January 19, 2018 - Meeting Minutes

Click Meeting Minutes from the January 19, 2018 SAQA-CT Meeting at Sew-Inspired in Simsbury.

Meeting Minutes 9/9/17 at the Mattatuck Museum

We had a fantastic meeting on Saturday, September 9, 2017, at the Mattatuck Museum, 144 West Main Street, Waterbury, CT. We had approximately 27 members and one guest in attendance.

We opened the meeting with a “thank you” to Roz Spann for coordinating our lunch. Note to all: if you see we are meeting somewhere in your neck of the woods, please speak up and lend a hand! We also welcomed our newest member to the region, Meredith Brooks.

We had another intro/reminder for our upcoming regional show, Local Color 3: Inspired by Science. There are two options to enter (you can even choose both!): the main show (juried) and the trunk show (all work accepted and will be for sale at a price of your choosing - recommendation from Cathy Smith is around $100-$150 bc it’s an “easy” amount for people to spend). Drop off is on December 2nd at Sew Inspired (this will NOT be a full meeting, only artwork drop-off...and maybe some shopping). Additionally, *trunk show pieces* can be shipped to Mary Lachman. We will need to know AT THE TIME OF DROP OFF, if you will need your main exhibition work professionally photographed (only available if it is accepted). There are already FOUR exhibition venues booked; the commitment for your pieces would be through the end of 2018. These details and more are located on the SAQA-CT website, under the tabs “Local Color: Inspired By Science” and “SAQA-CT Trunk Show”.

Christina then mentioned the SAQA-CT Facebook group. In order to access posts, you need to have a Facebook account, then be “invited” to be in the group. If you have a different email address attached to your Facebook account than what SAQA has on file, please email Christina so she can send you an email invitation. If you are not on Facebook or don’t wish to join the group, do not panic - THIS IS NOT THE PRIMARY METHOD OF THE DISSEMINATION OF REGIONAL INFORMATION. Anything crucial or critical is distributed primarily via email, and also via the SAQA CT blog. Similarly interesting for inspiration, tidbits, and community is the international “SAQA members only” page.

Sparked by a post on that SAQA Facebook group page - in which a member recounted jurying an exhibition of 130 entries but with NO fiber entries and thus encouraging members to ENTER - Christina opened up a conversation about entering work in non-fiber art exhibitions. Members who spoke up included:

Mary Lachman, who found the Mattatuck show #ibelieveinwaterbury on a fluke and entered a piece we then viewed on exhibition later in the meeting. She was similarly juried into a current Connecticut Women Artists exhibition. She had applied to SAQA shows in the past and was frequently disappointed, and so she was happily surprised at getting in to these shows, especially the curator’s excitement and enthusiasm for fiber.

Cathy Smith also has a piece in the CWA exhibition. She has always entered non-fiber shows. She says they are a great opportunity to talk to artists of other media. She notes to take advantage of the newfound excitement of fiber in non-fiber circles. She also recommends using your pods/Local Connections to get together to find exhibitions, to carpool, to split artwork drop-off/pick-up, etc.

Clara Nartey pointed out you might possibly win a non-fiber award, in her case - even a painting award! with your fiber work. She also strongly recommends getting involved in the organizations.

Margaret Phillips mentioned her involvement and success with the Greenwich Art Society. In particular, they have an annual show which includes a fiber award, and they could frequently use more fiber entries.

Pods/Local Connections: Christina handed out spreadsheets of member contact information, based on hometown.  She suggested groups just “GIVE IT A TRY” - initiate even one meeting at the library or at a coffee shop, and see what happens. It is an opportunity to network in your local community, find out about shows, grow as a group, prepare work, share knowledge. In addition, you can keep tabs on each other - for example, make sure everyone is getting all the information, carpool, run to fabric store. Local Connections can keep the SAQA spirit going, especially if you can’t make it to a regional meeting.

We finished the official informational segment of our meeting by giving members a short questionnaire on how our region and its meetings are going. Questions we asked were:

• How many meetings should we have per year?
• Should we meeting during the summer and winter? (What do you consider summer/winter months?)
• Would you participate in a CT-based weekend symposium with a nationally know speaker/teacher? How much is reasonable to spend on a hotel? How much is reasonable to pay for a day-long workshop?
• Do you have suggestions for meeting locations? Where?
• What would you like SAQA-CT to do more of?
• What would you like SAQA-CT to do less of?
• Are you interested in shadowing either of our current reps to see what it is about?
• What roles do you see yourself doing with SAQA-CT in the future? Meeting planning, exhibits, trunk shows, outreach, communications?
• Any other comments?

We will report back at our next meeting. If you missed our meeting, we would still LOVE to hear your thoughts on these or any other topics. Feel free to email either of us with some or all of these answers.

From 11:00-12:00, we held everyone’s favorite, Show and Tell:

Joan Blade Johnson has been working on eco prints on silk scarves and selling them in shops. If anyone has ideas on shops where she might be able to sell - contact her.

Barbara Dieroff showed off two of her quilted mandalas, steeped in her love affair w sacred geometry, both in dyeing and quilting. This work includes dye resist circles and Swarovski crystals. We learned of Hang it Dang its , a wonderful quilt hanging solution that comes in a wide range of sizes.

Rita Hannafin showed us a piece she was commissioned for to be gifted to a retiree (that she doesn’t know). She received 9 awful photographs about someone she doesn’t know and the tidbit that the recipient’s favorite color is pink. She challenged herself to do something she would enjoy, and knocked it out of the park.

Cathy Smith showed us a piece of her earlier work, to lead into the tell of the recently published book “Artistry in Fiber: Wall Art” featuring some of her work. The authors likely found her between advertising in Art New England (there is a fee, but it gets you out there) and her work in non-fiber exhibitions (see notes above!).

Phyllis Small bought a book by Dyllis, when we were at the Windham Textile and History Museum, and became deeply inspired by the clothing/work. Phyllis showed off a beautiful work in that vein, including the use of buttons and the overall color scheme.

Jan Doyle’s quilt, Fractured Owl, was accepted into an upcoming exhibition at The New England Quilt Museum in Lowell MA.

Meredith Brooks, our newest member, is just starting a series of planetary quilts. She starts with NASA photos of actual planets and turns them into gorgeous works.

Maureen Lopes is a self-proclaimed slow producer but had the tell that Shoreline Quilters Guild will be holding their Harvest of Quilts 2017 at the Madison Senior Center Oct 7th and 8th.

Bev Hughes showed off beautiful (self-proclaimed as not an “art quilt”) supermoon quilt.

Miriam Byroade read the book “Coyote America”  which details the science and history on how we’ll never be able to get rid of coyotes. Her pieces included “We’re not here to please you” coyote piece, with lettering stenciled onto fabric, applied with wonder-under, and carefully trimmed. She also showed us sun-printed cockroaches stating “we will be with you always”, and a work utilizing similarly indestructible dandelions.

Margaret Phillips noted that the SAQA auction starts next week (now last week), and has as a piece in it. She also showed other pieces from the same series of animal pieces.

Toni Torres participates in an annual show for African-American artists in South Carolina. One work just came back from last year’s show: the “Angel Oak Tree” in South Carolina - the largest oak tree in the country. She then showed us her piece from this year’s theme of “Moving On Up” - a beautiful purple mountain scene, “Journey to Peace Mountain”.

Evelyn Oliver is newly retired, and recently did some traveling. She went to the first National African American Quilt Convention in Kansas. There she took fantastic classes - including one on indigo-dyeing. Later, she went to Ohio, and spent an AMAZING afternoon with Dr. Carolyn Mazloomi and even bought a quilt from her, which she showed us.

Our guest, Connie Beckley, (Christina’s sister) shared “Ode to Thread” (complete with her first hanging sleeve ever!) Christina pointed out that her sister used a different method of facing on the two short sides, then the longer lengths on top and bottom, which means there’s less bulk in the corners.

Carol Vinick was also commissioned to do a retiree piece. Her quilt was for a pulmonologist. It featured logos from some of her grants and images of her and various programs she worked on. She also showed us a stunning piece on John Lewis (her entry into the Our Story exhibition).

Clara Nartey has four pieces in a show at a Newington country club through the end of the month. She has been interviewing artists on her blog about ways to make your art thrive. Check out her most recent interview, with Joe Cunningham!

Christina Blais’ Van Gogh Dog is going to travel as a finalist in the Cherrywood Fabrics’ Van Gogh challenge. She shared her work, Happy Dog, complete in all the colors of the rainbow. Cathy Smith mentioned that the Windham Textile and History Museum is still trying to raise money to purchase racks for displaying quilts (ideally enough to hang Local Color 3!). As a region, we donated the funds for one quilt rack.

We had a brief lunch, full of wonderful conversation from 12-12:30p. Then we packed ourselves up out of the meeting space and went on a tour of the Mattatuck, under the generous direction of Heather Whitehouse. We viewed Winslow Homer works from a private collection, a spectacular fiber installation by Nnenna Okore, luscious-colored paintings by Dmitri Wright, the button collection, and works by the Valley Girls. We also did a little hunting to view all the various #Ibelieveinwaterbury works scattered throughout the museum, including one by our own Mary Lachman!

Another successful meeting in the books. Again, if any of you had more suggestions that you did not put down on your form at the meeting, or if you missed the meeting and have input for how we can best serve our region, please please email me or Christina!

Thank you all! Keep creating!!!!!

Kelly Lorraine (art@kellyissuperneato.com)

And Christina Blais (christina.onebobbin@gmail.com)

CT regional co-representatives for SAQA

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!).

Meeting Minutes 12/3/16

Another fabulous meeting! We had 25 members and three guests for our regional meeting at the NEST Arts Factory in Bridgeport on Saturday December 3, 2016. It should be noted that our guests had quite the international flair: Selma Kenter came to us from Istanbul, Turkey, while Hiroko Matsuda and Masako Matsusaki were visiting from Japan. All three guests came to us through Sisters in Cloth.

Before I get into the meeting brief, a few calendar notes:
— Members of SAQA-CT (and NJ) are invited to the SAQA-NY regional meeting next Saturday, December 10, from 10-11:45am (RSVP to lisa@threadplay.com to confirm space availability). 335 West 38th Street, 8th floor #8.
— Sisters in Cloth will be having an Artists’ Reception on Saturday, December 10, from 2-5pm for their current exhibition at the Guilford Free Library. The exhibit will be up through the month of December and includes work by some of our SAQA members, as well as our recent guest, Hiroko Matsuda.
— The second half of the Local Color: Connecticut Stories exhibition will be up at Connecticut Hospice through January 7, 2017.
— We hope to have our next regional meeting sometime in February, but we’re still in need of a venue. Please email me or Christina if you have a (no-cost) meeting space for 45ish people on a Saturday from 10am-2pm…

Now back to our meeting! Christina briefed us on some helpful things found on the main SAQA website. First was the SAQA Seminar, a new project launched by the SAQA Education Committee, chock full of multi-media content - this series is all about "Stitching”. Christina also noted the fantastic index of back issues of the SAQA Journal. You can search or sort by topic, date, title or author to find what you need. So handy!

Our regional Trunk Show, “You’re Doing What?!" made a spectacular appearance at our meeting. It has visited three different guilds/quilt groups so far (email Hope Barton or Betty Warner to schedule the trunk with your venue!). It was a delight to see the variety of ideas and work amongst our regional membership, and the results of the hardwork of our Trunk Show committee. Those who were present and had pieces in the show spoke briefly about how their piece fit in the theme…or how it didn’t necessarily but represented their work or interests.

On to Show and Tell: many of those present had beautiful work to show off and exciting things to share. Some useful tidbits:
— Dot Bergen was enthusiastic about the use of encaustic wax to layer and college fabric. Highly recommended was the workshops of Leslie Giuliani.
— Paula Klingerman brought a great piece to show off the process of silk fusion, layering silk roving in cross-directional layers and melding it together using dish soap and textile medium.
— Carol Capozzoli reiterated her success working with a mentor, and inquired about critique or tips for using tulle to create depth or shadow.
— Norma Jean Brevik (who was also a hero in assisting with the abundance of door prizes for this meeting) introduced some of us to the wonders of silicone oven liners. Inexpensive and easily found, they can be used in place of a Supreme Slider  - just be sure to put some double-sided tape on the back. Others noted they are great for fusing assistance.
— The New Britain Museum of American Art has a enormous quilt reproduction fabricated in a manner reminiscent of sand mandalas, on exhibit in their New/Now section through January 23, 2017.

We then split into two groups and snuck into the exhibitions for Surface Design Association and the Celebration of Karen Loprete a little bit early, before adjourning.

SAQA CT April 9, 2016 Meeting Minutes

Another fantastic meeting! This was the first regional meeting for Christina and me to “fly solo” as your new co-reps, and we thank you for your patience with us. As I stated repeatedly over the course of the meeting – you are an amazing group of women [and Dwight] and we are so very lucky to be working with all of you.

Wanda Seldon, member of the CT-FAC and a board member of the Windsor Art Center, opened out meeting by welcoming the 38 of us to the exhibit and space, with an additional encouragement to become a member of the Windsor Art Center, especially with a Members’ Exhibition coming up!

We had a brief overview of the SAQA conference in Philadelphia. Highlights were:

- The opportunity to meet art quilters of all different levels and styles, along with their varied life stories and unique perspectives is absolutely invigorating.

- The encouragement that the “big names” in quilting have rough spots and have to just keep working at it, just like the rest of us.

- The idea to work BIG and the value to working in a series. Working in a series can mean many things: one thought is to make a piece, then change just one thing [color OR line OR shape OR scale OR…] that wasn’t working and try it again. Then change a different thing and try it again. Then change a different thing, or go back and if you chose A instead of B, go back and choose B this time.

At which point, Christina put out a call for a regional Visioning Project to work in a series. Anyone looking to work in an encouraging small group setting [and especially anyone looking to volunteer to wrangle such a group] toward a goal of pushing your work forward through working in a series should email Christina.

We also posed the call for a large open space for our summer regional meeting – we’re hoping to have a vendor/tag sale/stash swap day, by request from the membership. We have had a few of you mention some ideas – but are always open to more options for this and other meetings in the future.

Betty Warner is still open to accepting more pieces for our regional Trunk Show. Pieces should be 6x10 and will be mounted to a black backing board and inserted into a clear sleeve. Details are on the Trunk Show tab of our blog.

Cathy Smith mentioned the upcoming Quilting and Fiber Arts one day event, June 11^th from 10a-4p at the Windham Textile Museum.

As usual, we saw some stunning pieces from many members during everyone’s favorite, Show and Tell. A few notable links are:

-Barb McKie was published in a fantastic multi-page spread in issue 17.5 of the Australian Patchwork and Stitches Magazine and will be exhibiting in the International Quilt Invitational Exhibition at the Brigham City Museum, UT from June 17 – August 31, 2016.

- Barbara Dieroff mentioned “Connecticut Scissorhands”, the Connecticut chapter of Surface Design Associates exhibition at the Gallery on the Green [Dowd Avenue in Canton CT], from April 22 through May 22. The gallery is open Fri, Sat, Sun from 1-5p.

- Dawn Allen has her first solo show, “Larger Than Life Flowers”, at Black Birch Vineyards in Southampton MA for August and September [opening reception Aug 5th], and showed her new technique of digitally printing colorful flower petals she contructed and manipulated on the computer, through Spoonflower.

- Dwight Lopes showed off some fancy marbling using Golden fluid acrylic, and pieces then constructed using Sew Easy curves quilting method .

- Mickey Lawler recently filmed an online class. It’s not live yet, but keep an eye out for it on iQuilt.

- Cathy Smith highly recommended the viewing of the SAQA exhibition, Stories of Migration, at the Textile Museum in Washington, DC.

-Someone mentioned Brookside Quiltworks, a quilt shop in Egremont MA as a interesting place to exhibit.

A few other links to consider – CAFE for calls to entry,  Fiber Art Calls for Entry, Fiber Art Now is looking for Emerging Artists [working in fiber less than 5 years], and Laurie Russman mentioned her success with Quilt Canada.

Thank you so much to the Connecticut Fiber Arts Collective for a beautiful show and energizing Artists’ Talk.

- Diane Cadrain discussed about her experiences in Thailand, represented in “Buddhist Temple II” and “Buddhist Temple I”.

- Carol Eaton mentioned her process of “Walking with Sharon” in producing “Leaf Study I”.

- Karen Loprete showed us “Jazz It Up”.

- Carol Vinick explained “Roots and Wings”, a representation of her two daughters, with a beautiful hidden image of her and her husband.

- Linda Martin spoke of her collaged portrait of a Native American, “Righteous Spirit”, made up of over 1,000 pieces!

- Christina Blais gave us chills with her discussion of her Rosa Parks piece, “Determination”.

- Mary Lachman briefed us on the evolution of her work “Spiraling Out”.

- Wanda Seldon explained the joy and jubilation of her Soulful Journey, as depicted in “Praise God From Whom All Blessings Flow”.

Final notes: the CT Piecemakers Quilt Guild show was stunning, especially the SAQA-CT invitational exhibit. Thank you to the members who had pieces in it. We had a wonderful cross-section of styles represented, and viewers gushed about how much talent you all possess. I was SO proud of you! And an additional thank you to Laureen Pekar and Barbara Dieroff for inviting us and helping coordinate the efforts to get us together and hung.

Lastly, as mentioned a few times before, I am in the very slow process of reworking the SAQA-CT blog. So far, I’ve updated the tab of current members. Double-check that you are listed, spelled correctly, and your website or blog is linked. If any of these is off, let me know! It’s likely that your membership has expired and/or your information as it is in the SAQA database is incorrect or incomplete. Also - if I listed you as a second state and you are only a CT member, I went solely on mailing addresses thus far and have not gone back with due diligence to confirming official status. In any case, email me any changes, and I’ll make corrections.

Thank you again to all of our regional members, for your passion for art quilts and your enthusiasm for SAQA. You are such a joy!

Meeting minutes 2/20/16 at Guilford Art Center

Another fantastic regional meeting on the books! On Saturday, Feb 20, 2016, 41 of us met at the Guilford Art Center (411 Church St, Guilford, CT), in conjunction with the first showing of our second regional exhibition, Local Color: Connecticut Stories. Diane Wright opened our meeting with a brief overview of the jurying process for the show and a summary of the reception the night prior. Outgoing CT co-rep Barbara Adams presented our Exhibition Committee leaders Diane (and Kate Themel  in absentia) with small tokens of our appreciation for spearheading this wonderful opportunity for our region.

Next, Betty Warner, as part of our regional Trunk Show committee, discussed the hopes to have a minimum of fifty pieces collected for the exhibition. Due to feedback from the group, it was decided to extend the deadline to our April regional meeting.  Note:  Please do not mail your pieces to Betty; bring them to the April meeting or mail after April 1.

As our dear co-rep Cathy Smith has retired from her position, we took a moment to thank her for her service and presented her with a thank-you gift of hand-dyed fabric created for her personally by Carol Eaton.

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 This meeting’s agenda highlight was a small panel on the SAQA Mentor program:
·          Jan Doyle spoke with enthusiasm and finesse about her experiences with her mentor, Linda Anderson  She briefly described how SAQA pairs you with a mentor based on your interests and how much time you are willing/able to invest. Some resources mentioned during this time were the Spoonflower website for print-on-demand and custom photo fabrics and the Dreamscape app to turn photos into artist-stylized images.
·      Carol Capozzoli started as a Mentee with the goal of entering the SAQA call for Turmoil. Her mentor, Phillida Hargreaves from Kingston, Ontario, offered gentle guidance via Skype and email, to edit her work down, further and further. Some tips Carol offered included – Don’t take it personally. Go with the flow. Always say what you need to say. She revealed her piece, Cancerous Turmoil, to much admiration and discussion from the crowd. One notable link from her discussion was http://www.terryaskeartquilts.com/Studio/tips-tutorials-and-more/my-new-favorite-quilt-facing-technique/ for a great how-to on facing your quilt, rather than binding it.
·      One major point that both mentors seemed to really push was “What are you doing NEXT?”.
·      Cathy Smith spoke about how working with her mentor, Sharon Bass  helped her prepare the application for Juried Artist Member of SAQA. Some tips were to keep good records of everything you do (whether that be on a website/blog or otherwise), to preview the application beforehand so that you can prepare and work toward it, and to prototype/thumbnail 10 pieces together so you can see if you have a cohesive body of work. This turned into a fantastic discussion on finding your voice as an artist. Takeaways included the importance of working in a series and that while it is vital to find your voice, your voice can also evolve over time.

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After a delicious lunch, we handed out a few large door prize sets of varying goodies generously donated by our members. Then we turned the show over to everyone’s favorite, Show and Tell.   A few links from that time include:
·      Cathy Smith mentioned advertising in Art New England Magazine, which publishes an artist directory two times a year.
·      The Windham Textile and History Museum will host a series “Textile Trio 2016” in June.  On Saturday, June 11 from 10-4 there will be a series of talks and demonstrations featuring at least eight CT/SAQA members.  Check the website www.millmuseum.org for more details.
·      CT Fiber Artists Collective will have an exhibition called “Soulful Journeys” at the Windsor Art Center March 12 to April 23.  As part of the corresponding programs, there will be a fabric collage workshop led by Carol Vinick and Linda Martin on March 19 from 10 to 12 and a “Felted Labyrinth” workshop led by Diane Cadrain on April 16.  Workshops are $30 each; see www.windsorartscenter.org for more information and registration.

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Be sure to follow the regional blog at http://saqact.blogspot.com - but bear with us as it is slowly undergoing a makeover. One thing to note so far is the addition of an Instagram feed – tag your Instagram photos with #SAQACT for them to show up on our site and let other members see what you’re up to!

Our next regional meeting will be April 9, 2016 at the Windsor Art Center (40 Mechanic Street, Windsor CT) We will be generously hosted by CT Fiber Arts Collective to view their “Soulful Journeys” exhibit. Hope to see you there!

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Bonus note: Members, have you been receiving our newletters and updates via email? Be sure that SAQA is on your safe sender list [esp if you use gmail!] - directions to do so can be found in the website/technical questions section of the SAQA FAQs here. Email Kelly or Christina if you are not getting our notices!