Archive for the ‘Art’ Category

Lines that divide. Sometimes.

Thursday, March 11th, 2010

  In general, people that craft are one of the most accepting and giving of all the creative communities.  But, with quilters there can be divisions.  Some Art Quilters don’t understand the precise corner matching of the Tradition or Kit Quilters.  Some Machine Quilters don’t understand why Hand Quilters would want to spend hours and hours, months and months creating a quilt.

Quilters of a different style from you often will ask why you quilt the way you do. Your answer tends to cause their heads to tilt like a confused dog. I have found that if you give your quilting technique an official title people back off, because it’s official for gosh sakes!

Here is my list of quilting types and their official titles:

1. Traditional Quilt Crafts Person - TQC Person carries the heavy load of keeping the historic form of quilting alive.  They save traditional quilting from dying out.  It’s a burden they must bare for the sake of everyone.

2. Kit Quilters - Kit quilters not only use kits but love magazines that have quilt tutorials.  Their job is to honor quilt designers by creating their quilts using precision and superb color matching. 

3. Machine Quilter - The quilting culture is a living culture.  Machine Quilters are wise to the fact that their ancestors jumped at the chance to use sewing machines to piece their quilts.  They nod to the past with their precise corner matching and the fact that they can finish a king size quilt in a month without the need of a quilting bee.  Their ancestors would be proud.

4. Hand Quilters - Modern hand quilters practice the semi religious form of self flagellation by stitching everything with needle and thread. To appease the ancient gods of craftiness the hand quilter keeps sewing even when faced with a mean case of carpel tunnel, a bible bump and the beginning symptoms of arthritis. 

5.  Art Quilter - Art quilters use the craft of quilting as a form of self expression.  Weird themes, imagery, colors and materials form the bases for the art quilters artistic voice.  The art quilter is more interested in self expression than perfect stitches.  Art quilters tend to not be able to match corners if their life depended on it. 

6.  Folk Art Quilter- Folk Art Quilters are very close to Art Quilters.  What makes a Folk Art Quilter is simplistic expressive designs and the inability to make even stitches.  Flaws are acceptable, they’re Folk Artists for goodness sakes. 

7.  Outsider Quilter - Have you have ever felt the urge to create a quilt out of tires and bubble gum? Then you know where Outsider Quilters are coming from.  An Outsider Quilter often thinks like this, “Lets see, I don’t have any fabric, needles or thread to create a quilt with, but I wouldn’t want to use those materials anyways because I have a perfectly good jar of peanut butter and a whole bale of barbwire to work with.”  Outsider Quilters are often unaware that other quilters don’t think of kitty litter as being a good batting.

8.  Contemporary Avant Garde Quilter - Same as Outsider Quilter but with an education.

9. Visionary Quilter - Have you ever been quilting with a mouth full of M&M’s and sneezed, only to have the spray from your sneeze create a image on your quilt that looks like Jesus?  If you have then you are a Visionary Quilt artist.  You are also always under the distinct feeling that it’s not you that is guiding your quilting, but God.

Let’s face it, the lines of quilting types are often blurred.  There are Hand Quilters that can match corners and might add a bit a tree bark to their quilts.  There are Traditional Quilters that that will periodically use a machine to quilt their quilts.  What’s great about quilting is the many techniques to explore, the appreciation of  textiles (whether it’s fabric, wood, steel or otherwise), the concept of quilting, the room for play, experimenting and the fulfillment of the need to create. 

I guess what I am trying to say is that all creation is great and if it makes you happy that’s all that counts.

New! The Doom Girls.

Friday, March 5th, 2010

  Most of you know by now that I have opened a store at Big Cartel called, Badbird’s Art .   At Badbird’s Art I have listed some of your old favorites and some new prints that you can only find at Badbird’s Art.  The Big Cartel store is about not keeping all your eggs in one basket.  You know, what if Etsy disappears?  I don’t want to even think about it! If there is a god, please don’t let this happen!

  I have now opened another store at Etsy.  My new store is called The Doom Girls.  It has one theme; evil, bratty little girls.  Some of you already know that I create oil paintings that I sell through my galleries in Texas, and S. California.  These paintings are almost all about weird little girls.  I really wanted to have a Etsy store to further explore the cranky little girl theme. 

If you feel so inclined, click below to check out The Doom Girls.

Fawn

Wednesday, March 3rd, 2010

 When I was little the movie Bambi was hands down my most favorite movie.  Sure, I cried when Bambi’s Mom died, but what intrigued me was how cute all the animals were.  Even as a small child I was fascinated by how the animators captured the essence of a baby deer.  I loved Bambi’s long, hard to control legs.  The scene with Bambi on the ice was priceless test.

Here is my version of a fawn.  I really wanted to get the fawn’s small body with the spidery legs right. 

My new print, Fawn, is all legs and ready to go at my New Store:

Tile Quilt Revival: Reinventing a Forgotten Form

Wednesday, February 24th, 2010

 On my trip to Texas I was able to spend some little time exploring the town of Las Cruce, NM.  I stopped by a cool quilt shop called Organ Mountain Quilt Shop.  I bought a bunch of fabric and a book called,  Tile Quilt Revival: Reinventing a Forgotten Form, by Carol Gilham Jones and Bobbi Finley.  The beautiful quilt on the cover is what caught my eye.  

   Tile Quilt Revival book gives a nice history of this rare type of quilt.  The instructions on how to create your own tile quilt is very clear and quite easy.  And, to my extreme excitement, this quilt is best done by hand!  EEEEEkkkkkk!

So, to sum up this book,  wonderful and easy techique,  interesting history, beautiful patterns included, hand work prefered. 

 

Falling Star Quilt.

Tuesday, February 23rd, 2010

  After getting back from my Texas trip , I was in the mood to quilt.  I decided to create a small quilt.

  This quilt is 15″x19″.  I’m not sure I like this size for my quilting.  It just doesn’t seem graphic enough.  The embroidery seemed too small yet when I made a sample using my typical 6 strands of embroidery floss the stitches where overwelming.

  This is the entire quilt.  I added a bar of printed fabric to the left side, because I needed color. 

Trip to Texas, part I

Monday, February 22nd, 2010

  I just got back from my art show in Marfa, TX.  When my Husband and I take this trip we try to stop by our friend’s house in Silver City, NM.

 

   We had car trouble just outside of Tucson, AZ.  Our alternator died.  Praise Jeebus for Pep Boys.  They have rescued us more than  once. 

 

   We arrived in Silver City the next day.  Silver City is a very historic town. 

 

   We stayed with Cecilia.  She’s a good friend and artist.

 

  We met a few of her friends.

 

  Silver City is a blend of old Mexican families, White ranchers,  Artists and has a large gay and lesbian community.  Silver City has it’s own unique flavor and customs.

 

*Silver City is known for flooding mainly during monsoon season.  The downtown is especially prone to flash floods.

 

  Silver City is also know for their mining.

*Actual historic photo of The Ditch after a flood in downtown Silver City, NM.

Hart’s Fabric, best fabric store ever!

Monday, February 1st, 2010

   I love Santa Cruz, CA.  There is so much about that town that I  like.  I love Logo’s used book store.  I love Harbor Cafe.  I love all the old houses and the extra funky people.  But, what I love most, and what I save up most of my craft money for, is Hart’s Fabrics.

 The first time I went to Hart’s, I told my husband, “Look, this is going to get ugly.  Money, and I mean lots of it, is going to be spent today.  I just wanted to prepare you.” Being that my Husband is very understanding, and he has his own issues with buying computer books, he said he’d just sit in the car, read a computer book and let me have at it. 

  I get totally overwhelmed by  Hart’s  huge selection.  Here are a couple tricks I use to decide which fabric to purchase for my stash.  I visually pass over all of the fabric about 3 times.  I try not to think too hard.  I just let it soak in.  By the 3 pass certain fabrics start calling to me.  That’s when I start pulling the fabic bolts and setting them aside.  

Another trick I do to supply my stash is to pick out a rainbow’s worth of fabric. By this I mean I make sure to pick out fabric in red, orange, yellow, green, blue, etc…  And, don’t forget black, grey, white, salmon, purple,,,,,  You get the idea.  If I didn’t aim for a rainbows worth I’d come home with nothing but pink fabric.

  These two fine ladies helped me out.  I had a big mound of fabric which took them quite a while to get through. They where very cheerful at their task.  And before long I was out the door with my huge bag, wondering if maybe I should have gotten more teal fabric.

Here is Hart’s info:

Hart’s Fabric, 1620 Seabright Ave., Santa Cruz, CA,

831-423-5434

Website: http://www.hartsfabric.com/index.html

Blog: http://blogs.hartsfabric.com/

February’s Embroidery Pattern

Sunday, January 31st, 2010

 Free pattern time!  How many of you guessed that this Be Mine was February’s free pattern? (see previous article)  Due to extreme laziness I wasn’t about to do two Valentine patterns so I got double useage from this design.

As always, click on the pattern below to get the full size image.

 

 

Demon Valentine

Wednesday, January 27th, 2010

  Do you know how many vintage valentines showcase a devil?   Tons!  And it’s always a female demon!  What’s up with that? 

Well, for me, it’s a cool idea for a painting.

Galleri Urbane

Galleri Urbane

Tuesday, January 26th, 2010

 Here is another painting for my show at Galleri Urbane in Marfa, TX