Gosh, snow days are so much fun. I got up, made a cup of hot chocolate (I do not drink coffee) and went into the studio and got right to work. I started placing the black and white side triangles next to the scrappy slab triangles. Yes, I placed one at a time, and none of them were random. Every now and again I'd walk across the room to see what it looked like. I even - gasp - unsewed some of the darker black and white side triangles from their blocks and replaced them with lighter versions.
After another hour, I had filled up all the spaces. So I took a break, got dressed, changed the sheets, did the laundry, had breakfast and tinkered with my computer. (I needed to delete some unnecessary files and I ran a temp file cleaner. I was able to reclaim over 27 GB of hard drive space. Yay me.)
I made lunch, made a couple of phone calls and then got back to work. I think it's a good idea to let some time pass between the time you think you have something good and the time you do your next step. So when you go back into the studio, you notice things you might want to change. I did see a few things that needed modifying, so I did that. (I removed one of the bright orange pairs, swapped a light pair and moved the purple pair, among other things.)
I spent the rest of the afternoon sewing the triangles and the side triangles into blocks. (Those half triangles at the top and the bottom will be trimmed away.) I do see something I want to change before I declare this the final version, but so far, I like it.
There's only one tiny problem, and it exists only in my head. I showed the photo to my son. He appeared troubled. "Imagine being in the woods in winter," I said, "the sun is shining through the branches and you see the snow and the shadows on the ground. You see the brown leaves on the ground where the snow has melted. Occasionally you see a bird flying through the scene."
"Oh! As soon as you explained it, I got it," he said.
Yeah, so that's my problem. I don't want to have to EXPLAIN it. As far as I am concerned the artwork should speak on its own. (Hence the working title, "Winter Woodland.")
Anyway. Time for another mental break AWAY from the quilt.
**BTW, the weather guys originally said we were to get between 4 - 8" of snow yesterday. We got over 13". This was the inspiration view about four o'clock Thursday afternoon.
And this, after I did a bit of tinkering, and then undid the tinkering, and then tinkered in another area, is, I think, almost, the final version.
6 comments:
This quilt is going to be interesting to look at even if the viewer doesn't 'get' the title or understand what your inspiration was. YOU know the backstory and to my mind that's the most important thing.
Megan
Sydney, Australia
I love it. And have enjoyed watching the process of getting here.
your creativity is inspiring! I love the dappled look... I think it's not readily apparent that you are going for a winter wonderland because it's not linear enough. the colors are right, but the triangles draw your eye right and left. the vertical lines are not strong enough to evoke thoughts of a wintery woods. is there no way to flip it and have the tris point north and south, rather than east and west? just a thought...
like you, I seldom follow a pattern for a quilt (I guess you never do...) instead I prefer to play with the COLOR of the fabric, and let that do the talking instead of fussy piecing.
Art is subjective and everyone has their own interpretation of a piece. That's why there's artist statements next to art work at galleries. My eye follows the flow of triangles down the piece. Great use of movement. It's looking lovely and I'm looking forward to seeing it when you have finished. Thank you for sharing your process. It's been fun to watch it change and grow.
Watching how your quilt evolves is very interesting. Looks beautiful to me!
I love watching quilts come together. After reading the title, I saw your vision. Have you considered making a photo transfer of the original scene part of your label?
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