“The Road Ahead,” fused and quilted fabric collage mounted on canvas, acrylic paint

(more…)

Here are some images I’m contemplating for my February Take it Further piece. Initial thoughts are here.

This one is my favorite:

I’m not certain this will be a fiber piece yet — I may go for paper collage instead in the interest of time. To be honest, I’m not very motivated on this one.

The Take it Further Challenge for February is based on the question, “What are you old enough to remember?” or this color palette:

taken from this thread combination:

I’m not sure if I’ll use the colors yet.

I am 31. Most of my memories are based around what songs were on the radio or playing in either of my families’ homes. When I was six, or maybe a little older, I made a tape recording of myself singing. My choices? Bob Marley’s “Get Up, Stand Up,” and “Maneater” by Hall & Oates. Hilarious.

My mom and step-dad took me to one of Bob Marley’s last concerts, in Santa Barbara — the “Survival Tour” that is now out on DVD and used in PBS pledge drives was filmed at the very concert we were at, in 1979. All I remember is the usher giving me cotton for my ears when we first got there, and climbing all the way up to the lawn in the back of the Santa Barbara County Bowl. I was three and a half.

Now to try and sketch something that says something about these memories.

“The Road Ahead,” pre-quilting, fused cottons, 8 1/2″ X 11″

This is my piece for the January Take It Further Challenge. The challenge was to use this color palette:

or the concept of admiration for a person.

I started with both, sort of, in working from a spot on the road between Los Alamos and Santa Fe where it seems one could go anywhere, thinking I could create the landscape in an abstract way with embroidered words describing people who make it possible for individuals to make a new beginning, such as “mothers, artists, teachers, dreamers,” etc. As I worked with the fabrics, though, I abandoned that idea and focused on the shapes and proportions and colors instead.

Here it is with quilting:

It’s not finished at the point, because my plan involves supplies that I don’t have on hand. I have not yet decided on an edge finish, but I will mount the whole thing on an artists’ canvas, painted with the title and a couple of poetic phrases yet to be chosen. Oh, darn, I’ll have to go to the art store.

Assuming this turns out the way I would like it to, it will be my donation piece for the silent auction held by the Empty Bowls Project here in Los Alamos, to benefit Self Help, Incorporated.

fused cotton fabric collage, in progress

This is where I am so far for the January Take it Further Challenge, after pondering a rough sketch for awhile.

The mountains are all cut from one piece of striped batik fabric, fused with MistyFuse to the sky. The colors are more jewel-toned than this photo suggests.

I’m really happy with this so far, but don’t see it relating much to my initial concept. Since I’m not sure what to do next, I figure this is a good place to stop for now. So, now to ponder — paint, embroidery, machine quilting? Does the road fit into this at all? How to build out the bottom of it to give more depth?