A day out with my sister

Over the weekend my sister Deb came to visit me from Maine for Thanksgiving. With finances being so tight we haven't seen each other in 2 years, but a month ago we were able to find a flight on JetBlue for $80 roundtrip from Boston to Chicago to split, so this holiday has even more to be thankful for.

On Sunday we headed over to my favorite local gallery Packer Schopf to see the closing of Brian Dettmers exhibit of incredible carved books. The bonus was getting to meet artist Kathy Halper who also has an exhibit in the gallery this month.

I love Kathy's work, she does stitched drawings that explore the lives of teens in social media. Her images come from sometimes disturbing and often very humorous posts on facebook dealing with sex, drugs and the loss of privacy and innocence. Her work is so timely and relevant and perfectly executed in neutral colored floss on linen.

After the gallery, we walked over to my favorite coffee shop La Colombe, but had to stop at this dumpster when we saw it's public service message

Mmmmm hot coffee on a cold afternoon!

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Wonderful work inspired by a few of my classes and techniques

After taking my Heavy Metal Play Day class in St Paul last June Janet Hartje made this wonderful book to hold a variety of papers showcasing mixed media techniques.

Check out Janets blog to read more about the book and see some of the other cool stuff she's been creating! 


This week Marilyn Fischer, from Kentucky, shared this wonderful little tea bags on muslin quilt she made with her 94 year old mother who lives in Massachusetts. 

Marilyn's mother painted the tea bags, from a photo of Marilyn in her favorite hat and Marilyn did the quilting and mounting. They regularly share ideas over the computer and phone. Marilyn says "I LOVE the tea bags! They have it all.....look old, texture and I have always loved tea dyed fabric."

Thanks so much for sharing your work Janet and Marilyn!!!!!

Now, for some more inspiration, head over to Diana Trouts blog for a free 7 part mini watercolor workshop.

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Triple Inspiration!

Last month Jane La Fazio taught a lesson to her monthly art quilt class using teabags, similar to the work I have done collaging them on fabric. 

One of her students, Susie Zolghardri, had also been reading Carla Sonheim’s book and did some cat drawings, using a pillow as the support below the drawings to get more playful shapes, as Carla suggests in her book. Susie traced her cat drawings to teabags and made this adorable quilt!

It's so fun seeing inspiration from three different sources all coming together to make something new.

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The last week of April

Last week was an interesting one, so I thought I would share a few images from it.

On wednesday President Obama was next door at Harpo studios. Several news vans were outside with cameras set up to document the arrival.

I watched the motorcade drive up and into the studio garage, there were at least a dozen vans and cars. All the streets for several blocks around the building were closed to through traffic for 3 hours. The street below was filled with secret service guys, it was reassuring to see there was a lot of care done to protect the president.  I was not able to really get any photos because the secret service guys waved us off the balcony shortly after the president arrived.

Friday morning I stepped out of the shower and heard groups of women shouting out their love of Oprah. When I looked out the window I saw the sidewalk below filled with brightly dressed women in dresses and hats.

Then I realized this was an episode celebrating the royal wedding that had just happened that morning.

On the weekend, Nina and I went downtown

 to the Merchandise Mart. It is such a massive building.

We went to Artropolis, a huge fine art venue, on saturday and then the Antiques Fair on sunday. 

Both events were a lot of fun, but I really loved seeing the decorative arts at the Antiques fair. It was amazing to see so many pieces; from paintings, prints, renaissance period parchment manuscripts, furniture, to suits of armor, that one would typically see in museum exhibits.

One booth had several original paintings on canvas for old Guinness ads.

Another had doll molds, don't these hands look like they are doing the royal wave?

I adore these hand painted floral engravings!

A truly exciting thing that we saw was a French traveling salesmen's cotton fabric sample book from the 1820's. It was huge, probably 18" x 24" and at least 4 inches thick and it cost $35,000. The fabric swatches were in perfect shape and could easily be used to reproduce new fabric since it was old enough to be copyright free. What a treasure trove!

I love this view of the Chicago river from inside the Merchandise Mart.

Feliz Cinco de Mayo!

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A little Inspiration at the Art Institute

Saturday my friends Frieda Anderson and Laura Wasilowski picked up my daughter Nina and I on their way to the Art Institute for a meet up with other midwest SAQA members. The plan was to see the current textile exhibit, but I was sidetracked by the amazing exhibit titled Kings, Queens and Courtiers: Art in Early Renaissance France. It was a fabulous exhibit of paintings, sculptures, manuscripts and tapestries. I love this period of art, renaissance manuscripts and tapestries were the inspiration for this quilt

Oh Deer, Look What's Become of Me

Seeing all of those beautiful paintings makes me want to paint!

At noon we met up in the cafeteria for a bit of lunch and a meeting.

What a great day!

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My other love... pottery

In my conversation with Lesley I mentioned that I used to do pottery when I lived in Austin. I love working in ceramics, making the basic form and then carving the surface. Much like when I make an art quilt, I paint the fabric and then quilt the surface. I love that extra layer of visual texture. I found that each art form often influenced the other. Lesley asked me to post some pics on my blog, so here goes...

 

I eventually stopped making pottery, as much as I loved it, I had to make a choice, art quilts or pottery, there just wasn't enough time in the day to do both.

Street art in the neighborhood

One of the things I like about living in my neighborhood is finding bits of interesting street art when I am out walking my dog.

This is one of the newer pieces of street art by Banksy a well known, street artist from the UK.