Photo suite 15 -- Happy Easter!

Sign of the week

in the Classics Department

Deja vu

Somebody asked me if she could put a photo of one of my quilts in a book she's writing and of course I said yes.  But when it came time to send the photo, I realized that the quilt dates back to the era when photography resulted in slides.  I do have a digital image of the quilt, but it's not high enough resolution for publishing.

I've been meaning to get my old slides converted to digital images for a long time, but haven't gotten around to it, so when the author said I could just send her a slide I said great.  And then embarked upon a voyage to the past!

I still have my slide file cabinet, in really good order, with all the slides catalogued and filed with little tab dividers.  And my supply of plastic slide holders.

My day job used to involve a lot of slides and I could always bring home the beat-up plastic holders to feed my show entry habit.  When I retired I figured I had a lifetime supply of slide holders -- which turned out to be true.  Who knew that in a few years slides would become the next best thing to obsolete.

But here I was, rooting around in the drawers that I haven't opened in years, finding the slides, putting them in plastic holders, making a little protective carrier out of old quilt show postcards.  Just like the olden days.  Glad we don't have to do that any more for every show entry.

The Natural World

Martha Sielman's new book, "The Natural World," is getting lots of buzz among art quilt bloggers, since Lark Press has sent copies to many, many of us for review.  I opened the book without high expectations, as I think flowers, animals, landscapes, etc. have been overworked by quilt artists and are too often predictable and sappy.  But I was pleasantly impressed by the range and quality of work that Martha has found for this book.

Also subject matter -- not just flowers, animals, landscapes, etc.  Several intriguing pieces depict dirt, stones, fossils, petrified logs, roots, spiderwebs, coral and diatoms.

Martha has chosen 19 artists for close focus, and included one or two quilts from 70 more.  In the longer sections she has allowed each person to discuss their background, inspiration and techniques in detail, which I loved.  Many people look at books, magazines and blogs just for the pictures, but I look for the words as well, and I thought the words in this book were especially well done.  Either the 19 featured artists are an exceptionally thoughtful and articulate bunch, or there has been some really skillful editing, probably both.

I was happy to find Ruth McDowell as one of the featured artists.  Because she avoids the art quilt show circuit I haven't seen her work in person or in catalogs, and because I haven't bought one of her books recently, I've missed out on what she's done in the last several years.  The answer: what she's always done, making striking quilts with a masterly use of commercial fabrics.  (And I suspect few of them come from current designer lines.)

Looking carefully at the range of techniques and treatments, I realize that no matter what the subject, I much prefer treatments in which the artist departs from photorealism.  (Other than the gee-whiz factor of how much the quilt resembles the photograph, I'm never sure what is accomplished artistically.)  Some of the quilts in the book go a long way toward abstraction; others are representational but in a painterly way.   In many cases relatively realistic subjects are seen over totally nonrealistic backgrounds, many of them referencing more traditional fabrics and quilt patterns.  I like this effect; it makes me feel confident that there was a reason to execute the picture in the quilt medium rather than as a painting or photo.

It's a hard call, but if pressed I would say my favorite pieces in the book are Ginny Smith's birds.  I first saw and loved these creatures at Quilt National in 2009, but hadn't realized how many other pieces she has made with the same cast of characters.  These are birds with personality.

Ginny Smith, Night Woods, 2007, 67 x 59"

Ginny Smith, Anxiety Won, 2006, 69 x 62"


 

Copyright terrorism

I don't usually link to other people's blogs and say "read this" but today I will make an exception.

There has been much hoohah on various quilt lists and blogs about a certain copyright case, which I mentioned in a recent post of my own.  Of all the hundreds of comments I've read regarding this case, there's only one that I would recommend you read, and it's this blog post by Leah Day.  She titled her post "copyright terrorism" and I think she chose her words aptly.

It's a long post and you may want to skim over some of the details, but please stay tuned until you get to the end and read Leah's exchange with Kate Spain, the fabric designer whose threatened lawsuit set off the whole thing.

Basically Leah says that if the quilting industry gets any more bogged down in worrying about who is (perhaps) copying whom and who might conceivably make a dollar that might conceivably belong to somebody else, it will hobble everybody's creativity.  I won't repeat her arguments -- go read them yourself -- but will say that I agree entirely.

Unless we all plan to paint, print, dye or otherwise create our own fabrics for everything we ever make as fiber artists, and unless we all can swear that we were never influenced in any way by any other piece of art, craft, architecture, furniture, clothing, cinema, photography or edible foodlike substance made by any other person, we all should be concerned about these issues.  Please read Leah's post, and let me know whether you agree.

Photo suite 14 -- topless buildings