Tag: Other Artists

More on Judy Martin’s Scraps

In my post called “Happy Geranium Block Dots,” I paraphrased Judy Martin’s theory on making quilts with scraps. Here is the actual quote:

“When you make a quilt from 35 identical blocks cut from the same four fabrics, you’re done with the creative part after the first block. The next 34 blocks are just pushing a needle. When you make a scrap quilt, you get to savor the creative parts and prolong the artistic decision making. Throughout the process of cutting and piecing, you are making creative choices.”

I love that phrase ‘pushing a needle.’ It makes me think about thte quilt work that I do, huh?

Anyway, I like to make quilts with different blocks and I think that Judy Martin explains why with her description of scrap quilts above. The reason for enjoying scrap quilts is the same for sampler quilts.

I think it is worthwhile to read some of the text of quilt books. I am certainly guilty of buying books and then only looking at the pictures. If you read the books, you come up with some gems sometimes.

Carrie Bryan’s Blog

Carrie Bryan has started a quilt and garden blog, http://quiltgarden.blogspot.com/. While mostly about her garden and some quilting, she has a very good, recent post about God on it. Not one for the general, superficial God-chumminess that people seem to have these days, I was surprised to find a thoughtful and thought provoking post.

Her blog is quite new and there is a post about her recent quilt thoughts on it as well. I like Carrie’s descriptions of her garden.

Wayne Thiebaud on City Arts and Lectures

No, I didn’t abandon the blog. Life got in the way. School started, which means PTO meetings, Cub Scouts, etc. I also had to go deal with a family pseudo-emergency (nobody died) in SoCal one weekend which kept me away from home two weekends in a row. Anyway, I am back, though no sewing under my belt.

City Arts and Lectures is one of my favorite radio shows. I listened to Wayne Thiebaud last week on my way back from the Qi Gong retreat. Thiebaud is one of my favorite artists. I love the simple complexity of his work. One of his assistants worked as an adjunct professor at Berkeley and I was fortunate enough to have him as a teacher in an art class. I still have the works that I did in the class. I never get tired of looking at them. Colored pencil is still one of my favorite media (after fabric, of course!).

Anyway, one of the great things that Thiebaud said is that he isn’t an artist, he is a painter and that history will have to decide whether he is an artist. I love that and plan to adopt it as my mantra. I have been thinking about it a lot and what it means. I think it means that I can just do my work.

Being an artist is so much responsibility. I don’t know if I am artist or if I am making art and I don’t want to decide. I just want to do what I do and let someone else deal with the labels.

I really wish that City Arts and Lectures would put their lectures on Audible.com, so I could listen to Thiebaud’s comments again.

Self Portrait in Green

If you haven’t seen JZS’ self portrait, go and look at it immediately. I have been thinking about a similar sort of thing to put on my blog picture spot, but haven’t done it. Perhaps the time is now? JZS always inspires me with her work and especially her OUTPUT. She just keeps working while I moodily stare at things for a year and a day. Another quality to strive for! Onward!

Michael Adamson

This link will probably die at some point, but in the meantime, I am glad I found it. The site itself is clean and easy to view art at. Michael Adamson is a Toronto artist. I saw an article in the paper about him, which included a photos of his painting Elephant Walk, which I love. It is happy in a sophisticated sort of way (not a Hello Kitty sort of way). The man looks like he knows how to paint and has a method rather than just slapping paint onto a canvas, because he didn’t want to get a job.