Greetings from Montevideo, from Alison Schwabe, Aussie quiltmaker

The Artist Statement

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 14:43:00 +0000

The title of this work is "Flood 2"

I have always said the perfect artist statement for any work is a well chosen title. It offers some insight into the subject matter of the design, but leaves the viewer free to experience a work with unhindered by moulded expectations.

Further, I have often grumbled about having to produce yet another artist statement. And yet, its not hard. In this computer day and age its easy to have on file various lengths of statement from the ' in less that 50 words...." version of something to extensive on-file ramblings from which I pluck something to provide customised longer statements.

I have just come to the end of working with a team of web dsigners for a completely new website which now appears at http://www.alisonschwabe.com Moving the images round into a different order was interesting in that it helped me crystalise my thoughts about the groups of work I have done. That exercise prompted me to devise a general statement of the concept behind each series or group of quilts. For the moment I have not cluttered each quilt's page with a particular statement about that quilt, as I feel the general one is enough, brief as it is. Following the statement is the list of techniques I used on pieces in the series. That's for the technically curious, most often quilt makers. It's about as informative as listing a painter's works as "abstracts in oil" or "watercolour landscapes" but so often people want to know. IMHO, far too many textile artists go into long winded statements which include in almost mini tutorials on how they made each piece. That temptation is prompted by some exhibition organisers who ask for it on entry forms. I usually resist, or provide only a simple list. But one can be too brief - the photo of a quilt of mine was left out of a catalogue once, with something like " no statement provided' printed on the page beneath the name and title, dimensions and year of my quilt. I thought that was particularly snarky, but maybe it was tit for tat. I really could have said something very brief but chose not to. Now I always try to have a sentence at least about a quilt ready, along with title, dimensions, date, and price in the list I keep.

Thinking about what I am doing and why, with required objectivity and ordering of thoughts into comprensible printed or digital format can be hard, but is an ongoing process in which I've gradually learned more about myself. It has helped me to jot down notes as I work, and I don't always do this, and don't always feel I need to. I also make minimal drawings, and never make patterns or draw up anything in detail before starting a new piece, unless I am doing a commission, but that's a bit different.

Oh, and the quilt, "Flood 2" comes from my Colour Memories series, and you'll find it in a gallery by that name on http://www.alisonschwabe.com/ This blog will shortly become totally embedded in the website itself, and when that happens there will be a link to steer you, Dear Reader, straight to the right blog address. Just a little kink to be ironed out, and I'll change my signature and all that when it's done, probably tomorrow.

My Place Exhibition

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Sat, 17 Jan 2009 12:47:00 +0000

An international exhibition, MY PLACE, was shown in South Africa last year; will be seen this year in Australia in march, and then in New Zealand. It comprises thirty 50cm square quilts from each country, 90 in all.

I previously blogged this on 16 june last year, but only showed the detail as the selection process for My Place exhibition was not complete. for further information about this exhibiton and its schedule, go to www.myplacequilts.com

It was new work for me at that time, but I have since gone on to make other works in this vein and subject matter. Compared with previous works, the techniques including slash and burn, lots of irregularity within structure and no binding or formal edging of any kind are 'rough' , but to work this free way has been exhilarating, and you will be able to see more when my new website goes live in a short couple of weeks or so.

From the body of work commenced with this piece, comes "Timetracks 7 " which has been selected for Quilt National 09, and on the opening day for that exhibition, an image of it will appear on this blog and my website.

Architectural Oddities Department

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 18:13:00 +0000

About this time of year I often publish an architectural or structural oddity, normally something I have noticed on our travels. Sometimes I have found actual follies, but that's too strong a term for this one, really. It's a new house near the town of Piriapolis, Uruguay, where we have just enjoyed some seaside and beach time with visiting family.

It reminds me of those pre-calculator day things called 'slide rules' - my DH was old enough to have had and used one, I didn't, probably because I didn't get enough involved in mathematics, and then calculators began to appear not too long after that. They are a mystery to me, but watching my father use one, I do recall how they involved sliding one part with numbers or symbols back and forth against gradations on another part - sliding the pieces apart or back together - to get some kind of answer to some kind of question .... anyway, this reminds me of them. they're actually a real collector's item right now.

So, it seems the house has been "pulled a bit apart" to reveal the first floor deck, which is clearly the chief outdoor area. So far, anyway.

This is the back, from a bit further up the hill. I don't know the people, so can't be sure, but with the absence of a chimney up on the deck it would seem the essential outdoor BBQ, aka the parilla, is not up there but somewhere lower down, maybe along near the car somewhere. It would have to have been part of the essential planning - everyone has one and everyone uses theirs, often.

Just note how dry the grass surrounding the house is. The whole country is tinderbox dry, and no sign of rain. Fires either deliberately lit or ones that escaped from campsites were fanned by strong winds late last week, resulting in a lot of property damage and some loss of life. At least one person has been imprisoned, other charges may follow. There is no open fire ban law like most parts of Australia, but considering the huge number of eucalypts, introduced, and now all over the country, this is something Uruguayans should be looking at. There are disasters waiting to happen here.

Ebb & Flow #8

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 12:37:00 +0000

To enable reference while reading the post below. Ebb & Flow carried on the same design idea witha more satisfying result.

Machine pieced and machine quilted (ditch) with hand quilting in the plain squares.

Dimensions, 55" x 44" , 141cm x 113cm

This quilt will be seen in SAQA's "Transformations 09" in the UK later this year, before that exhibition goes on to Houston.
In the pieced units, I did hand quilting in the same charcoal grey as the background fabric.

Ebb & Flow 4 !

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 11:44:00 +0000

I confess - I had forgotten I had this little piece until it rolled out from the back of the cupboard in a recent clear out. An early member of the series, it was shown in in my Washington DC show in 2005, but not seen since I unpacked it returning from that.

Having my website redesigned just now has set me wondering, where is # 5 ? I keep a list of quilts/availability/year made/price, but neither made it onto that list, which is bad enough, but, and unusually for me, I didn't have an images of them either, until I took one of this one, #4, the other day. but never will of #5. I think I may have subtitled a small piece Ebb &Flow #5, but since the one I am thinking of sold and has gone, I can't check for sure. My record keeping has some gaps, but then, I am not sure whether this really matters much in the long run, as I doubt any curator is ever going to be searching through and assembling a restrospective of my quilts.

Ebb & Flow #8 followed on from the idea of this layout. Of course I love repeat units, but in #8 the units are separated by blank unpieced squares across which the quilting continues, imho a more pleasing effect. And in #8 also, the quilting takes on more design importance. It is pictured on my blog xxxxx and website.

For the technically inclined:- dimensions are 36" H x 30" W, the fabrics are machine pieced (not bonded fused or appliqued) and quilting is by machine, both in the ditch where units join, and wandering horizontally across the cream, stopping wherever that comes up against print. So, lots of stopping and starting, ends darned in as I go, but not tedious, it's just the way I work.

Ancient Expressions Series

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 13:14:00 +0000

Recently on one of the lists I belong to there was a discussion on series. This topic bobs up once or twice a year, usually covering the exact same ground - as people new to quiltart wonder about the business of working in a series. But this time an interesting comment came from someone who wondered out loud if she should take the 'risk' of working in one, and what was the opint anyway of 'doing the same thing over and over again'

I don't actually see any 'risk', to exploring the same thing over and over again - consider Jorge Rodrigue's Blue Dog paintings, hugely commercially successful, and quite intriguing to many, wish I had one or two.... or what about Turner's clouds, or Monet's haystacks and lily ponds. And then again, 'doing the same thing over and over again' might refer to technique, colour palette, raw materials, processes, subject matter - there are many possible unifying elements on wqhich to base a series.

Rather than pontificate about series in abstract, I thought I'd offer this selection from the first series of work I made, " Ancient Expressions" being from UL to LR, nos. I, VI, X and XII, dating from 1988 to 1992. As suggested by the title, the group/series has a general theme, which I didn't foresee as ongoing while working with what eventuallybecame "Ancient Expressions". At the time I regarded myself as an embroiderer, and was only just beginning to learn about traditional patchwork, almost on the side. Hence the paint plus hand stitch and in this case quilting through layers, I thought of as an embroidery, a wall hanging. I had used 'quilting' as a needlework technique often. However as an art quilt, AE was juried into a very prestigious exhibition and sold. That was encouraging, and this whole area being of great interest to me, I renamed it "Ancient Expressions I" and continued on with the theme of man-made marks in and on the Landscape reflecting human activity in a region, and forming a link back to ancient peoples. I don't know anyone who isn't moved by this.

As the series develops the landscape element becomes more abstract but is always still present somewhere in the quilt. The markings form patterns and are less pictorial, but are based on real shapes or linear patterns I observed either on rocks or artefacts in museums and books. The series also reflects my expanding technical skills. The last work was "Ancient Expressions XIV", and although that was 1993, I don't consider this series is 'closed'' which is another way of saying I think I sitll have something more to say or explore on this theme. Not procrastinating though, I am wondering about exactly what it is I want to say and how I want to say/analyse it.

SAQA Online Auction Continues

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 13:54:00 +0000

In the SAQA 12" Squares Online Auction. Sold

Go to http://www.saqa.com/ and follow the prompts.

Aussie Comment- Ignorant, Offensive

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 11:35:00 +0000

The APEC gathering of leaders from countries in and around the Pacific was held in Lima, Peru, and wrapped up, so to speak, on 24/11/08.

One of the traditions of these conferences is the presentation by the host nation of a wearable textile gift to each attending leader. There have been some memorable Malay and Indonesian batik shirts, and the Philipines presented them with those lovely peñasilk dress shirts worn everyday by men there. Of course, as every traveller knows, something typical of one culture can look a bit comic back home, and nothing shrieks louder of a returned tourist than sporting a piece of culture-to-wear, like a Union Jack waistcoat, an Akubra hat with shark tooth adorned headband, or a t-shirt adorned with native american symbols worn with turquoise and silver jewellery.

For the host nation, the trick is to choose something identifiably national and that can be worn by both male and female leaders. The previous APEC gathering was in Sydney, Australia. The government of the day would have sifted through various national clothing ideas - stubbies, thongs and t-shirt perhaps? (stubbies are very short shorts) but maybe not for the sheilas -stubbies are often revealing enough on the blokes. They might have considered white t-shirts with shark bites out of them and splashes of what looks like fresh blood? bad taste, and pun intended ... shady hats with bobbing corks around the rim? They eventually came up with the ubiquitous Akubra(brand) wide brimmed felt hat, worn year round by blokes and sheilas, in town and country - perfect. Then our people went way over the top with excessive largesse, teaming these hats with indivdually sized with choice of coloured suede trim Drizabone rain coats. These are robust waterproof coats of oiled fabric, styled with a split back to enable the wearer to be mounted on a horse OK while droving or working out in wet windy cold weather. They're legendary, and totally wonderful, but not your everyday wear for most Aussies, and in addition they aren't cheap - think several hundred dollars. It felt to me like we were wanting to totally out-do our Pacific neighbours, rather like the suburban mum planning a kiddies' birthday party wanting the take-home party favour lolly bag to be bigger and better than anyone else's. So nouveau riche.

I thought this article on the poncho gifts and photo opps windup was particularly snotty and rather embarrassing to read in our national newspaper. Shame on you, Matthew. It will find its way back to Peru, and there will be taken as an ignorant put-down: Peru's APEC ponchos resemble 'potato sacks' The Australian The photogallery on the LHS reveals that some have no idea how to wear this garment, or the need to stand up straight while doing so. However our Kev looks cool in his, and wears it with apparent enjoyment, and the respect due to this fantastic gift. OMG, any textile fan would simply love an alpaca poncho like this, as I am sure it would be of the very highest quality and slip through the hands smoothly and be light but supremely warm. The undyed natural colours suit every complexion. and a poncho suits, some would say "covers" every figure type. Perfect. If our Kev doesn't see himself wearing it back home, I have my hand up for the cast off; but I am sure Terese will snag it and wear with style in our national capital next winter - over black pants and a warm black top or cream shirt it would look great. George Bush looks as he possibly felt, a bit dorky, but lacked the plain social skills of others who were too polite to show any feeling of awkwardness in their getups.

For an interesting article on how this tradition came about, and some better pics of GWB, go to
http://timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=743005&category=STRANGENEWS
What I didn't know until I read this article (18/1/09) is that there was a gift for spouses, too, described as shawls. I'm glad they didn't confuse the issue by using that ubiquitous term, 'pashmina' for shawl - it's now the generic term for any light shawl-like garment woven from any fibre, natural or man made. Most of us could not afford the luxury of a genuine shawl made from pashmina, the finest of fine cashmere. And anyway, they don't have pashmina goats in Peru.

Starting Point for New Work

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 12:31:00 +0000

"Pick Me! Pick Me! " they seem to cry as I look
down from my sewing table for the next few choice little bits to add to the growing composition below. Some of them are indeed very small, catching my eye as little gems against the background of the less startling; but properly placed adjacent to something else, potentially every piece will become important in the overall outcome.

As I comment below, I literally do up-end the scrap bags onto the floor, and there's another heap behind the camera, too, but the light coming in onto it made that too hard to photograph without moving everything around. At times I feel as a dumpster diver must feel, searching through people's discarded stuff looking for useful or valuable things, or, let's be honest, maybe looking for food, depending on where the dumpster is.

Hauling out recyclables from the city maintained dumpsters on every block in Montevideo is still a reasonable business, generally run by one or two people with a horse and cart. With the dumpsters being emptied 3 times per week and pressure hosed once, they have to be organised to be ahead of the rubbish workers' schedule. Licences are gradually dwindling though as they come due, and this way of life is allegedly disappearing. I always do my best to put recyclables in the orange plastic bags you get, theoretically one or two with every supermarket order, and they are meant to only contain recycleable glass, plastic, paper, styrofoam and such. The list is printed on the outside. Previously, each house had a basket up on a pole outside the front gate, into which bags of rubbish went; and every monday a guy would come down our street looking for cardboard and plastic packaging, etc, and I used to put anything like that out that morning. I'm not sure how he'd be doing, never see him around now.

New Work in Progress

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 20:39:00 +0000

This will be a wide piece, at least 2m wide and probably about 1m - 1.25m high. A couple of years back I did a piece I called Lightstream, thinking as I was at the time how as white light passes through a prism it is divided into the rainbow bands of colour. This is a follow up I have been meaning to do for a while, and so it may bear the same name, Lightstream #2. But it is also very much in the style of the Ebb & Flow series. Who knows, I may not name it, as I intend for it to replace a will quilt that has been hanging in my own home for several years. (that one will be retired to a labelled cloth bag.)
As each vertical strip of fabric I am inserting strips into is about 25cm wide, I have at least 4 more to go, maybe 5. I want it to look light and lively, full of motion.

As with all my pieced quilts, this is truly a scrap quilt, more accurately a scrap bag quilt, since I have emptied the bag containing small almost useless size scraps, offcuts, of fabric onto the floor beside my machine, and am diving into that peridocially, putting buts and pieces together to form strips of chunks of colour usually no more than a couple of inches wide, max. As I use them the curvy bits tend to make one edge trail off into a sliver - so that bit comes off and I add something more to make it a useful length again. sometimes I divide up a unit and intersperse another colour, or some cream, which if used occasionally gives the impression of some wandering line suddenly coming to an end part way across the vertical panel.

As with any scrap quilt, it might all look random, haphazard and unplanned ( some would use'intuitive' here) but once all the strips are pieced, they have to be placed in relation to each other, adjusting either up and down or in different relation to the right or left edge. Probably one or two will need to be pulled out and replaced with something else - a need that doesn't become clear until later. For example, the rather long sinuous bright blue close to the centre of the photo is a bother now that I step back and look through the lens. I will either break it up with some other colours or replace it totally. Alternatively I might consider long bright blue pieces elsewhere, 2 or 4 more of them (the ikebana principle) I also might even add in more cream here and there, depending on how the final 8 or 9 look done. Light and dark clear and bright, large and small spaces, and 'incomplete lines' all need to be balanced in the final assembly. That means another 20 hours or so in the piecing stage I estimate, or in other words, it's about half pieced.

While all this is going on I am considering glitter, if, which colour and where, and the quilting pattern. At the moment I favour machine quilting with a shiny cream rayon thread wandering randomly from left to right; and that too may change.

SAQA Online Auction - Happening Now!

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 16:37:00 +0000

EBB & FLOW #12 sold

in the SAQA online 12"squares auction

From an ongoing series, this small quiltlet is 12" square, as are all the other pieces in the auction. It is a lead in to another work now under way, but much larger - 2m wide and I haven't yet decided how deep, but probably about 1.25m high. It's coming along- see above.

Peru - food

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 13:16:00 +0000

Served in lost of places, fish seems to appear far more on the menu there than here in Uruguay. The Incas fished the seas, rivers and highland lakes. and were traders of dried fish over long distances. We were presented with lots of vegetables, too. Over 1500 varieties of potato, and over 450 of corn are produced there. We found there always seems to be potato and/or corn in there somewhere at most meals.
You might not be able to tell, but the LR pic is fish in a shallow lake of potato blended with pumkin and cilantro and, well not sure what else, but very yummy - we'll be doing a version of this at home. It also came with an upturned 1/2 hard boiled egg and a black olive which are no longer evident. Above, in UR, is another piece of fish served on a bed of potato with tomato and not sure what else blended in with it, it was fantastic.
The two pics UL and LL are two versions of ceviche, the fresh fish pickled in lemon or lime juice with cilantro and a little chilli basically, and served everywhere it seems. The upper one is covered with masses of fresh onion with slivers of moderately hot chilli peppers; and the lower one came flanked with white beans, lima probably since we were in Lima, plus oven baked corn, and the ceviche in the centre was topped by a mild chilli pepper. A meal in iteslf, although it was listed under 'entradas'.

Arpillera - details

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 12:50:00 +0000

The details are wonderful relflections of what is on sale in the daily markets - notice the brooms and basketry objects, small miracles of minature construction; and the hats, jewellery and musical instruments down the left edge of the upper pic.

Lots of people are either shopping, or offering, as one Egyptian market vendor expressed it last year, to "Let me help you spend your money madam!" I have to say, though, the marketing was less directly aggressive. In Egypt I found that vendors would even gently take hold of my arm or wrist to direct my attention or try to make me head in a particular direction. In Peru there was constant verbal pressure sotto voce, and goodness, I would love to have bought up something from every stall, but everyone knows that can't be.

Over on the right of the lower pic are some of the fruits and vegetables, as heaped up in every general market amongst the household items.

These are major works of the miniaturist's art, quite up there with other examples like dolls houses or ships in bottles, IMHO. I have never been bitten by the bug, but do appreciate the work of people who love doing this.

Arpillera - Peru- Enthusiasm !

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 12:17:00 +0000

While we were visiting Peru just a ceek or so ago I bought this arpillera at the markets in Aguas Calientes, en route to Machu Picchu ( think I finally have the spelling of that one right - I have seen it every way you can think of)

These deslightful needlework pieces come in a range of sizes and complexity, and therefore, cost. I have seen similar works from KI think vietnam, qwhere the subject as i nthis one is depiction of some aspect of daily life or flora and fauna of the region - all were available, but I thought this one was wonderful. Up near the RH cloud in the top picture is sewn the word 'mercado' meaning market. Against a backdrop of the clear skies and bold clouds we experienced, a typical building from that part of the Andes, some of the plants, people in dress costume dancing, and the llamas you see everywhere is a crowded market scene. Fruit and veggies, meats, fabrics, shoes, clothes, sewing notions, flowers, baskets, jewellery, brooms, musical instruments and more, are al crowded onto the market area, just as in real life.

I love the dancing ficures. We went to a musical evening in Cuzco and enjoyed quite a number of of dances, most of which were al;ong formation formall movement lines, and this is exactly what the figures are doing, accompanied by a pipe player, see upper left edge of this detail shot.

Peru - Vitality in Ceramics

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 12:30:00 +0000

One of the most delightful experiences in this museum in Lima, the Museo Larco, was to be able to go through the museum's storage area and see the thousands of pieces of precolumbian artifacts that were not currently on display, but just crowded together behind glass, on floor to ceiling shelves, and decorated with every imaginable pattern and texture.
UL gives a general impression, masses of embayments like this, with crowded floor to ceiling shelves, daylight coming in from above, and the freedom to wander and enjoy, with not a guard or official in sight anywhere through the museum.
UR Parrots, parrots, parrots.
LL some serious probably important figures or officials
LR showing the wonderful variety of decoration on a selection of bottles or vases - how modern does the black with beige dots look on the upper row of this group?
It was here I had a watery knee moment, as I seem to experience when the immensity of history suddenly hits me....as it did too at the Bayeux tapestry, the V&A's medieval tapestry room, and standing in front of the death mask from Tutenkhamen's tomb in the Cairo museum.

Peru - Sexuality in Ceramic

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 12:04:00 +0000

From the Museo Larco in Lima, a couple of snaps of some of the pieces on display in their room of erotic Inca art.

These might go just as well in some gynaecological exhibit, I'm thinking!

Hallobloodyween Again

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 17:40:00 +0000

A visit in the past couple of weeks to some of the offsprings up in Maryland US involved going out to a farm and shoosing a few pumpkins of various sizes for carving and display on the front doorstep. In this semi-rural area I don't understand why everyone pretty well doesn't have pumpkin vines trailing all over their back fences - but they don't: anyway there are lots of places you can get them, from outside your local grocery store to one of the farms between your town and the next. At this place it was big seasonal business - fascinating collections of pumpkin-looking ones and more ornamental quash, incredible variety. Just some are shown here.

Well the boys entered a frenzy of carving and really got into the spirit of a book they have of pumkin carving design ideas - with the emphasis on the less benign, no, lets say, petty nasty pumpkin visages! I joined in too, with help at some of the finer points for the younger carver, and they looked great on the front step with little lights inside....

Well of course, this has nothing to do with the culture in Uruguay, where I am sorry to say retailers are yet again revving up for this imported culturally irrelvant event. We will not be here, but will be enjoying visiting Peru for the first time ever - really looking forward to that. There'll be a couple of Uruguayans here house sitting, staving off this year's trick-or-treaters. I hope it's not all too much for them, as it's really 'bad' here in our part of the city and one or two neighbouring barrios. Our first year in this house I just answered the bell a number of times and siad "Sorry, no, we don't do halloween" and had an egg thrown at the house for our trouble. It damaged the paintwork badly enough to need repainting, making that just wanton vandalism IMHO, nothing less. Since then we have gone out for the evening, leaving a box of wrapped sweets n at the gate asking people to take one and leave the rest - but I imagine most coming along have been faced with an empty box, but too bad.

Small Change, Big Difference...

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 17:17:00 +0000

This quilt, Ebb & Flow 10, was completed in 2005, and appeared in the solo exhibition I had that year at the Australian Embassy in Washington DC. It is one of a series of quilts with this title, the theme of which is how various aspects of Life change constantly, ebbing and flowing with highs and lows, as with the restless ocean tides.

Although I had been very keen on it during the making, between beginning the quilting and finishing off the binding, somehow some reservations about it developed in my mind. Ideally some of the murky green would have been a perfect binding - but there was none left - this piecing takes a lot of fabric, it can be surprising. Next possibility was a turn back facing, but I had fallen love with a hot pink with fine black pin dots on it, and put that on - I thought it looked good,at the time. But it didn't seem to attract much interest at the solo or the another public airing here late last year.

Recently an interesting exhibition opportunity for this quilt came up, and I realised I only had gallery shots, not suitable for submitting on cd for jurying. So some new pics would need to be shot - and just before my appointment with Eduardo the photographer, I determined to change the binding on this one. Rummaging in the cupboard I found a mauve fabric, bought only in the past year but one I had still not been inspired to cut into (something occasionally happens between the shop and the workroom) It's a difficult colour, perhaps, and I am not really sure why I bought it (for the challenge?) - but anyway it turned out to be perfect for this quilt's new binding.... see photo below. Only a small change, but it makes a big difference. Oh, and IMHO, does not change the quilt sufficiently to re-date it or re-title it, either!

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 16:48:00 +0000

So this photo is of the newly bound quilt with the mauve binding.
The hot pink with black pin dots has been pinned to the front to give an idea of what it used
to look like - in such haste to get the old binding off I didn't think of taking a snap for the record
before I removed it.

Dumbing Down in a Crowded Field?

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 01:18:00 +0000

I make very non traditional quilted textile art works, commonly called 'art quilts' , although as I and others have said before, there really isn't a totally satisfactory term to cover these endeavours.
Recently a publisher announced plans for a new periodical for 'art quilters' to consist of one part information including how-to articles and advertising, and the other part focusing on individual artists and their works. It sounds to me like a cross between a catalogue and a magazine, with the inevitable ads. This kind of venture has been tried before. Ten years or more back, there was one with huge amounts of lovely pics and original writing including interesting reviews , but it folded after a couple of years' struggle with production difficulties -the supporting advertising revenue didn't seem to be there. Another more recent publication has become a series of mass-appeal project pieces with advertising - very, very technique- and how-to oriented, and really short on the art side of it all. Safe and mainstream.

As one friend privately commented last week, among aspiring art quilters there is so much emphasis on technique and very little attention paid to learning more about art, the general perception being that for those wearying of making traditional quilts there is the art quilt field to just blithely transition into. There are heaps of classes covering how to manage the mandatory dyes and paints, printing manipulating digital images, and all the while designing intuitively ... 'intuitive' is a buzz word in the art quilt field.

And not only that, but there are associations, organisations one can join to learn all about promoting and marketing your art in a series of professional development programs, ranging from mentoring phone hookups to on-line encyclopaedic treatises on everything the aspiring art quilter could possibly need to know, from what size a mailable quilted postcard should be, to whether quilted art should be framed, mounted or hung, with or without glass, and so on. You can even pay someone to help you design your studio; and no one calls their work area a 'sewing room' or 'work room' nowadays, it seems.

The main point is usually missed totally: that in truly original work there are no rules.

'Art quilters' will flock in droves for subscription copies of this new publication, and will seize the opportunity to be featured artists by submitting images; but I predict none of it will result in wider appreciation of the genre, nor will it result in more high quality writing , or thoughtful reviews of quilted textile art. Michael James ruffled feathers and caused frenetic controversy a couple of years back by suggesting that quilters as a group are woefully ignorant of the wide world of contemporary art and design, mostly happily reproducing what they are taught by workshop teachers who present predominantly technique based classes. Among the many contemporary quiltmakers I personally know there are relatively few original designers demonstrating mastery of design and colour, who choose to use sublimely appropriate techniques (high or low tech) who really think about the content of their designs, and whose work can be identified as being of note within the contemporary art scene in their region in which they operate.

Small Works with Leather

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 19:13:00 +0000

The learning curve consisted of working out how to do a fitted bed-sheet kind of arrangement with the metallicised under layer of leather. Edges were then turned back and the mighty new stapler used to tack all that in place.

The textured leather (very daggy, really)appears to drape over the under one - enhanced with judiciously placed old gold wax. Black and gold thread was used to stitch lines of large stitches, some of which are crossed over by others.

Each panel is approx 8 in/20cm size.

Another Fascinating Leather Factory

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 15:37:00 +0000

Regular readers will remember my post of another leather processing plant back at the end of June this year, where huge quantities of leather are produced for export to large furniture and clothing manufacturers, seeking a consistent quality product.

A few days ago my friend V and I visited another, Curtiembre Fazakas Cible S.A., www.cueronet.com/cible just a few blocks up the same street on the northern outskirts of Montevideo, but they are a world apart in every sense. This plant has been in operation for a long time, work areas are rather cramped, lighting and ventilation leave a lot to be desired, but the exciting leather treatments experimented with and produced here are a total feast for the eyes, and hands too - many wonderful textures are being achieved here with both mechanical and chemcial processes.

UL shows chemically treated leather to produce texture patterns - the dark brown metallic has been turned back to reveal what is more easily seen on the suede side, a grid effect, and the leather is quite stretchy now - it'd be great for a vest or cushions..... Silvery grey metallic piece has been greated to give a wonderul gathered, ruched effect. Clothing? Interior decorating? UR shows a couple of different hides - one with zebra-like stripes painted on in totallyt not natural colours - and the one beneath has been treated to produce hair-free patches, along with colour variations. For several years we have had a mat in our entry hall with this texture, but in natural earthy colours. LL shows one of many gold foil patterns applied to leather there, with designs ranging from incredibly delicate almost lacey patterns to large ones that look like globs of paint after an accidental spillage of the gold paint pot. The foil patterns come on cellophane-like sheets, and are applied under heat and huge pressure. The LR pic is one of many tumblers that dry pieces of leather between processes.

A piece of leather here can go through up to 80 processes, and each piece is continually being auditioned for its appropriateness for a range of final product, much of which is exported to Spain and Italy where a lot is paid for these innovative results useful to the high end design market. There are almost 60 colours available to say nothing of combinations. I was told that Nicole Kidman (or her interior designer? ) had ordered some sent to Australia - would that have been Madonna if I had been norte americano? My friend Virginia seems very keen for me to order a group of zebra-looking skins in wild colours to take back to Australia .... Of course, I could not resist buying several small pieces, and since I did not have wads of cash in my wallet that day, I had to choose carefully - see below for what I came away with, gleaned from the exciting mounds of skins everywhere we walked , stepped or sidled through - reminding me so much of my friend W's studio ! I'll bet the guys who work here, like W, could lay their hands on any particular item in double quick time.

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 14:59:00 +0000

Views of part of the processing and display areas of the plant, an Aladdin's Cave if ever there was. Masses of colours, masses of samples, various hides used, from really fine small animals to large cattle and, clearly, horse hides (Uruguay exports horsemeat to France) The place is not at all modern BUT what is coming out of there in terms of innovation and experimentation is wonderful. Refer back to my recent post on 'Studios'. This works.

Leather I Couldn't Resist !

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 14:45:00 +0000

I could not walk away without any of these pieces from this leather place ! it was hard to choose, and perhaps not a bad thing I wasn't carrying a larger amount of cash that day!

UL- A fine leather with metallicised finish in a very muted geometric crazy paving look.
UR - A very rough suede 'rustico', looks rather battered but in addition to a few holes (love them) there are subtle smudges of dark gold/bronze paint randomly here and there.
LL -a really fine piece of suede, like a car washing chamois, drapes beautifully, one side dusted with old gold.
LR - another rustic looking piece, very rough in finish, shreds hanging off in some areas, holes of course, in a deep charcoal or very dull faded blackish colour.

Will I use these? I certainly plan to, including thinking about some ways to use the holey parts whey they occur. Working small... Textured stitchery? Mounted on small artist mount/frame thingies? ... I'm thinking, and with this in mind plan to acquire a serious stapler today.

Motorised Shopping Trolley?

noreply@blogger.com (Alison Schwabe) — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 14:15:00 +0000

Returning home through a part of the city unfamiliar to me, but which apparently DH passes through regularly on the way to and from a government office where he gets maps and mining information, we came across this wonderful little delivery vehicle parked outside its supermarket on the corner. As luck would have it my camera was in my bag.

There are lots of these in Montevideo, very popular for supermarket deliveries especially, although a well known pool servicing firm uses them and these are a sight I do mean to capture on er, pixel, one day, with the long handled mesh strainer scooop thing plus other equipment tied to the luggage rack on the top.

Anyway I think this one is perhaps the most beautiful and certainly the wittiest I have seen. The contents of the grocery cart are all actual brand names that the supermarket would carry - I wonder is this an adversiters' sponsored paint job? the quirky appearance of the UR corner of this photo is due not to fancy photoshop editing but a white trim on the building on that side of the street - I decided not to change anything, quite liking the quirky appearance of this photo.

Eat your heart out, Mr Bean !