Today let’s finish the “Modern X” Exhibit from QuiltCon2023. Remember that these are quilts made to say Happy Birthday to QuiltCon!!

This first quilt was based on the remembrance of an Athletic Trainer who was told “when in doubt, make an X over the injury when taping or bracing it”……

What a fun inspiration!!

The next quilt has a lot of hand quilting…..

….with embroidery thread used to stitch the tiny x’s….

Lots of “X-tra” detail was used in the Courthouse Step Block Quilt……

To truly understand this quilt, you have to get up-close-and-personal…..

And, when one of the “White glove helpers” runs over and asks if you want to see the back of a quilt, you ALWAYS say YES!!!

In this quilt, Jessica Plunkett made a series of Sawtooth star blocks and spent time playing with the position of the stars to create new and secondary designs…..

I love the gradation of color!!

The next quilt…..

Isn’t the quilting wonderful!!

The maker notes that this quilt stretched her abilities with paper piecing and partial seams…..

Finally, I love the “pixelation that appears in the colored squares….

And, the quilting is nothing to sneeze at either!!!

There were a bunch more of these Happy Birthday quilts, but I was completely out of time as they shooed me out of the hall!!

I hope that you enjoyed the Anniversary X quilts.

Tomorrow we start with the Ruby & Bee Fabric challenges. You will be amazed at what people can accomplish with just 6 fabrics!!!

Now, what is that????

Okay….that sounds interesting!!

Jane made this quilt as a “what-if” game to figure out how to incorporate her small, brightly colored crumbs into a quilt!!

What a great idea!! Turning crumbs into strips is SO much easier than turning them into blocks. That’s ANOTHER idea to add to my list!!

Natalie Skinner used her quilt to push just a little beyond her comfort level…..

I have actually heard that you work better when you are working at a level slightly higher than what you are comfortable with!! Just a fun fact!!

In this quilt, the maker explored bias tape applique…..

This next quilt honors all of our quilting grandmothers’ sense of thrift and beauty by only using scraps of fabric that would normally have been thrown out…..

You can do SO much with strip pieced blocks like these and I love the transparency that she achieved here.

You can also add this to my list of “projects that I want to do”.

PLEASE tell me that you all have endless lists of such projects as well!!

I love the innovative quilting on this next quilt…..

The use of the Drunkard’s Path blocks in this design is amazing.

But look closer at the quilting……

The next quilt didn’t stop with just ONE X!!

In the artist’s statement, Augusto says that he wanted to explore the possibilities of the three dimensions in the plane. Based on the number of different levels that I see in the quilt, I think he accomplished that well!!

The next quilt was inspired during a quarrel with her husband…..

You really have to get up close and personal with this quilt to truly appreciate how much the quilting adds…..

That’s half of them….more to come tomorrow.

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When I stepped into this Category area, I was expecting to see lots of quilts with small designs and tons of empty backgrounds with lots of quilting.

I was wrong….. Here is the directive for the category…..

USE OF NEGATIVE SPACE….. Quilt design incorporates creative use of negative space integrated into the composition of the quilt.

OK…..NOT blank space but new designs created by the background.

Take this first quilt for example…..

Amy improvisationally paper-pieced the blocks and then rotated the blocks to create fun “steps” in the negative space.

When I first saw this quilt, I didn’t notice the two different arrangements from the top right corner to the bottom left. It really adds interest to the piece.

Amy also created the next one in a similar colorway…..

I love the designs that show up in the lighter white/beige fabric.

Black and White dominate this 1st-place ribbon-winning quilt…..

The quilt was inspired by a wide range of modern and contemporary art pieces that date from the 1950-1970s.

The chartreuse added to this black and white quilt adds interest…..

This quilt took the 2nd-pace ribbon in the category and was the result of a 30-day improv sew-a-long. Nice result!!

This next quilt fits more with my idea of what a “Negative Space” quilt would look like…..

Claire designed the quilt in Procreate and used English Paper Piecing to complete the top.

As you might imagine, I am quite taken with the quilting…..

The final quilt is my favorite…..

I originally thought that it was the same quilt that I had seen at Houston, but as I looked back, I found that I had actually seen two other of her quilts in a similar style…..

I am obviously a FAN!!!…..Is that weird??

Tomorrow we start looking at the “Modern X” category…. Be sure to come back for more.

If you are a fan of straight-line quilting, you might be interested in this online course teaching 8 (or more) ways to use a Straight-Edged ruler….

For the last three days, we have been looking at the Community Quilts that were made by various Modern Quilt Guilds.

These quilts continue in the same vein with several people coming together to make something of beauty!!

This first quilt was probably my favorite in the category….

Marci said that there is no deep meaning to the quilt….it just celebrates the love of flowers, embroidery and an electric color scheme!!

The next quilt keeps the same color scheme but leads with abstract shapes rather than flowers….

The group members were asked to make “exuberant blocks using geometric shapes, swoopy curves, and thin lines in bright colors on a navy background”.

Some of these designs look like they would be fun to make…..

Here is the explanation for the next quilt…..

That whole process sounds like a lot of fun to be part of!!!

The third-place ribbon went to this quilt…..

This quilt is a tribute to the iconic musician “Ray Charles” who lost his sight as a child. The main body of the quilt depicts, in braille, the first verse of the song that made Charles famous….” Georgia On My Mind”.

Being from Georgia, I ESPECIALLY like this one!!

The 2nd-place ribbon went to….

The improv log cabin blocks each contains some of the Kona 2023 Color of the year…..Cosmos!!

The 1st-place ribbon went to this quilt…..

Each column contains improv components made with 2 colors and using designs that uniquely represent its maker.

What a fun idea!!!

Unfortunately, I was running out of time when I got to this category so there aren’t as many photos but I hope that you enjoyed seeing these few!!

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Tomorrow we will look at one of the tenets of the Modern Quilt Movement…..negative space!!

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Today we will look at a few more “Community Quilts” from QuiltCon. To learn more about this category, check out the post from a few days back.

I must have really liked this quilt since I photographed it on two different days…..

I like the color transitions but the quilting is what makes the quilt!!

This palm block quilt is intriguing……

I love how the color shift is asymmetrical!!

This tessellation design works beautifully in a quilt…..

It was paper pieced from a pattern based on a woodblock print by Mel Beach….WONDERFUL!!

Take a look at this one…..

I love how the light shows thru!! And how the square quilting design fits so well with the pattern.

The Denver Metro Modern Quilt Guild gave us this one…..

I am sure that this is the view from many of their member’s porches!!

This group emphasized the yellow end of the color spectrum…..

I particularly like the curvy quilting against the intense angles of the diamonds.

Now, this is my favorite….probably of the whole category…..

I absolutely love the whimsy of this quilt and that fact that “Leon” (read the title) does disappear into the background!!

OKAY….that is it for the “Community Quilts” from QuiltCon.

There were many more that I didn’t photograph but I loved the idea behind these quilts and the obvious camaraderie that proceeded from their making.

There are still a few Quilt Con categories to explore, so stay tuned for more!!

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In this blog, I post stories about creativity, techniques, tools of the trade, and lots more about the wonderful art of quilting. If you are enjoying these posts, please subscribe to be notified of each new blog as it becomes available.

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