Stuff I liked at FNF 4

My favorite quilt at "Form, Not Function" was made by Pat Pauly.  Who knows why judges choose one thing over another, but if I had been in their shoes I would have given this one a nice prize.  This is the first year FNF has not specified a maximum size, and opening the show to larger works has made for dramatic display. 

Here's the long view of Pat's quilt, hung at the end of the neoclassical Carnegie Library (if you have a Carnegie Library in your town you know exactly what this building looks like).  From 85 feet away, you can't see much detail but the complementary colors have enough presence to make you want to stroll across to see more.

Pat Pauly, Pink Leaf 4 (Yellow)

The quilt, the largest piece in the show, is a surface design extravaganza.  Pat has dyed, stamped, screened and painted designs of varying scale onto her fabrics, both  before and after piecing, as well as incorporating some commercial prints.

It takes a sure hand to combine so many different motifs, scales, techniques and colors and still have a cohesive and appealing composition.  But Pat has clearly showed everybody who's boss. 

dense parallel quilting in some areas, "drawn lines" in others

it takes guts to apply surface design on top of already-pieced work

fine-line piecing, commercial prints, with surface design over the top

sometimes the motif was on the bottom layer, not the top