Art should be like a holiday: something to give a man the opportunity to see things differently and to change his point of view. -Paul Klee, painter (18 Dec 1879-1940) 

So I’m part of Mt. Battie Modern Quilt Guild, one of two local groups. This chapter, part of the MQG (Modern Quilt Guild) is the smaller of the two and is almost completely comprised of members of Coastal Quilters (the other group) which is part of the statewide Pine Tree Quilt Guild (Maine is the Pine Tree state). For once, I decided to participate in a round robin sort of thing. This year, the group opted to have each person do a block for ONE member of the group, doing it every other month or so.

Let me tell you I was stumped. I started by pulling fabrics.

This past month was Becca’s turn. At first her prompt had me totally baffled: Paul Klee – Swiss/German Artist 1879-1940, use solids/read as solids, and she quoted several bits about his style and inspiration:

• Klee … greatly admired the art of children who seemed free to create free of models or previous examples. In his own work, Klee often strove to achieve a similar untutored simplicity, using the intense colors inspired by an early trip to North Africa and by line drawing in the unstudied manner of everyday craftsman.
• Klee suggests that color, shape and the faintest suggestion of a subject are enough to powerfully recreate in the eye of the viewer the actual feeling of repose the artist experienced in the original landscape.

Once I started pulling fabrics, though, I got excited. I googled Paul Klee…well first I googled Klimt and it didn’t seem to jive, then Becca corrected my mental jump from Klee to Klimt and things made more sense. I thought this quilt looked like good imagery for improv piecing:

I started with the pointy roofed houses and made two sets, then did some strips. I made my castle wall darker and shorter than his, but opted to have two towers reminiscent of the ones here. I used a few pops of the brighter yellow and ochre and the light green and the bright blue scattered hither and yon as in the original. I really liked the odd jigs at the top so left it up to Becca to leave them or trim.

At about 24 x 27 inches, it is a rather large “block,” but only took me a couple days to put together. There may be something to this improv stuff! Anyway, I had a ton of fun and am energized to dive into dyeing fabric and new work in January once the holidays are done. Hope you’ve enjoyed!

If you have to run errands, take time to smell the roses on the way. This photo is for Jacquie, with a detail below:

At Portland Architectural Salvage I saw this fireplace piece with the owl andirons and had to take a picture for Jacquie, who loves owls! (Waving over to Vermont!)

OR, in the case of doctor’s appointments in far-away cities, do fun stuff!   Last Monday I had to drive to Brunswick (75 minutes) for a 20 minute appointment.  But it is right near Freeport, home to L.L. Bean.  So I did some Christmas shopping and thanks to MANY credit card points, got a couple great bargains.  The next day, I had another longer drive:  nearly 2 hours each way to Portland for a final check-up on my feet (a year ago I had arthritis in my big toe joints removed and can now bend my feet again!).   So I visited Portland Architectural Salvage, Micucci’s Grocery, the Old Port Specialty Tile store and the Portland Museum of Art, and finally Whole Foods (the Key Lime cheesecake is awesome).

Jacquie: isn’t this a fine owl! He looks a lot like my sketch that I posted a few days ago.

There weren’t any great deals at the Salvage shop; it has clearly been discovered by the young 20-somethings fixing up their cool downtown Portland apartments and condos!  But there was plenty of free inspiration.   I just LOVED looking at the lines of doors stacked up and the abstract strata design in this close up:

Love the patterning in the peeling paint on these doors.

There were several ogival panels, too, that I am guessing came from a church.  What awesome quilting or applique designs these would make:

There were several of these panels (which I think cost about $400 each!). This is a perfect example of my fill-the-space exercise in my quilting designs class!

And more inspiration in the form of old heat registers:  you know how we have ugly rectangles with straight lines through which dry air blows heat at us?  Well, a century ago those openings for the heat to reach you were much more interesting:

An old heat register. This would actually make a cool “window” in a garden gate, or in a custom door with an arched top, wouldn’t it?  All that rasty old paint would need to get stripped off, but what a beautiful design!

Next I went to find Micucci’s, an Italian grocery that also wholesales gourmet foods to various places around the state, including Megunticook Market in Camden where Joshua works in catering.  I found a jar of chestnuts, torrona, and other delectables, and I also discovered the tile store was two doors away.  I had seen ads for this place, and OH MY.  Now, to win that lottery so I can re-do the bathrooms….

At the Old Port Specialty Tile store, I saw this mosaic by New Ravenna Tiles. I WANT. I want Want WANT!

Then before I went to Whole Foods on the way home (I call that place the hundred-dollar-a-bag store, my foot doc says locally it is called Whole Paycheck, but my they have good food and stuff you can’t find unless you order on the internet), I treated myself to visiting the PieceWork exhibit at Portland Museum of Art. I joined the museum when I signed up to visit the Winslow Homer house at Prout’s Neck, and I promise I WILL share pics from that visit a while back.  I was beyond thrilled to see at least EIGHT textile works of art as well as several mixed media.

I first saw this installation piece—it is easily 9 feet tall and much wider–at a gallery in nearby Belfast, Maine.  I was thrilled it made the cut for the biennial exhibit, which is of works by people living in or with other significant ties to Maine.

Library by Abbie Read

The signage for the mixed media work above

You could spend an hour or more poring over the artworks within the artworks.  I kept taking pictures, fascinated by the materials and messages.  Here is just one of the detail photos:

Detail from Abbie Read’s Library.  I love the start chart with which she has lined the box, the carefully cut twig and the niche she has created within the box.

I left SO inspired…all I wanted to do was head to my studio!

And a slide from my Adult Ed class on the Native Peoples of Maine, the Wabanaki, looking at how they lived both before and after the arrival of Europeans in the early 1600s.

So you can see, I am VERY BUSY.  Can someone please find me another 27 hours a day so I can make some art??????

I seem to be congenitally incapable of making abstracts.  Using Kathy Schmidt’s Cell Block Blues pattern, from here Rule-Breaking Quilts book (see my post here reviewing the book), I started working on a quilt with a selection of ten blue and white fat quarters purchased at the AQS Tennessee show, where I was teaching. The picture above shows the beginnings…my first ten blocks, along with the recently returned (after a year away at shows) Field of Gold and the ribbon it won in Houston and a table-runner that needs to be quilted.

This AQS-Knoxville show was my last big away-teaching of the year, and I thought I’d treat myself to some fabric and totally unlike-me quilting, possibly as a project for another book.  I thought it would be fun to help support friend and fellow-author Kathryn Schmidt by using one of her  projects, and thought it would get a good stretch for me.  So what do I do with this fun, easy abstract?  I make it into more work (splicing in those bright colors) and into leaves—I just can’t seem to make something if I don’t relate it back to reality!  Anyway, I went to the Batiks by Design booth and made my own assortment of ten fat quarters and, amazingly enough, forgot to take a picture before I started slicing them up!   By the time I got the center of the quilt done, I was left with less than a fat eight total out of all ten!  Fortunately, I found them online and have ordered more for the borders and binding (that’s a wicked teaser!).  Most of the batik designs we see are from Bali, but these designs are from Java and are more like the old-time designs.

In Rule-Breaking Quilts, Kathy Schmidt teaches how to stack and slice, then swap, fabrics for an improvisationally pieced block. See my review of her book for more information and where to order!

Here I'm auditioning a bright yellow-hand-dyed that I intend to splice into the seams

In this photo, you can see that I've stitched the first side of the inserts. On the left of each block, the piece is ironed, on the right the seams are as-stitched.

The right hand side of the blue block assembled and pressed

and the yellow block in process; you'll note that the edges are uneven and will require smoothing out with the rotary cutter

Sometimes (often!) after sewing the first seam, I like to fine-tune the shape of the spliced-in color to match the next bit of batik

The yellow block with the "leaf veins" sewn, but the center stemline needs to be refined and re-shaped

The stemline has been trimmed and smoothed, and now I'm getting ready to cut the yellow for that inset

Same process, but for a light blue block; here I have already trimmed the wonky edges to create a smooth space for the center stemline

Blocks sewn but not yet pressed or squared up

Pressed blocks, looking a bit more presentable!

After I made my blocks I squared them up.  Most were able to come out to 8 inches cut, but a few were smaller.  As you’ll see when I get to showing you the way the quilt came together, this really didn’t matter as I filled in odd shaped rectangles with strips and rectangles of batik (talk about a LOT of partial-seaming…erg!  I NEVER seem to do anything easy, but I must say I’m pleased with the outcome so far….)