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Tuesday, July 30, 2013

Symposium - Exhibition

Continuing on with the quilt symposium.

The Great Lake Centre is in the centre of Taupo, just a 10-15 minute walk from Taupo-nui-a-Tia College where the classes, etc. took place.   There was also a shuttle for those in a hurry or less inclined to walk.
 
As well as the Symposium exhibition, there were the Tutors quilts and SAQA's Trunk Show C.

On the Sunday morning I did a white glove duty - always a great way to get a better look at the quilts.  

Just a few quilts that I liked.

Quilts by Tutors:


Sandstorm over the White Desert, by Jenny Bowker
closeup


 
Star Sign, by Philippa Naylor
closeup




Psychedelic Big Bang by Susan Cleveland




closeup








Exhibition quilts:

by Wendy Ward

The dress is a map of the South Island, so clever.


















closeup

The Comfort of Stitch by Lee-Ann Newton






Tradition with a Celtic Twist by Anna Williams
I had seen Anna working on this technique earlier this year.  This is a stunning quilt.


 








Best of Show


My Turkish Plate by Valda Sutton
detail
Past Imperfect by Josie Willis


One of my favourites by Josie WIllis.  The quilt isn't wonky its just my photographing skills.


I spent quite awhile trying to work out how it was pieced. 

Closeup









 Finally my quilts
Out My Window II

A larger version of my quilt that is in Beneath the Southern Sky Exhibition.




Out West
This quilt is loosely based on a bus blind and features the western suburbs of Wellington.  Its a wholecloth that has been dyed, the letters were 'bleached' with Decolourant and trapuntoed.






 
Vanilla

The vertical line down the centre is just a shadow.  This was my first effort using doilies after I started following Cindy Needham's blog and before she came to NZ earlier in the year.



SAQA Oceania Blog Hop for this week



 Art Quilt by Ruth de Vos
30 July                  Ruth de Vos                   ruthdevos.com/blog
1 August               Ali George                     aliquilts.blogspot.com
3 August               Rasa Mauragis              rasamauragis.com/blog
5 August               Alison Schwabe             alisonschwabe.com/weblog


For the complete Oceania Collection Blog Hop timetable. 

Saturday, July 27, 2013

Symposium Classes - Gwen Marston

My first class was a two day class with Gwen Marston, Small Studies.  It would have to be one of the best classes I've ever done.  Gwen is such a generous teacher.  

By morning tea we'd realised that Wellington had experienced a reasonable sized earthquake.  The class was mostly people from the Wellington region so we got a range of updates.

By the end of the first day I'd completed a small piece.

 
It measures 18x25cm, so quite small!

 








I'd previously looked at Gwen's '37 Sketches' book and didn't think I needed to buy it, by morning tea on the first day I'd raced off to the Merchants Mall and purchased it.  
  



While the book has mostly pictures, reading it is like have Gwen standing behind you and guiding you through the techniques.







Here is my second piece:




It started off very beige but the colour just kept on creeping in.  It measures 19x22cm.

 






Gwen had an exhibition at the Taupo Museum featuring the quilts in her book as well as larger ones.  


 







During the class she showed us some other quilts.












Friday, July 26, 2013

SAQA Oceania Blog Hop for this week

Art Quilt by Averil Stuart-Head

22 July                  Lisa Repsevicius            SAQA Oceania blog

24 July                  Averil Stuart-Head          avesrave.blogspot.com 

26 July                  Mel Forrest                     mixedmediabymelforrest.com
 
28 July                  Brenda Gael Smith         serendipitypatchwork.com.au/blog

For the complete Oceania Collection Blog Hop timetable.

Thursday, July 25, 2013

Back from Taupo

Just back from Taupo and the quilt symposium.  This may take several posts to cover a great week.

Left Wellington last Wednesday with a fun stop on the Desert Road









The road had been closed a day or so before.  Just a tad cold but so much fun.

 

Mt Ngauruhoe and Mt Tongariro

Mt Ruapehu










 Arriving in Taupo ...

The symposium started on Thursday with registration.  Great fun catching up with friends and people I hadn't seen for ages.  The merchants mall was open and a bit of shopping was done.  




 





Had to do the touristy thing and visit Huka Falls

 








View of Huka Lodge across the river. 
 









In the evening was the opening and awards ceremony. A later post will detail the classes and the exhibitions.

Friday, July 12, 2013

Coming soon - SAQA Oceania Blog Hop

As I mentioned here and here I have a quilt in the 2013 SAQA Benefit Auction (auction starts 9 September, see here for more info.) 

The Oceania Collection are the 12x12" works donated by SAQA (Studio Art Quilt Associates) members in the Oceania region (mostly Australians).   

Follow the Oceania Collection Blog Hop to get a peek into the work of each artist.  

The blog hop starts next Tuesday (16 July) with Sue Dennis and ends on 6 September when I will be posting about my piece 'Fishnets'.   

Thursday, July 11, 2013

In Print

The latest edition of NZ Quilter magazine arrived on Saturday.


I'd been waiting for its arrival as I was looking for the registration form for the 2015 Symposium in Palmerston North.  Quickly filled it in, wrote the cheque and popped it in the post.

The reason to get in quickly is to get a low registration number which then means (hopefully!) a better chance of getting into class/es of choice - usually with an overseas tutor.  It does seem a bit odd given that the Symposium is 18 months away and this years starts next week.

Anyway turning to page 1 to see:



 
'Chained' is part of Aotearoa Quilters' Connections exhibition that has been touring New Zealand.








More excitement when getting to page 26 to see:

'Colourful' is part of NZ Quilter and Nutex's Colours of New Zealand touring exhibition.







While I've had quilts exhibited throughout New Zealand and overseas, these are my first quilts to be hung at Minerva, here in Wellington.

Sunday, July 7, 2013

Jeannette deNicolis Meyer class

Back in April our guild organised a one day class with Jeannette deNicolis Meyer.  

I've admired her work ever since she had an exhibition 'Speaking in Cloth 6 Quilters 6 Voices' at Taia Gallery (predecessor to Minerva) with 5 other quilters. 

The class was called 'Circles and Curves'.  I've avoided sewing curves as I thought I couldn't get them accurate enough.  With Jeannette's well explained and quite simple techniques I was off.  Sewing freehand curves and circles was easy - sort of.

Her hint for moving the needle position and using the edge of the foot as a guide so the seam allowance is smaller than 1/4" made sewing the curve easier and more accurate as there was less fabric to get in the way - if that makes sense.

I never quite learn - I took some smallish pieces of hand-dyed fabric and quite liked what I created - but now don't have anymore to make the piece larger.  Unless this becomes the centre piece and the rest is slightly different ...





Tuesday, July 2, 2013

Solander Gallery

Last week, I spent an amazing two hours at Solander Gallery.  

Friends of Te Papa organise various talks, presentations, etc which are usually held at Te Papa.  The visit to Solander Gallery was part of their 'Walking Tours of Local Dealer Galleries' series. 

Vincent Drane (Solander Gallery director and artist) trained in Melbourne as a print maker, he enthusiastically guided us through the various forms of printmaking.  

He had a couple pieces of A5 sized plastic that we could dry etched designs onto.  Some people did some really fine drawings, like a cat.  I tried leaves, grasses and random quilt patterns. 

The print from our etching/scratching ... 


... not overly exciting but it did give me ideas for future projects ...


I'm now investigating Japanese vinyl, which is the next step up from lino.  The vinyl can be cut on both sides and doesn't bend like lino when it is wet.