Aullwood Art Quilt Show: Debra Bentley and Robbie Porter

Debra Bentley, "Little Things Matter", 19.25" x 45.4" NFS

Another Miami Valley Art Quilt Network (MVAQN)  member, Debra Bentley  also exhibited a piece at Aullwood this year.  Deb as well as Maxine and I and a few other people went to a workshop at Shelley Brenner Baird's studio to learn about printing with thermofax screens and thickened dyes.  Deb sent off a detail of a photograph she took last year of fruiting bodies on some moss which grew on some of her flower pots on her deck to have a screen made.  Interestingly enough, the photograph she used for her screen, she also used in her piece for Aullwood last year.

You can see the results of her printing at left.  She then took some photographic images which she transferred to fabric and stitched additional leafy things in the background.

The fabric which Deb choose for her background was a piece of rust dyed fabric she had made a couple of years ago.  Deb laughed when she saw what I had entered as both of us used some raw edges on our quilts, a somewhat similar palette and the rust dyed fabric.

When I was talking with Barbara Trick, the Aullwood organizer, she mentioned that we had used rust-dyed fabrics and that a couple of years ago, everyone was using rust-dyes, but that it had fallen off.  She went on to say that she always saw trends in the show.

I don't think Deb and I are trendy.  Both of us use rust dyed fabric because we like it...and if it works in a piece, that's fine.  To us, it is just as any other method of dyeing fabric....and I love the colors we get from it.  Deb lives in Xenia and has always been interested in the natural world.  She volunteers at local nature centers, in addition to being a Master Gardener in Xenia, Ohio.

Robbie Porter, "Katie and the Coneflower," 40" x 36" NFS.

Robbie Porter is another fellow Ohioan.  She lives in Batavia.  Her entry this year is "Katie and the Coneflower," a portrait of her granddaughter Katie.  I love the bright colors Robbie used and also the flowing edge on the bottom of her quilt.

On her artist statement, Robbie used this quote from Rachel Carson:  "Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts."

Here's the rest of her statement:  "My granddaughter Katherine has a favorite color, purple.  Katie has always had  an interest in nature and has often planted her own flowers, most often those that are purple. A love of gardening and helping beautiful things grow is a wonderful thing to teach a child.  Katie has learned a great deal about our Good Earth and what she can do, even at age eleven, to make the earth even more beautiful.  The quilt "Katie and the Cone Flower" was inspired by observing my granddaughter as she admired her first garden.

Robbie did a wonderful job at shading the quilt, especially with her quilting.    She told me that Katie attended the opening with her and people recognized    Katie as the "girl in the quilt."