Thursday, July 6, 2017
JAM exhibition
The JAM (Journals and More) quilt group from Berlin, CT has a quilt exhibition at the Plainville CT library, 56 East Main Street, Plainville. It is on display from July 1-31 and is open during library hours. On view are 40 works, featuring 7 challenges, by 7 art quilters (Rose Unwin, Marlene Shea, Lesa Gemmel, Patti Slason, Rosemary Dziubinski, Angelina Kendra and Anna Tufankjian). Come and enjoy!
Thursday, June 1, 2017
Local Color: A Double Exhibition!
LOCAL COLOR – An
Exhibition of Fiber Art
By members of SAQA
(Studio Art Quilt Associates)
Please join us for the OPENING RECEPTION
Sunday, June 11, 2017 from 1 – 3 PM
The Slater Memorial Museum, Norwich CT
Local Color is a dual exhibition presented by SAQA members
from the Connecticut region and the Northern California/Nevada region.
Connecticut, home to a growing number of talented fiber and
multi-media artists, has centuries of stories to tell. “Local
Color: Connecticut Stories” is the second Connecticut-themed, juried
exhibition organized by co-curators Diane Wright and Kate Themel and brought to
life by Connecticut SAQA members. This visually exciting collection embodies
the uniqueness of our state’s history and each artist’s personal narrative.
Participating artists
from Connecticut include: Debbie Bento, Christina Blais, Diane Cadrain, Kelly Caldwell, Alice Chittenden, Carol Eaton, Ann Marie Gontarz, Rita Hannafin, Yvette Howard, Angelina Kendra, Paula Klingerman, Aurelle Locke, Karen Loprete, Barbara McKie, Clara Nartey, Margaret Phillips, Judy Ross, Phyllis Small, Catherine Smith, Kate Themel, Anna Tufankjian and Diane Wright
“Local Color: Stories of Our Members”
will showcase recent, innovative works, which celebrate the personal stories
and narratives of Northern California/ Nevada SAQA members. The theme can be
broadly interpreted from personal stories to regional history and from literary
references to regional environment, and beyond. The Northern California/ Nevada
exhibition team includes Jennifer Landau and Denise Oyama Miller.
Participating
artists from Northern California / Nevada include:
Karen Balos, Nancy
Bardach, Maria Billings, Sonja Campbell, Adriane Dedic, Aileyn Renli Ecob,
Kathy Grady, Jean Renli Jurgenson, Roberta Lagomarsini, Denise Oyama Miller,
Patricia Porter, Nancy Ryan, Ann Sanderson, Roxanne Schwartz, Eileen Searcy,
Sue Siefkin, Sigrid Simonds, Gail Sims, Ileana Soto, Deborah Weir, Evelyn
Wickham, Amy Witherow, Martha Wolfe and Ellen Wong
The Slater Memorial
Museum
108 Crescent Street
Norwich, CT 06360
Thursday, May 18, 2017
Sunday, April 23, 2017
Textile Duo at the Windham Textile & History Museum
Windham
Textile & History Museum
411 Main
Street and 159 Union Street; Willimantic, CT 06226
Phone: 860-456-2178
E-mail: themillmuseum@gmail.com
Hours of
Operation
Fri, Sat & Sun – 10 am – 4 pm
Admission: Adults: $7.00 • Students, Seniors $5 •
Groups: $4
Museum Members & Kids Club Members: Free
Guided Tours: Sunday 2:00 pm
Self Guided Tours are during hours of operation
Parking Is directly across the street.
June 1st – June 30th, 2017
Invitational Fiber Art/Quilt Show– “Locally
Inspired”
Solo Show – Sheila Rae Lutz
June 10th - Quilting & Fiber Arts
Day – The speakers and vendors for this day include:
Speakers
10:00 a.m. - Hope Barton – SAQACT and SAQA
Traveling Quilt Show talk and display
11:00 a.m. - Martha
Sielman, Author – Art Quilts International “Abstract & Geometric”
Noon - Music & Lunch available at the museum
- Allison Wilbur –Sashiko Stitching
1:00 p.m. - Patricia Ferguson - How to Hang Quilts/Fiber
Art
2:00 p.m. - Lois Palmer – Anatomy of a Quilt Appraisal –
Description: The steps used when doing a quilt appraisal
3:00 p.m. - Jamie Eves, Executive Director WTHM – "Connecticut and the History of Early Sewing
Machines." with a focus on 19th-century machines including the
Singer with ties to Connecticut
4:00 p.m. Day ends
Vendors and on-going Demonstrations 10:00 a.m. -
4:00 p.m.
- Allison Wilbur
- Carol Eaton Designs
- Catherine Whall Smith
- Dawn Allen
- Joan
Blade Johnson
- Mary Lachman
- Michele Palmer
- Patricia Ferguson
- Schiller’s Sewing Circle
- Stitch Chicks Fabric Store
Monday, April 17, 2017
Meeting Minutes - April 8
We had a terrific joint meeting with our regional cohort of Surface Design Association, including their representative Ellen Schiffman on Saturday, April 8, 2017. There were 33 SAQA members and 13 SDA members (with approx 10 SAQA members also members of SDA!) in attendance at Guilford Art Center.
Our first order of business was to acknowledge our gracious host location, Guilford Art Center, and the stunning photography exhibit on display. We also noted the beautiful quilt hanging in the entryway, which was donated by Sisters in Cloth, to be raffled off as a fundraiser for the Art Center. Raffle tickets are still available, so be sure to stop in the gift shop Mon-Sat 10am-4pm, Sun 12-4pm to pick up one, or a few! The final drawing will be at the Craft Expo in mid-July.
We had a brief intro to SAQA and SDA. SDA has been meeting regionally for about three years now. They have a regular newsletter, Facebook page, workshops (usually open exclusively to SDA members, due to space and material constraints), movie nights, and exhibitions (this fall, they’ll be in River Street Gallery in New Haven). Most importantly, they hold a variety activities to make the connections among its members.
Cathy Smith spoke briefly about the upcoming Textile Duo event at the Windham Textile & History Museum: June 10 will be Quilting and Fiber Arts and June 17 will be Spin Weave Knit. There will be a variety of speakers, vendors and demos (including a display of one of SAQA’s traveling trunks!). Also featured will be the month-long exhibition “Locally Inspired”, which will include pieces from some of our members. Our next regional meeting will coincide with the closing reception, on SATURDAY, JULY 1 (411 Main Street, Willimantic CT).
Cathy also mentioned that she is helping to organize a Fiber Arts exhibition at Gallery 53 for April 2018. Anyone interested in assisting her should contact her directly.
We then broke into 6 small groups of mixed membership, to share our Show and Tell pieces and stories. After carefully coordinating the timing, we broke for a brief bite to eat. We reconvened for the real treat of the day, our fabulous speaker (who just happens to be a regional SAQA member and, oh yeah, SAQA’s executive director), Martha Sielman.
In 2004, Martha became the executive director of SAQA, and at the time, our Connecticut region had a whopping SIX members. Over the years, she has had the joy of working toward and watching the organization, and our region, grow, as well as the overall awareness of and interest in art quilts start to take off. As both a result of that growth as well as a factor in it, Martha pitched, and authored, Masters: Art Quilts...then a volume 2...then a short series of specific topical books (The Natural World, People and Portraits) within the Art Quilts realm. In preparation for her newest book, Abstract and Geometric, she garnered over 1700 (!) entries to sift through and distill into a single volume. Drawing from that wealth of imagery and insight, she spoke to us on the Top Ten Trends in Fiber Art. It is a talk she has given on numerous occasions over the years, and yet it is always different.
The most significant change over the years has been COLOR. In the late ’80s, deep jewel tones were all the rage. What’s pretty current right now are golden browns/yellows/reds, though there seems to be a shifting tide toward stark black and white. But the real trend that coming through is (1) “Crayola colors” - bright, vivid, saturated primary colors.
Another feature to consider in art quilts is how they are quilted. There seem to be two divergent trends: (2) very, very dense quilting, such as in tiny matchstick patterning or a piece completely covered in stitching shapes, such as circles, with little spacing, and (3) handwork, also often dense, frequently in heavy thread to really showcase the maker’s hand and the process very visually clear in the final piece.
Other things she’s noticed gaining popularity:
(4) Machine-worked thread painting - covering the entire surface in stitching in order to create the coloring of the imagery.
(5) Use of sheers - often playing with the light and/or perspective of the viewer.
(6) Found fabrics - frequently stemming from environmental ethics of reuse, but also for memorial tributes and other purposes.
(7) Whole cloth quilts have been around forever, but it’s being done in new ways. Some examples shown were the incorporation of airbrushing, stencils, and dye-painting. One interesting comment from an artist she interviewed mentioned that the quilting catches light very differently than if the painting were just a flat unquilted piece.
(8) Inkjet and digital printing.
Like color, the use of embellishments has changed over the years. While once favored to be completely encrusted with bling, the current trends lean towards a more restrained and minimal use these days. Embellishments that are gaining in popularity are (9) text and (10) fabric manipulation, such as slashing, gathers, and dangling threads.
The whole presentation showed us tons of stunning, inspirational works by artists from all over the world. Most of the images are in Martha’s newest book, so I definitely encourage you to check it out and get your copy today!
Thank you to Martha for giving such an incredible talk, to Ellen and SDA for joining us, to Guilford Art Center for hosting our meeting, and always always, to you, the members of our region for showing up, making the work, and being passionate about art quilts. We hope to see you at our next meeting (if not sooner!).
Our first order of business was to acknowledge our gracious host location, Guilford Art Center, and the stunning photography exhibit on display. We also noted the beautiful quilt hanging in the entryway, which was donated by Sisters in Cloth, to be raffled off as a fundraiser for the Art Center. Raffle tickets are still available, so be sure to stop in the gift shop Mon-Sat 10am-4pm, Sun 12-4pm to pick up one, or a few! The final drawing will be at the Craft Expo in mid-July.
We had a brief intro to SAQA and SDA. SDA has been meeting regionally for about three years now. They have a regular newsletter, Facebook page, workshops (usually open exclusively to SDA members, due to space and material constraints), movie nights, and exhibitions (this fall, they’ll be in River Street Gallery in New Haven). Most importantly, they hold a variety activities to make the connections among its members.
Cathy Smith spoke briefly about the upcoming Textile Duo event at the Windham Textile & History Museum: June 10 will be Quilting and Fiber Arts and June 17 will be Spin Weave Knit. There will be a variety of speakers, vendors and demos (including a display of one of SAQA’s traveling trunks!). Also featured will be the month-long exhibition “Locally Inspired”, which will include pieces from some of our members. Our next regional meeting will coincide with the closing reception, on SATURDAY, JULY 1 (411 Main Street, Willimantic CT).
Cathy also mentioned that she is helping to organize a Fiber Arts exhibition at Gallery 53 for April 2018. Anyone interested in assisting her should contact her directly.
We then broke into 6 small groups of mixed membership, to share our Show and Tell pieces and stories. After carefully coordinating the timing, we broke for a brief bite to eat. We reconvened for the real treat of the day, our fabulous speaker (who just happens to be a regional SAQA member and, oh yeah, SAQA’s executive director), Martha Sielman.
In 2004, Martha became the executive director of SAQA, and at the time, our Connecticut region had a whopping SIX members. Over the years, she has had the joy of working toward and watching the organization, and our region, grow, as well as the overall awareness of and interest in art quilts start to take off. As both a result of that growth as well as a factor in it, Martha pitched, and authored, Masters: Art Quilts...then a volume 2...then a short series of specific topical books (The Natural World, People and Portraits) within the Art Quilts realm. In preparation for her newest book, Abstract and Geometric, she garnered over 1700 (!) entries to sift through and distill into a single volume. Drawing from that wealth of imagery and insight, she spoke to us on the Top Ten Trends in Fiber Art. It is a talk she has given on numerous occasions over the years, and yet it is always different.
The most significant change over the years has been COLOR. In the late ’80s, deep jewel tones were all the rage. What’s pretty current right now are golden browns/yellows/reds, though there seems to be a shifting tide toward stark black and white. But the real trend that coming through is (1) “Crayola colors” - bright, vivid, saturated primary colors.
Another feature to consider in art quilts is how they are quilted. There seem to be two divergent trends: (2) very, very dense quilting, such as in tiny matchstick patterning or a piece completely covered in stitching shapes, such as circles, with little spacing, and (3) handwork, also often dense, frequently in heavy thread to really showcase the maker’s hand and the process very visually clear in the final piece.
Other things she’s noticed gaining popularity:
(4) Machine-worked thread painting - covering the entire surface in stitching in order to create the coloring of the imagery.
(5) Use of sheers - often playing with the light and/or perspective of the viewer.
(6) Found fabrics - frequently stemming from environmental ethics of reuse, but also for memorial tributes and other purposes.
(7) Whole cloth quilts have been around forever, but it’s being done in new ways. Some examples shown were the incorporation of airbrushing, stencils, and dye-painting. One interesting comment from an artist she interviewed mentioned that the quilting catches light very differently than if the painting were just a flat unquilted piece.
(8) Inkjet and digital printing.
Like color, the use of embellishments has changed over the years. While once favored to be completely encrusted with bling, the current trends lean towards a more restrained and minimal use these days. Embellishments that are gaining in popularity are (9) text and (10) fabric manipulation, such as slashing, gathers, and dangling threads.
The whole presentation showed us tons of stunning, inspirational works by artists from all over the world. Most of the images are in Martha’s newest book, so I definitely encourage you to check it out and get your copy today!
Thank you to Martha for giving such an incredible talk, to Ellen and SDA for joining us, to Guilford Art Center for hosting our meeting, and always always, to you, the members of our region for showing up, making the work, and being passionate about art quilts. We hope to see you at our next meeting (if not sooner!).
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