A smaller view

There were 47 entries in the “Small” Pictorial Quilts category at the International Quilt Festival. In this post, I have managed to narrow it down to a dozen favorites!

So…..let’s go!!

Mimi Ghauri-Young produced this quilt that really does look like a Matisse painting…..

“Seaside View — Homage to Matisse”

This quilt from Judith Phelps is painted and machine quilted…..

“Remembrance”

As with many of these pictorial quilts, the quilting makes all the difference…..

The expressions on these sheep faces drew me into this quilt from Enid Weichselbaum……

“Lambing Time”

Karen Hull Sienk used mixture of piecing and fused applique to create this wonderful canyon scene…..

“Tribute II”

I love how the pieced border echoes the interior picture.

This Third-place winner from Roxanne Nelson was a study in detail…..

“Come on In, the Water’s Fine”

Just look at how many fabrics are used to create the eye…..

….and these couched threads work perfectly as whiskers….

For the last few years, there have been so many quilts that came from the quilters in Taipei City, Taiwan. This beauty from Li-hsiang Wang is another of those…..

“Making Rice Dumplings”

Sandra Mollon used fused applique, dying, inking and machine quilting to create this wonderful landscape….

“Toroweap Overlook”

Ann Pigneri created this quilt from a photograph that she had taken……

“Fort Lauderdale”

In particular, I love the reflections…..

Carolyn Allison used a photo to depict her grandsons on a windy day at the beach…..

“Look! They’re Not Fighting!”

In particular, I was enamored with the movement in the clothing…..

The horizontal lines in this quilt by Deanna Corrigan are the perfect contrast to the applique!!

“Mountain Lake”

I loved this quilt from Sue Colozzi…..

“Snug Harbor Egret”

And was particularly impressed and interested in the thread painted foliage…..

Finally, Kestrel Michaud presented this fun quilt based in a steampunk junkyard……

“Not Today”

Just look at the detail in the Roadrunner…..

Well, that is it for the pictorial category. Tomorrow we will have a look at some of the quilts in the Pieced category!!!

Get the BIG picture

Today I will work thru the LARGE Pictoral quilts and tomorrow will hit the small ones.

It was an amazing category!!!

The first-place winner was “The Memories That Remain” by Lynn Czaban…..

“The Memories That Remain”

Can you say WOW!!!!

Just look at his face…..

The thing that I love about this quilt is that there is no painting involved. It is made with fused applique, thread-sketching, and machine quilting!!

She took the design from two photos that were taken in 1935!! They were in the public domain and documented in the Library of Congress. Her artist statement said “I imaged this gentleman gazing wistfully into the distance, thinking of a life well lived and the woman he loved!!”

WELL DONE!!

Next is a quilt by Hiroko Miyana and Msanobu Miyama……

“Catch It, Yuri!”

This quilt made wonderful use of dying, painting, fused applique, and FMQ. The quilting added so much to the design…..

“Memories of a Maiko” by Melissa Sobotka is painted, embroidered, embellished, and machine quilted…..

“Memories of a Maiko”

Just look at the detail on the face……

…and don’t miss the matchstick quilting in the background.

Karen Lambdin created this fun quilt…..

“Spiral Vortex”

It looks as if it is intricately pieced, but instead, it is appliqued……

But look at all of those pebbles!! I have to wonder how long it took to quilt!!

Jane Sassaman had a number of quilts in the show, including this fun, fanciful design…..

“Illinois Album 2”

I honestly hadn’t noticed the butterfly in the center until I posted the above photo!! Part of the appeal of this quilt was her use of machine embroidery stitches in the background…..

It was very effective and added another dimension to the quilt!!

Karen Eckmeier created this quilt as part of her “Happy Villages” series, although only the mermaids will be living in her “Sunken Citadel”

“Sunken Citadel”

There were so many fun things about this quilt, but the fish topped the list for me…..

I love that they each have different colored tails!!

Karen also produced the next quilt…..

“Tree Town”

She obviously loves giving the observer plenty of things to look at…..

This quilt had a layer of Tulle holding the appliques down for quilting.

Come back tomorrow for the smaller versions of the Pictorial category!!

A quilt with a view

I am not sure exactly what is the difference between a “Landscape Quilt” and a “Pictorial Quilt”, but today let’s look at a few of the quilts in the Landscape division!!

Now I LOVE these types of quilts and, if you remember, have one in process, although if I don’t get going on it, it may end up in the UFO category!!!

I’ll start with this one that was pieced and was one of my favorites, made by Barbara Danzi…..

“Fern Forrest”

It is very stylized but I love the impressions that you get from the piece!! You can definitely feel the ferns!!

This next quilt, by Susan McBride Gilgen and Cheryl Paul Styler had a bit of everything in it…..

“Remembering Old Nauvoo”

There was Applique, Embellishing, Embroidery, Dyeing, Piecing, AND Quilting. There was even some tatting!! I had to scour the photo to find it, but it is used as an embellishment in the binding. Sorry for the quality of this photo, but at least you will get the idea…..

The colors in this quilt by Susan Jackan definitely appeal to me…..

“Nature’s Architecture II”

She said that it was inspired by photos of rock formations in Utah and she marveled that a tree could actually take root in such a challenging environment. She used painting, hand piecing, and machine quilting.

Nancy Hershberger created this magnificent Autumn scene based on a photograph of the Great Smoky Mountains….

“Tennessee Autumn

The leaves were done with snippets and were super effective…..

….and the quilting added great movement. You can feel the leaves blowing in the breeze!!!

I am always interested in how quilters portray water in their masterpieces…..

Finally, Barbara Matzke produced an amazing river mill scene…..

“Glade Creek Grist Mill”

The threadwork in the trees was wonderful…..

….and I especially appreciated the piecing in the bottom of the quilt…..

It was a great way to recognize that this was a quilt and not a photograph!!

In the same vein, tomorrow I will show a set of Pictorial quilts. Believe me….you WON’T want to miss them!!

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Only two colors…..

I am not usually a fan of two-color quilts. Sometimes I find them to be a bit boring, but these five quilts that were displayed at the International Quilt Festival were anything but boring!!!

Lynn Crimes presented this wonderful low-volume quilt…..

“A Neutral Score”

Let’s get a little closer on this one…..

She used improv piecing over BLACK batting. That is why the seams and quilting stand out so much!! VERY clever!!!

Connie Dyer Zafaris used a mixture of Charcoal and Silver to make this “Ripples” quilt….

“Ripples”

The quilting does an amazing job of highlighting the design!!!

This next quilt from Martha Ferguson is also enhanced by great free-motion quilting from Karen Kendo……

“Modern Chain”

Connie Dyer Zafiris also submitted my favorite of the two-color quilts……

“Fitting A Square Peg in a Round Hole”

Finally, this quilt from Hope Reed……

“The Preppy Illusion”

….is a great optical illusion quilt and the colors are perfect for the design!!

And of course….. now that I have looked closely at these two-color quilts, I am thinking that it might be fun to try one myself!! Isn’t that how it always goes!!

Come back tomorrow and we will look at some astounding landscape quilts!!!

Can it GET any smaller?

One of the exhibits at the International Quilt Festival was called “Micropiecing: 200K”. MAN was this category amazing!!

Instead of the limbo mantra of “how low can you go?”, the quilting version is “how SMALL can you get?”.

There were 21 quilts in this exhibit, all made by Amy Pabst. The quilts focus on a traditional pineapple block done on a VERY small scale. All blocks are 2-inches or less and the strips are 1/8-inch wide OR LESS!!

The series was considered complete when the total number of pieces reached 201,751!!!

Many of these were pieced on a 1947 Singer Featherweight!!

These are a few of my favorite quilts in this exhibition…..