After the Harvest

"After the Harvest," 17.25" x 30.5"

It's Friday....and time for participating in Nina Marie's "Off the Wall Friday" blog hop.  I must admit, I'm a bit embarrassed to say that I have been working hard on straightening up my sewing room, trying to beat the cold weather outside, mourning the loss of many of my favorite large goldfish to a raccoon, and re-working "View from the Abyss" for another show.

So, I was a bit annoyed when I went to my photo files and couldn't find what I intended to write about tonight....but then I realized that I never showed you the result of the work I started in Montana for "The View from Here," a SAQA regional show.  So, here it is.  I'm not entirely happy with it...but I think that that is quite often the result when you imagine something and think you know how you're going to do it and then you realize that that won't work.  You see, I intended to show a cornfield which had been harvested right in the early part of December or so...Here in this part of the Midwest  snow comes and blows across, catching in the stubble.  I thought I would represent that by taking strips of sheers which were shredded on the edges...but when I tried that, it just didn't look right.

So, when that didn't work, I couched strips of confetti yarn down, then hand stitched over the top with hand painted variegated perle cotton I purchased at the Shibori Dragon.  The confetti gave the feeling that it was loose pieces of corn leaves fluttering in the wind, which is pretty much the feeling I wanted to express.  The ground is some of that rust dyed fabric I wrote about here and the sky is hand painted.

The trees didn't turn out quite the way I imagined.  I hand stitched in blacks, grays, and lavender over the top of netting, then cut the netting away to give the trees the branch effect.  I stitched this for hours in the car while driving around Montana and then back to Olympia.  Needless to say, all I could see were cottonwoods with leaves on, so I fear that they look more like cottonwood rather than oaks and maples which line the fence rows of Ohio and Michigan...and more Michigan than Ohio!

I'm tempted to rip the quilting out of the sky and do it over again....I think that the pattern obliterates the shading in the sky, which as you can see from the first picture look very much like the Midwestern sky.
I wanted to indicate wind, but these are just far too tight.  I was also struggling yet again with my hands. The barn sort of bugged me too...I wanted to thread paint it, but in this too I don't have the control I once did.

So, I hope you enjoy it, and take the opportunity to go to some of the other blogs.  I have to get back to finishing up the re-vamp of "View from the Abyss" and look forward to taking in the last of my big ceramic pots from outside and washing windows.

Losing Part of our Heritage

 When I was in high school, my mom used to tease me that she was going to find two bumperstickers for me.  One was to say "I brake for barns." the other was to say "I brake for cemeteries."  I love both, and you probably have noticed my love for old barns just by reading my blog.

I suppose part of it is that when I was a child, I lived on a road which we were the only house on the entire road which was about 2 miles long.  I most often played by myself, and the barn with its lofts was  a favorite place.

A couple of weeks ago, we had two very large windstorms which came through.  They didn't bring us much rain, but they brought us some pretty significant destruction.

I have been worried about this barn....although it was painted with a quilt pattern not too long ago, I noticed this spring it was missing many shingles and the roof line was beginning to look a little swaybacked.

It was build probably around the 1910s and in all likelyhood was a dairy barn.  It stood in West Milton, Ohio, on the east side of Rt. 48 just south of town.  According to a friend, it managed to survive the more significant blow on Friday, but when Sunday's second bout came through, it crumbled.  I am hoping that one of the German Baptist barn salvage people will come and at least salvage some of the wood...but I suspect that because of it's collapse, it is too dangerous and will probably be burned.

Another Quilt Inspired by the Barn in Palestine, OH

Here is the second of the two barn quilts I submitted to the Studio Art Quilt Associates Ohio regional show. Like the round window, it did not get it.

While this was fun to do and I like it, it didn't surprise me that it didn't make it in...for all the round window's faults, I think it is a better composition.

This one is also sort of problematic because I realized that I made one of the branches grow from two directions....The fact that it started out life as a grape vine, sort of confused me...there was grapevine as well as tree in the original picture...I opted not to use the grape leaves because I couldn't get the look of them down well enough. Instead of being divided, these grape leaves were not lobed much at all and the fact that they were old (this was taken in October) meant that the leaves were limp and fluttery....not looking much like grape leaves at all.

I wonder, if I cropped it a bit more, taking out some of the door casing maybe like this, if it wouldn't be better.  It still doesn't solve the branch issue...which I'm sure you'll be able to find easily in this shot.

In addition, I wanted this to be "painterly" in the painting...not tight and controlled...I tend to paint very tightly and I'm trying to retrain myself.   While the streaks of pain and some blobs of gold didn't bother me, I wonder if it does bother others.

The blobs at the far left are actually grapes..as well as the blobs in the center.

I'm still having significant problems controlling my machine quilting.  The numbness in my hands just makes the fine motor control difficult.  I'm hoping that with more practice, I'll be able to either overcome it or develop a method or style of machine quilting which doesn't look too bad.  I rather like how the thread painting on these stems makes it look sketchy.

It was my intention to make even more thread build up on these...but I found that I was using a heck of a lot of thread and the way in which I was doing this was leading to too much distortion.  Rather than doing this on just the top with a layer of stabilizer behind it, I sandwiched it and thread painted through the top/batting/backing.  I then put another backing on it and quilted some more since the thread painting makes the back look so rough.

Practice makes perfect...and I've been trying to "do the work" a lot lately.  You can't get better unless you put in the time.  I'm looking forward to exploring more of my barn sketches and photos through quilting.

You can see the original barn quilt posting with the photos here:
http://michigoose-life-quilts.blogspot.com/2010_10_01_archive.html

Sculptures on the Square: Opening Doors to Troy, OH

I think I have mentioned in the past that Troy, Ohio, where I presently live, was blessed to have a foundation started by Troy's "captains of Industry" in the late 19th/early 20th century.  The money they set aside was invested and has grown.  I suspect that others have added to it over the years, but it is used for the betterment and promotion of the city of Troy.  Each year they underwrite lots of projects, non-profit institutions and  scholarships.

In the past, they joined with the Troy Mainstreet organization which is composed of local downtown merchants and the city to host "Sculptures on the Square."  Every other year various sculptures are placed on the town square and for about a block or two beyond. The first couple of years were "rented" traveling exhibitions of one artist who didn't have a connection with Troy.

Then, I think under the "push" from Karen Purke, then the director of the WACO Aircraft Museum  (WACO rhymes with taco and stands for the Weaver Aircraft Corporation which was headquartered in Troy, OH) here in town, they held a sculpture exhibition. 26 fiberglass "blank" WACO designed airplanes were delivered to area artists, non-profit groups and schools who signed up for the project.  The idea was much the same as the famous "Cow Parades", "Flying Pigs" in Cincinnati, and various other fiberglass art.  These were absolutely fabulous and a great hit.  The airplanes were auctioned afterward with funds going to the WACO Museum/airfield.  Some of the purchasers were as far away as New Mexico.  Since most went for over $2,000 I don't have any flying in my back yard.

So, this year, the door theme was brought out.  Old, salvaged doors were provided to 28 local artists and organizations.  Each chose their own interpretation of "Opening Doors to Troy."   Logically enough, the exhibition was sponsored by Clopay, the garage door people who have a factory about 1/4 mile (I originally wrote 1/4"  I guess I really am a quilter through and through!) or less from me.  Other funders the Troy Foundation and the City of Troy.

The exhibition will be up from now until September 17, 2011 after which the doors will be auctioned.  You can find a list of exhibitors and more information here.  As I am able to walk a bit more (I was hurting last night), I will post more.  

Troy is blessed with wonderful restaurants in it's downtown area.  Last night we went to our favorite, The Caroline, which if you are ever passing through on I75 and need a place to eat you must veer 2 miles off the highway to the square and eat here.   About the same price as Applebees or Ruby Tuesday, it has an award winning chef and absolutely fantastic food for all appetites and people wearing casual attire (or not...I've seen really well dressed people there too....just not my spouse :) ).  It is, after all, small town Ohio (I think one of my husband's raves about this place is you can get Guinness on tap).  The interior is wonderfully decorated with art as well...but ..once again, I digress.  We visited last night in honor of what I hope to be my last chemo treatment.  When we went outside, the Cincinnati Symphony orchestra was playing (every Friday in the summer they close traffic to the square (a round-about or rotary) and have live concerts).  Just outside the Caroline was Karen Purke's door.

Karen is a great person and a wonderful photographer.  Here she chose to highlight the "quilt barns" of Miami County.  I have written about them before,   You can read an article about them here and a map may be found here.  You can pick up the brochure, but look at the map ahead of time as you can group them more effectively on your own. I believe we are up to 67 barns or structures with quilt patterns on them with more being added.  In addition there are some which are "unauthorized."  Quite a few are in really lovely areas.  All of the people who have barns painted with quilts from the official site have agreed to allow people to pull in their driveways to take pictures.

I admit, I'm a barn junkie and Karen did a really fun job with her piece.  You can see other pieces of Karen's artwork at her website, "McGuffey Press."  As a historian, naming your printing company after the early school book publishing company just tickles my fancy.

Barns and Quilts

My mind has been on barns lately. Of course, my mom would say that my mind is always interested in barns. I love the light inside them. Playing in the haymows as a child, and looking into all the dark nooks and crannies was (and is) one of my favorite things to do.

This year, the Batty Binder's Quilt Guild in Troy had a scavenger hunt as part of the activities. Miami County is one of the several counties in Ohio who have promoted the painting of quilt patterns on the barns. For Miami County, this was an effort to connect people with Miami county's rural areas.

Rafael Santoyo, a native of Villa Modera, Mexico has painted over 50 barns throughout Miami County. While other counties in Ohio have done this (in fact, it started in Ohio in the Appalachian foothills in Adams county with the work of Donna Sue Groves), so far, ours are the most spectacularly painted. Rafael actually replicates printed fabrics in his work...even going so far as to make "batiks."

We had to go out and photograph as many of the quilt squares on the barns as we could. Then, last month, we were assembled into "teams." We are now going to individually make quilts with a barn theme. I already was thinking about barns and quilts...so I will probably do a series.

Then, the Fast Friday Fabric Challenge group assigned us the theme of "chiaroscuro." Chiaroscuro is an art term which referes to painting (or drawing) in a moody way, with extreme lights and darks. Carravagio was a master at this method, but I am sure you can think of many others who also work(ed) in this way. My thoughts immediately went to this shot I took, as well as many others I did in Montana several years ago.

This lovely double wedding ring pattern is painted on the side of a barn which was raised in 1858.


The barn is kept in good shape by the Zimmerlin's of Piqua, Ohio.


The Wintrow Barn, also in Piqua has the log cabin pattern on it.






and the Shutt Barn has "All Hallows."













While it doesn't have a quilt pattern on it, this is one of my favorite barns, and rather unusual. It is done in the Second Empire (also known as Mansard") style and accompanies a house in the same style. I'm a little worried about this one. Barns are often not kept up. The gutters fall into disrepair dumping water onto the foundations which then freeze and thaw and sometimes break down. The roofs are not maintained and water gets in, rotting the floors and sills. Then they start to fall. Vandals, lighting strikes, and basic neglect (which then causes insurance liabilities) . Pole barns (barns made from telephone poles and metal siding) just don't have the same character that these wonderful wooden structures have.

Now I have to get back to trying to finish my last 2 FFFC quilts done...I REALLY want to get them finished before I start on the new one...I'm very close to being done!