I recently attended the annual conference for SAQA, Studio Art Quilts Associates, which was held in Portland, OR, this year. The more events and conferences I attend, the more crucial SAQA is becoming for my professional and artistic development.
I’ll just mention some of the highlights for me this year.
The very best of the excellent keynote addresses for me was Maria Shell, The Art of the Word — Getting Grants and Other Art Opportunities by Crafting a Well-Written Proposal. From the far corner of Alaska where she lives, she has been able to gain fellowships, shows, grants, and generally widespread exposure for her work. Moving to the country can no longer be any kind of an excuse for me. I need to apply some of her heartfelt advice.
Of the workshops and break-out sessions I attended, I was most influenced by “Master Social Media and Rule the World (or Market Your Work)”, led by Carolyn Higgins. I have a long way to go in making good use of Social Media (including keeping up this blog), but she reinvigorated my quest to do so.
The post conference workshop I chose was Fabulous Ways with Fusible Web, led by Sue Bleiweiss. I use fusing a lot in my work, and consider myself pretty proficient. I wanted to make sure I wasn’t missing anything. And indeed I learned quite a bit.
Meeting a couple of my mentors in SAQA helped too. Katie Pasquini Masopust was the teacher for an on-line course I took this winter called Color, Composition and Design. Even though she didn’t immediately put my name to me face I introduced myself, she did afterwards, and had kind words to say about my work.
Also Sharon M. W. Bass is the mentor for SAQA artists who seek to join the elite, professional level of SAQA membership, Juried Artist Members. (JAM). I determined to try for this.
Finally, I had so much fun in the Creative Collaborative Collage ice breaker session led by Lyric Kinard. I want to try to lead a session like this sometime. And I cannot forget the “Maker Space” session Friday evening. I got to dip into needle felting, use of stenciling with Shiva Paint Sticks, making small landscape collages, use of Jacquard dyes and more. I think I was the last one out of the room — I was having so much fun playing.
