsa quilt and the start of a freemotion quilting practice quilt.  Make sure and stop in this coming weekend and link your blog up for Design Wall Weekends!

You Might Also Be Interested In:

CQA Surface Design Party

Viewing for Inspiration

Designing, Stenciling & 
Making Marks on Fabric

BAM - High Fiber Diet

Today was all about the High Fiber Diet... and I'm not talking about food!  Our local Bellevue Arts Museum or 'BAM' is currently hosting a Biennial exhibition which is featuring Fiber this year!  BAM has considered one of its roles to include recognizing "the enduring and uninterrupted role of craft in shaping the aesthetic landscape of the region" (from the High Fiber Diet exhibit pamphlet.)  Today they hosted an all day Symposium with incredible speakers and moderators which left me itching to come home and create!  Since today was our normal day for our Contemporary QuiltArt Association meeting, we choose to meet at the symposium instead... which gave BAM a sold-out crowd!

"Oyster Light" by Barbara Lee Smith

"Oyster Light" detail by Barbara Lee Smith

One of the well-known moderators was Barbara Lee Smith, a resident of a small island in the Puget Sound. Barbara's piece, "Oyster Light" is made from painted, collaged, and stitched synthetic fabric- a translucent, non-woven industrial fabric that looks like Japanese paper.  Her sewing lines "echo the currents of sea and air, the topography of the earth, mapping the work with stitches that literally and figuratively finish it."

Lorraine Barlow, Howard Barlow, Nate Steigenga,
Jiseon Lee Isbara and Barbara Lee Smith
(from left to right) at BAM Symposium 2/09/2013

Barbara moderated a talk called "Reinventing Tradition" with four of the other artists in the show.  It was fascinating to hear the viewpoints and how tradition has influenced some very cutting-edge fiber artists.

"The Infallible Accounts of the Tilapia People and the Dead Which
Soon Outnumbered Them: a Toile De Jouy" by Nate Steigenga

One of the artists on the panel, Nate Steigenga, won the John and Joyce Price Award for Excellence for the BAM show, earning him his own solo show in the future.  The fascinating thing about his piece is that it is reminiscent of a traditional quilt... sort of a tree of life feel, but when you get up close it's much closer to something you'd see Hieronymus Bosch create with fabric!  It's actually a twist on Toile de Jouy, a type of fabric with an intricate scene printed on it.  This artwork is made from bedsheets and pillow shams are backed with ironed-on drawer liners, which gives shade and depth to semi-transparent fabrics.  Nate uses an exceptionally fine collage technique (many of his pieces are tooth-pick wide slivers.)

While I appreciate the process that went into the piece, as well as the black humor, I find it somewhat disturbing... I could stare at Barbara Lee Smith's piece all day, but this left me somewhat disquieted.  But perhaps that is the point.

Detail from Nate Steigenga's artwork

Detail from Nate Steigenga's artwork

 There really is so much to say about all the pieces at this exhibition that it will probably take me many, many posts to share them all with you.

In a way, it was somewhat daunting. Here are "real" fiber artists... at least to this museum's tastes.  Art should be an expression of oneself and each piece in this exhibit is so different that it's can be overwhelming.  A few of the people discussed the sense of the the exhibit being "loud" since there is so much (44 artists... many with huge sculptural pieces) and that it isn't a body of work that all goes together.


I found some of the work inspirational, some of it to be admired for technique, and some awe-inspiring for the scale or complexity which the artist achieved.   But, most importantly, it was wonderful to be immersed in a community of artists with a "common thread" running through us all.  Seeing all my CQA friends, meeting many of the artists with pieces in the show, it reminded me of how important it is to get out of the studio from time-to-time and see others who are involved in your genre of art.

I'll post more photos from the exhibit soon.




You Might Also Be Interested In:

Complex Threads 1

Complex Threads 2

Viewing for Inspiration

Beachpiration

I've always found beaches to be an incredible source of inspiration for me.  We're lucky here in the Pacific Northwest to be surrounded with water, mountains, and greenery. Every once in a while, we even get to bask in some sunshine out in nature.

This weekend, I was up at our getaway on Whidbey Island, a 2 hour trip from our home.  The day cleared up for a short while and I took our dog for a beach walk.  What a glorious day.  This great blue heron was a little far for my camera lens (and my dog was a little too close for his comfort to stay while we advanced towards him!)  But I loved the composition and think I could make a lovely pictorial quilt from this photo.

While I love beaches and sea creatures, one could imagine they might cause some bittersweet feelings for me.  Many years ago I was an extremely active scuba diver.  I was a certified PADI rescue diver and was working on my Divemaster certification.  I assist-taught classes for beginning scuba, which meant I was diving a minimum of twice a week.  I was a diver for the Seattle Aquarium, giving shows of hand-feeding the fish (even the 4-5 foot dogfish, a native shark) on a regular basis.  For those of your from warm climates, go ahead a shiver... the Puget Sound is about 40-42 degrees F. year-round.  But the diversity of sea life is incredible in our region.  It's like going to the Amazon rain forest, only under water.

Unfortunately, while I was starting my second year in college in oceanography/ marine biology, I had a diving mishap and ended up in a decompression chamber.  It was never 100% certain that I actually had "the bends" or whether I had a pinched nerve from carrying the heavy tank on my back.  However, the result was that I needed to choose to either quit diving or risk the potential of a serious or life-threatening injury if I were to continue.

I chose to turn the page to a new chapter in my life.  I also still choose to find joy in beaches and the sea life that I can experience, rather than holding any negativity or resentment towards my loss.  Even though I won't ever really get to have the incredible experience of being weightless and discovering the underwater world again, I cherish my memories.  I'd love to do more artwork based on our native Northwest marine life.

One of my friends from the Contemporary QuiltArt Association, Carla Stehr, makes incredible quilts based on photographs she takes with a scanning electron microscope for her job at NOAA.  She has even published a beautiful book of photographs called "Sea Unseen" of these microscopic organisms.  Here is a video of Carla speaking about her work and it's influence on her artwork:

Note: If you're interested in obtaining a copy of Carla's book "Sea Unseen", she does have a few copies still available for sale.  Let me know via a comment and I'll get you in touch with her.

Another wonderful aspect of the beach is finding treasures, such as this rusty grate which I found this weekend.  I've been saving up some rusted pieces of metal that I've collected off the beach and this one takes the prize!  I think the patterning will make some amazing rust-dyed fabric.

How do you feed your creative muse?  Do you have special places to go to be inspired?


You might also be interested in:

Viewing for Inspiration

Sunshine and Sand- 
Design Inspiration

Golden Hour at Penn 
Cove & Monet's Haystacks

Fitting my Challenge with Showing

My first week's piece for
the 5 x 7 Challenge

For those of you just tuning in, I not only have the 5 x 7 Challenge going on this year, where I make one 5" x 7" artwork each week, but I also actively show my fiber art work.  As the Exhibitions Co-Chair (along with Carolyn Hitter) of the Contemporary QuiltArt Association, I do all the planning and production of setting up exhibitions for our 100+ member group.  Currently, we have 19 members with work that will be shown in the Patchwork and Design Festival in both Rio de Janiero and San Paulo, Brazil.  The quilts have arrived there safely and in plenty of time, so my work there is pretty well done until it's time for the quilts to come home.

Our next exhibition which I'm working on will be at Mighty Tieton, an artistic community in Eastern Washington.  Since the surrounding area is particularly known for their produce and fruit production (in fact the gallery is in an old fruit processing plant!) and the community has a large Hispanic population, they asked for our theme to reflect this if possible.  We've named the exhibit "Salsa!" and hope to get member entries that will reflect this theme in numerous ways.

I'm faced with the difficulty of  putting in lots of hours into setting up, doing logistics, getting entries, jurying the quilts and art cloth, etc. and wanting badly to also participate in showing my artwork.  But creating a piece takes time... a commodity that I'm a bit shy on these days!  So, here's my plan... I thought what I could do is a coordinating 5 x 7 piece each week for 9 weeks, then put these together into a quilt.  I'm planning to do a thread-painting of the following fruits and vegetables:

• tomato
• onion
• cilantro
• lime
• corn
• tomatillos
• peppers
• avocado
• chili peppers

Detail of quilt made from Guatemalan
fabric by artist Priscilla Bianchi

Then, each thread painting will be appliqued (probably with a bit of trapunto) to a quilted coordinating background.  I'm not sure about how they will all fit together yet, possibly with some of my hand-woven Guatemalan fabric, or even with machine-made lace.

What do you think?  I'd really love some comments on this idea... combining my 5 x 7 challenge with the Salsa exhibit seems to kill two birds with one stone, yet maintain the spirit of my challenge to create each week.

You might also be interested in:

Planning an Exhibition

Scope Creep

The Art of Organization

CQA Surface Design Party

Today turned out fantastic at our CQA meeting!  We had the following stations for making surface-designed fabrics to contribute to Stashfest:

Christina Fairley Erickson (me!): Shiva Oil Paintstick Rubbings, Stencils, Fabric Markers and Tsuneko Inks
Cameron Mason: Mono-printing with thickened dye
Colleen Wise: Thermofax silkscreening and foiling
Peg Swartzman: Oil Paintsticks with resists and stencil brushes
Kathy Cooper: Printing with Print blocks

Peg Swartzman teaching how to use Oil Paintsticks with
Freezer paper resists and stenciling brushes for an
elegant gradient effect

Cameron Mason (far right) teaching mono-printing with
thickened dyes to Roslyn Duffy (left) and Roberta Andreson (center right)

Roslyn Duffy's mono-print with thickened dye

Flora Dalglish making Shiva oil paintstick
rubbings at Christina's station

Debbie Babin designing with fabric markers after adding oilstick rubbings
at Christina's station

Barbara O'Steen (left), Barbara Kanaya (center) and Debbie Babin (right)
working at Christina's stenciling, fabric pens, and oil stick rubbing station

CQA President Marylee Drake (foreground) doing
Thermofax screen printing with Colleen Wise (background)

Some of our finished packets of fabrics to sell at Stashfest

We labeled each packet with the artist's name who made the fabric(s), size(s),
and the processes used on each piece.

Stashfest Creator and CQA Member, Patricia Belyea
measured the fabrics and helped bundle them for sale

Want the chance to buy some of these wonderful fabrics?  Come to Stashfest April 6 and 7 up in LaConner!

You might also be interested in:

Making Fabric

Viewing for Inspiration

Making Fabric