Well, It's been a super busy summer, and it is coming to an end too fast. I have definitely found that 7 shows and 1 family reunion in 8 weeks is too much. After almost a week since my last show, I am beginning to try to catch up on things.
One project I need to work on is my piece for the "Flower Power" quiltart challenge. We each took a "test" that told us what flower we are, and are making a quilt to represent that flower. I came out an Echinacea. I have always grown them at the greenhouses, but only 2 years ago, started to put them into my home gardens. The most common color for these are shades of pink to rosy purple and white, thus the common name- Purple Coneflower. Now days, there are new and fun colors. This was a stretch for me, they now are available in shades of apricot, yellow, orange, deep magenta and more. These are colors that I have not allowed into my gardens very much. The great thing about the orange shades is that they all have undertones of purple, or lavender to purple petal backs. Thanks to the self seeding of my purple and white ones, I have a range of shades from pale pink to rosy purple. The others I have are apricot, orange, and lavender with white speckled leaves.
I took photos of each one of them as they began to bloom, and got good shots of all except for the white (it seems to really attract bugs that ate the petals off), and the double flowered one that bloomed during a weekend away, and began to fade by the time I returned.
My first thought was to use the photos in some way in the quilt. I also spent a couple afternoons
painting and printing some fabrics I thought would also work. A photo of my "summer paint studio" is here. It is amazing how you can make a weedy garden and planters look great by cropping out the bad parts at the right angle. I usually keep my home out of pictures, but you get to see part of it. My show canopy works great for the shade I need to work under beside the front door, then I take the fabric on my boards to the paint table in the sun. I keep my paint supplies in the plastic drawer unit, and the work "table" is a 6' wire closet shelf attatched to the wall at the back and supported in the front by a pair of 3' shelves on each end. (one advantage of no siding- no worries of paint splatters on it or screws into it- but it is ugly)
Here are the sunprint panels I ended up with. I was trying to include all the flower colors in the paint. These may look muddier than they are in person. I like the apricot and purple tones that showed up. I also used some super sparkle paint, so they have some shimmer. I found that if I cut apart the Echinacea flowers, I could place them to look like they do in the garden , as viewed from the
side.
Here is a piece of salted fabric that I did using the same colors as the sunprints. It doesn't look like it in these photos, but Sunprint 1 has the same coloring as this piece. I like what the salt did on this, along with some running without blending of the colors. This photo may be a tad bright.
This is a photo of an Echinacea relative- Rudbeckia Herbstonne, or Autumn Sun. I used petals from a few of these flowers in the sunprint panels. The blue flowers are from a Caryopteris or Blue Mist shrub. I like the yellow against the bright blue in the garden. I'm amazed that the shrub is blooming because it got knocked over by deer during the winter- It's a bit crooked at the base, but not noticed now.
Here is one possible layout of the photos I printed onto fabric. I used cotton for this piece. As you can see by the photo's name, it is the 3rd layout I did on the design wall and photographed. I am finding this helps me a lot since I can't get far enough away from the wall to see it at a distance. I have been using the camera more and more as a tool this year. It has helped me to make a lot of creative decisions. I'm not sure exactly what will be in the spaces between the photos, maybe more of my fused crazy patch in ivories and whites. I'll post more as it continues in the process. I was originally going to use the sunprints and/or salted fabric above with the photos, but they don't look great together.
Ok, these are a few Echinacea flowers past their prime for good photos, but I took them for a reason. The left photo is of the variety Double Decker. You can see where the extra petals came out from the cone center of the flower- real neat! I just didn't get a good photo when in bloom while I was away.
My original idea for these photos was to use them in another piece with birds in it- probably Goldfinches, which love the ripened seeds of these flowers. Good thing we don't live in town or near the road, I don't keep these deadheaded so the birds can have the seeds. Looks a bit messy, but seeing happy birds here is worth it.
Well, back to the above photos….. After putting them into my photo program, I began playing around a bit, and stumbled on some really interesting things. I used the outline feature in the program, and the result was something that got more ideas flowing.
See the top 2 right photos here, This is what happened after I played with them, and printed them onto fabric. I also did the same thing with the other photos of good flowers that I had. The resulting colors and "coloring book" feel to them I think will work with the fabrics I painted. Not sure where I will end up, but I will keep you posted. Now to find some more Wonder Under to get more fabric ready for the printer.
Final photo for this post. I took this this morning as the fog was rising from the Susquehanna. Towanda is completely blanketed, and you can see just the very top of one mountain. The fog was even hiding the far trees a bit. I also wished I had better zoom in this camera, there is a flock of geese in the far field just past the gap in the hedge row. This may be inspiration for another "Blue Skies" type piece, for which I used the view from here as it's inspiration. "Blue Skies" now is in a "Private Collection", I really didn't expect it to sell, but it did!
Hopefully it won't be so long before the next post. I am only planning for shows no closer than every Other weekend, now.
I am a former textile artist and new pattern designer with a degree in horticulture, wishing to share my love of nature, flowers and gardens with everyone through my photos, sunprinted fabrics, and now pattern designs. Chronic Lyme Disease has caused major changes to the direction my life. I have to limit the amount of time spent digging in my gardens, and quilting has become more difficult. I discovered pattern design as a way to get art back into my life. I now use my gardens and photos to inspire designs that can be used on fabrics and print on demand items.
