An old/new project

Quite a number of years ago, before I taught at my first national-level show, I had a rare opportunity in about 2007.   Dianne Hire, author, teacher, quilter, artist, gardener, lives nearby me here in Maine.   Alas, she hurt her back–badly–just a wrong move picking up a light stick.   And she was scheduled to teach at her favorite retreat in just a few days.  She needed someone to drive her and help schlep all the teacher stuff.  Luckily for me, my name came up as one of two folks who might be able to help her.  The other person couldn’t do it, so I finally got to meet Dianne (we have a mutual friend but had never met) and in the one week of summer where I could take a break from Paul and the boys and go.  So I drove her to Paul Smith’s College (!!! Yep, can you believe it, a college with that name in upstate NY near Lake Placid) and got to sit in and take all her classes.   I began this project back then, but never finished it though I always liked it.

Another bit of astounding good luck:  I’ve been affiliated with Janome America in their artists and teachers program for a decade now.  Can you believe it?  I can’t, but they seem to be happy with me and willing to keep me on.   I had never really wanted or liked the high end machines that do fancy embroidery software etc.  Then at International Quilt Festival in Houston last year I taught a class in a room with Janome’s new top of the line machine, the 15000.   WOWIE ZOWIE is it a BEAST!  And much easier to use with all sorts of cool features.   Even more astounding, Janome is lending me one!   Here it is, newly set up in my studio:

Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, because the Janome 15000 is of course the great White Wizard, the most powerful wizard ever

I decided to finish the quilt above (I won’t show the whole thing because Dianne is working on a book with the pattern) as my first project on the machine so I could get to learn the machine and make friends with it.  THEN I’ll move on to the Embroidery function learning curve!  Here are some close ups of the fantastic satin stitching I’ve achieved on this beauty!  I was able to taper (adjust) the width of the stitch as I stitched to get smooth thicks and thins in the satin stitched line.  WOOT!

Satin stitched, quilted, then the applique was outlined to make it pop. The large motif in the center is stitched in the ditch, but the motifs in on the right aren’t yet outlined.  It really makes a difference!

And my border design.  Here, the motifs on the right are outlined, the ones on the left are not.  The ones on the left kinda ripple.  By outlining, you really define and refine the shape.  Getting the tension just perfect was a bit fiddly.  I have found that the more complicated the machine, the more delicate they are in their settings.  Once you get them set, they are perfection, but you really need to understand your machine, be patient, and get to learn and know the way the machine works.  So often I hear students say “my machine won’t do that.”  Most of the time, I regret to say, it is operator error–not taking the time to learn and be patient.  So I am telling myself just that and hoping for LOTS of time in the near future to get to do that learning!

MASSIVE thanks to Janome America for their continuing generosity with me.   I hope to be able to give back to them and make some awesome, award-worthy quilts on this beauteous wizard of a machine!

This autumn I will embark on something new:  curating a SAQA (Studio Art Quilt Associates) exhibit titled “Food!”  That actually sounds a lot more glamorous than it is:  essentially, I will be the behind-the-scenes person coordinating entries, notifications, getting the quilts, communicating with venues and such like.  The juror, the person who will select the quilts for the exhibit, is the irrepressible Alex Veronelli of Aurifil Threads.

Tomatoes, Basil and Garlic, No. 1, the start of what I will call my Quilting the Good Life series!

This blogpost is to whet your appetite (pun totally intended) and get you to thinking about food and its portrayal in cloth.

I’ve used my small Tomatoes quilt (the one in my Video Workshop on how I create and quilt my collaged pieces) to illustrate this just so we’d have a tasty visual, but this post is all about ideas from words.   To find a full prospectus, you need to be a SAQA member; go to the Members login page to (duh) log in.  Then click on Calls for Entry (here), and then for even more information, click on “go to complete prospectus and entry instructions” or click here (remember you must be a SAQA member and logged in for that link to work).  In a nutshell, though, the exhibit will be about all aspects of food from production to consumption.  Finished quilts must be between 24 to 46 inches on each side; the variation in size will make it challenging for me to organize and hang the selected quilts, but will give artists substantial flexibility in size and orientation of their quilts.

While we were discussing the title and working on the Call for Entry, I googled around to find quotes about food.  Here are a whole bunch–do any of these inspire YOU to make a quilt about food?

• First we eat, then we do everything else. — MFK Fisher
• Nothing would be more tiresome than eating and drinking if God had not made them a pleasure as well as a necessity.  – Voltaire
• We are indeed much more than what we eat, but what we eat can nevertheless help us to be much more than what we are.
  – Adelle Davis
• One of the very nicest things about life is the way we must regularly stop whatever it is we are doing and devote our attention to eating.  – Luciano Pavarotti
• Always serve too much hot fudge sauce on the hot fudge sundaes. It makes people overjoyed,and puts them in your debt. ― Judith Olney
• There ain’t no point in making soup unless others eat it. Soup needs another mouth to taste it, another heart to be warmed by it. ― Kate DiCamillo, The Tale of Despereaux
• Sitting on the porch alone, listening to them fixing supper, he felt again the indignation he had felt before, the sense of loss and the aloneness, the utter defenselessness that was each man’s lot, sealed up in his bee cell from all the others in the world. But the smelling of boiling vegetables and pork reached him from the inside, the aloneness left him for a while. The warm moist smell promised other people lived and were preparing supper.                                                                                                                                                                                                                       He listened to the pouring and the thunder rumblings that sounded hollow like they were in a rainbarrel, shared the excitement and the coziness of the buzzing insects that had sought refuge on the porch, and now and then he slapped detachedly at the mosquitoes, making a sharp crack in the pouring buzzing silence. The porch sheltered him from all but the splashes of the drops that hit the floor and their spray touched him with a pleasant chill. And he was secure, because someewhere out beyond the wall of water humanity still existed, and was preparing supper. ― James Jones, From Here to Eternity
• … food is not simply organic fuel to keep body and soul together, it is a perishable art that must be savoured at the peak of perfection.  –E.A. Bucchianeri
• Jam on a winter took away the blue devils. It was like tasting summer. –Sandra Dallas
• We eat the year away. We eat the spring and the summer and the fall. We wait for something to grow and then we eat it.― Shirley Jackson, We Have Always Lived in the Castle
• This magical, marvelous food on our plate, this sustenance we absorb, has a story to tell. It has a journey. It leaves a footprint. It leaves a legacy. To eat with reckless abandon, without conscience, without knowledge; folks, this ain’t normal. ― Joel Salatin, Folks, This Ain’t Normal: A Farmer’s Advice for Happier Hens, Healthier People, and a Better World
• The first supermarket supposedly appeared on the American landscape in 1946. That is not very long ago. Until then, where was all the food? Dear folks, the food was in homes, gardens, local fields, and forests. It was near kitchens, near tables, near bedsides. It was in the pantry, the cellar, the backyard. ― Joel Salatin, Folks, This Ain’t Normal: A Farmer’s Advice for Happier Hens, Healthier People, and a Better World
• You know, the act of feeding someone is the ultimate act of care and affection…sharing yourself with someone else through food.” He held another mouthful of cake under her nose. “Think about it. We are fed in the Eucharist, by our mothers when we are infants, by our parents as children, by friends at dinner parties, by a lover when we feast on one another’s bodies…and on occasion, on another’s souls. ― Sylvain Reynard, Gabriel’s Inferno
• Southerners are known for their hospitality and the foremost way of exhibiting it is through food. ― Cicely Tyson
• There is communion of more than our bodies when bread is broken and wine drunk. ― M.F.K. Fisher
• Good bread is the most fundamentally satisfying of all foods; and good bread with fresh butter, the greatest of feasts. ― James Beard
• I’m pretty sure that eating chocolate keeps wrinkles away because I have never seen a 10 year old with a Hershey bar and crows feet. ― Amy Neftzger
• First we eat, then we do everything else. ― M.F.K. Fisher
• Red onions are especially divine. I hold a slice up to the sunlight pouring in through the kitchen window, and it glows like a fine piece of antique glass. Cool watery-white with layers delicately edged with imperial purple…strong, humble, peaceful…with that fiery nub of spring green in the center… ― Mary Hayes-Grieco, The Kitchen Mystic: Spiritual Lessons Hidden in Everyday Life
• The shared meal elevates eating from a mechanical process of fueling the body to a ritual of family and community, from the mere animal biology to an act of culture. ― Michael Pollan, In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto
• To eat well in England you should have breakfast three times a day. ― W. Somerset Maugham
• Bacon is the candy of meat. — Kevin Taggart
• It seems to me that our three basic needs, for food and security and love, are so mixed and mingled and entwined that we cannot straightly think of one without the others. So it happens that when I write of hunger, I am really writing about love and the hunger for it, and warmth and the love of it and the hunger for it… and then the warmth and richness and fine reality of hunger satisfied… and it is all one. ― M.F.K. Fisher, The Art of Eating: 50th Anniversary Edition
• Mayonnaise: One of the sauces which serve the French in place of a state religion. ― Ambrose Bierce
• your body is not a temple, it’s an amusement park. Enjoy the ride. ― Anthony Bourdain, Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly
• I don’t know what it is about food your mother makes for you, especially when it’s something that anyone can make – pancakes, meat loaf, tuna salad – but it carries a certain taste of memory. ― Mitch Albom
• Tomatoes and oregano make it Italian; wine and tarragon make it French. Sour cream makes it Russian; lemon and cinnamon make it Greek. Soy sauce makes it Chinese; garlic makes it good.”― Alice May Brock
• If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world. ― J.R.R. Tolkien
• Ask not what you can do for your country. Ask what’s for lunch. ― Orson Welles
• After a good dinner one can forgive anybody, even one’s own relations. ― Oscar Wilde, A Woman of No Importance
• I cook with wine, sometimes I even add it to the food.”― W.C. Fields

The end of the year insanity began with States in Cross Country. Here’s Eli receiving the baton in the 4 x 800 m. relay

Good thing my blog allows me to write posts then schedule them out into the future!   It has been insanely busy.  Here’s a smattering of the early June busy-ness!

The kid in mid-stride, airborne! The team was happy to not finish last at States, as the fast runners were doing other races and not the relays.

And Eli passing TWO other teams/kids in the final lap!

Then the Track and Field team end-of-season picnic and awards at a waterfront park in Rockport, Maine.

Eli with teammates Melissa K. and her sister Emily K.

Then there’s the garden. I need to see if I can get the weed whacker working (ugh, I am NOT mechanical), but here I hacked out the dead rugosa rose stuff. Fortunately, there are a lot of “runners” that are growing well.

And here’s my hilarious helper, tethered to the pine tree so he can wander but not wander off!

And my beloveds, Sven (the gnome)  and Phineas (the phlamingo):

Whimsy in your life is a good thing. Thanks so much to Joshua and Ashley for the best mother’s day gift EVER! I keep moving the pair about. TOTALLY LOVE THIS!

Then on the final day of school, after Eli’s last exam, we attended a memorial service for one of his Cross Country teammates, Forest P., who died a week ago from a brain tumor at the age of 18.  His parents got him a tutor, though, and he was able to graduate along with his class (though of course he was way too ill to attend the ceremony, he died just a few days after).   His father wanted the teammates to come do his practice run route near their home where the reception after was held.  When Forest and a friend would come in (usually within 10 feet of each other), everyone would shout “Run, Forest, run!”  so we did.  Sigh.  So impossibly sad:

Members of the team including the coach head out to run for Forest–kids are to the right of the lady in the rose suit

And Friday night was the delayed Wrestling potluck and awards. Eli received a new award, the Chris Remsen award named after a legendary Camden high school athlete. Given the description, I’d call it an all-around best award: best athlete, scholar and teammate. [We postponed the dinner/awards because asst. coach True’s house burned down two nights before the original date.  Luckily though they lost their dog, they and infant son are fine.]

the 2013-14 Camden Hills Regional High School Wrestling team, champions yet again

Let the summer begin…it looks to be as busy for Eli and me as this past week!

Playing with the Stillman and Birn paper samples.  Pens and pencils I used in my test are to the left.

First up:  my apologies–this post got REALLY LONG.  But I have a feeling I may be referring people to it so wanted ALL the info in one blogpost.  So here goes:   many moons ago, the generous folks at Stillman and Birn sent me a sample pack of their six papers because I didn’t know what to order in a sketchbook, and the sketchbooks aren’t exactly inexpensive so I didn’t want to buy six.   I decided to do a controlled test on the samples using various pens, pencils, inks and watercolors.  The paper comes in two weights:  100 lb and 180 lb, two colors: white and ivory, and three finishes:  vellum, cold press, and smooth.  Vellum is a velvety finish (not like drafting vellum which is like a heavy duty tracing paper); smooth is comparable to hot press.  Here’s the S&B information:

Stillman and Birn chart with the differences in the papers (alpha through Zeta). Paper specs are on the S&B site here.

And some useful links:

• Stillman & Birn website
• Dick Blick offers S&B sketchbooks here and here.
• Binders Art Supply in Atlanta carries the sketchbooks AND the paper!!!!  Awesome customer service (see below)
• Goulet Pens has great fountain pens, a massive selection of inks, a billion instructional / informational videos and (DRUM ROLL of epic proportions please) they sell SAMPLES of the inks.  You can get about two cartridges worth out of each sample…so I have ordered and used about TWENTY samples.  But that is a separate blogpost for later.
• Online classes with Val Webb, probably the best art teacher I’ve ever had; she helps all of her students achieve more than we could ever dream!
• Online classes at Sketchbook Skool with Danny Gregory, Koosje Koene and various guest teachers

Here’s a photo of the six pieces of paper in my Stillman & Birn sample pack:

The six papers from Stillman and Birn.  I’ve put on the back the name of the paper, weight, finish, and the ink used (Noodler’s Lexington Grey).  Top row is 100-lb, bottom row is heavier 180-lb.

Here I’ve got the paper criss crossed with the 100 weight on top so you can see the effect of very wet watercolor on it and the show-through (or lack thereof).  For lighter weight paper, the lack of ghosting and bleed through is good.

Another view of just the 100-lb papers while still damp (the ones on the right) from watercolor

Here are close-ups of each of the six papers showing how my favorite pens and pencils behave on each offering:

Still wet! Alpha series 100-lb. Vellum surface.  You can see that I did the “evil” test with LOTS of soupy watercolor to see how far you can push this paper.  The answer:  a long way!  I did find that for me the Vellum surface papers were a bit “skittery” with the extra fine Pitt Artists pens, which I didn’t enjoy.  Personally I preferred the Epsilon (below), but that is totally a matter of what each person likes.

Close-ups of the various papers.  This is the white Beta series, a cold-press finish sized for multi-media

Gamma Paper, 100-lb Ivory, Vellum finish

Delta Series, Ivory, heavier weight 180-lb paper.  Suitable for very wet media.

Epsilon:  this ended up being my favorite because of both the surface and the fact that you get more pages per sketchbook.  If I were endlessly wealthy, I might (or might not) choose the Zeta.  But since many of my pages do not use heavy water, I chose Epsilon knowing full well I could end up with some buckling.

Zeta paper.  White, smooth finished.  Suitable for wet media and more.

I’m just finishing up my first S&B sketchbook, an Epsilon 7 x 10 wirebound.   I LOVE IT!  So much that I ordered some individual sheets to customize my sketchbook for my trip to England.   Before that though, here are some sample pages from my Epsilon sketchbook so you can see how it handled various media.

Epsilon 7 x 10 sketchbook, pencil on left page. Charcoal pencil and water on right page with white charcoal pencil. Exercises from a **fantastic** online class with Val Webb.

My rudimentary watercolor, from the first two lessons at Danny Gregory’s Sketchbook Skool. Pen and ink with watercolor. The heavier usage on the left ripples a bit, but I’m ok with that. And I could, quite honestly, iron it flatter if I wanted to!

More lessons from Val Webb (cats in pencil) and a portrait of artist and Sketchbook Skool teacher Tommy Kane from a screen capture image from one of the videos in the Sketchbook Skool class. Done in Pitt Artists pens S and XS. I roughed in the general shapes with pencil, inked, erased with kneaded eraser, then filled in and stippled and cross-hatched. Excellent paper! 

I also got lucky:  I emailed Stillman and Birn  (they are SO responsive!) to ask if they had ever considered making a “sampler sketchbook” as the samples were small, but I didn’t want to buy six sketchbooks!   Turns out they had, but they didn’t sell well so won’t be making more of these samplers.  The guy told me that Binders in Atlanta might still have some, so I called them up a couple months ago since none of the sampler sketchbooks were listed on the website.  The nice lady at Binders (which also has OUTSTANDING customer service) went to look in the shop as the computer showed they had four left.  I bought three of them, two as gifts, one to use myself.

Contact info on the inside cover of my Stillman & Birn sampler sketchbook–alas these are no longer made!

The sampler sketchbooks are the small size (6 x 8 ish, with 5 1/2 inches of usable width on the page) with four sheets/eight pages of each of the six papers.  Sometimes I like wide–enjoyed the format of a Moleskine accordion fold, but not that paper.  .  So I bought some of the Epsilon and Zeta paper sheets and make myself some 2-page and some  accordion fold “extensions” to tape into this journal in the sections I’ve reserved for art.  I’m not as fond of ivory paper, so I used the vellum ivory Gamma pages to write down essential information for my upcoming trip:  lodgings, emergency contact numbers for insurance, lost credit cards etc.  I’ll do some watercolor washes on the Delta cold press and may use that for both watercolor and collaging in trip ephemera.  The Alpha pages will be for my trip “calendar.” The Beta, Zeta and Epsilon pages will be for artwork.

I made a few “page extensions” (the size of 2 sheets) and a few “accordion or Z-fold” extensions to add to my book should I feel the urge to do a really wide landscape or a funky train-journey thing.  I purchased individual sheets of both the Epsilon and Zeta paper, then cut and folded these extensions.  I’ll take some glue or tape to affix them if I decide to use them on my trip.  This is my work-around to not wanting to make a complete journal on my own and them not having the exact thing I want–just modify!

And using more of the single sheets of paper I’m going to draw a map and then illustrate it as the journey progresses.  I’ve cut it to about 11 x 14 inches so I can glue one corner to the inside cover for opening out easily.  On the last page, I’m taping in a printed-out map, also that can be folded up nicely.

Taped in printed-out map of about half of England, folded, glued to last page in sketchbook.

Opened up printed map.

Then my hand-drawn illustrated map will be taped/glued to the inside of the back cover.  With the wire-bound, there is enough room to add these extra pages without having the rigid covers “splay out” much if at all.

So thank you if you’ve manged to read through this massive tome!   Really loving my Stillman and Birn, as well as great classes from Val Webb and in the Sketchbook Skool, and the fabulous customer service and responsiveness from S&B, Goulet Pens and Binders.

Hi all!  Thrilled to report that I am one of the artists in the Dare to Dance exhibit and book!  Dare to Dance is now available from Mary Wilson Kerr or Amazon.

Mr. Wiggles does the Circle Dance, in Dare to Dance by Mary W. Kerr. (c) 2014 Sarah Ann Smith

The quilts were to be 18 inches wide by 30 inches long reflecting the theme “Dare to Dance:  An Artist’s Interpretation of Joy.  This exhibit began as a local one in northern Virginia, but expanded into a wider call for entries from across the United States.  In the end, 60 quilts were selected; of those, 30 are on tour including mine.  To see the long list of venues for this exhibit over the next two years, please visit this page on Mary Kerr’s website.

Dare to Dance by Mary W. Kerr

When I first read the call for entry, immediately I thought of our pug’s exuberance when asked “Are you hungry?” (which is quilted into this piece between the dog dish and my feet, even though it is hard to see in a photo). The quilts are presented in alphabetical order by title.

When my copy of the book arrived, I was surprised, expecting the usual size of art quilt book.  This hardback is smaller, 6 x9 inches (approx), but each quilt gets a full page, allowing you to see delicious detail.

My pages in Mary Kerr’s Dare to Dance. Quilt and text (c) Sarah Ann Smith 2014.  Click for a larger view.

The facing page includes the title, Artists’ name and website, plus the story of the quilt.  I can’t wait to sit down and savor this book, dipping into to it for vicarious glimpses of joy.   Thank you, Mary, for including me in both the book and the traveling exhibit!