These pieces cover a wide variety of subject matter. What they have in common is the way they were created.
Instead of starting with a drawing, and adding the fabric shapes and layers until the image is completed and formed, these are composed intuitively, by collaging the images, fabrics, found objects etc into a pleasing whole.
I was a little surprised when I put this gallery together in 2019 to see how far back I had been working like this for some of my pieces. I have been making art quilts since about 2009, and some date almost that far back. I like to gather the fabrics, laces, the “whatever” around me and put them together. It feels like I’m creating a little “world.”
I didn’t include all of the travel quilts in this gallery, like the Eastern Europe in Stitches series. But that is how they were done too.
A note on technique: I find it useful to prefuse the backs of the fabrics with Mistyfuse before cutting and putting them in place. Later, when the composition is complete, I can iron them down and stitch them. I use Mistyfuse on the front AND back of papers. This preserves them so that they don’t degrade, and I can stitch right through the paper.
Also, my best friend is a “sewing tweezers,” a long handled tweezers that helps me maneuver the bits and pieces.