Detail from "Rain Dance," an original quilt by Sherrie Spangler

Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Color therapy


I needed a serious shot of color after making that winter quilt from a few posts ago, and I needed something to get me back in the studio. So I did a little warm-up exercise using a piece of fabric that I painted (below) and a bias fusing technique that I just read about on Laura Wasilowski's blog here: http://artfabrik.blogspot.com/2012/05/how-to-make-bias-fuse-collage.html


I liked the breezy feel of this watercolor painting of flowers. I copied this page from a book for inspiration a few years ago, and now I can't remember the artist's name. Her work blows me away. I'm not very good at realism, so I was just going for the whispy, curvy feeling.


Using Laura's technique of cutting straight strips on the bias and curving them as you fuse, I laid down a few green strips.


It didn't really grab me, so I added more and started to like it better but not enough to finish it.



I was about to throw it in my pile of rejects, but then on my way to bed I stopped in front of it and sliced it up with a rotary cutter and rearranged the pieces. That looked WAY better and more interesting, so I slept well. Now I just have to decide whether I want to finish it as a little piece or make a bigger quilt with more of the same.


I'm leaning toward a bigger quilt because Laura's technique is so easy and fun.

Have a colorful day

4 comments:

Robbie said...

How cool! Love the bright green bias strips! Perfect compliment to the piece!

Judy Ferguson said...

I am a graduate of the "Chicago School of Fusing." I use her method on almost everything I do now. I do not have the patience for all that piecing. And I love the ease of designing with this method. Have fun. I love it.

Ladybug said...

I've been spending a LOT of time on the beaches lately, so I see EELGRASS & SUNSET (or early dawn!) Whatever - I do like it. I enjoyed hearing that you just HAD to stop on your way to bed to rearrange it. I've done that with other projects so often that I thought maybe I was a bit wierd - if I am, I now know that I have company!

The Idaho Beauty said...

Color therapy indeed! I love that background fabric and adding the somewhat lime-ey green just makes it sing. Cutting it up definitely improved on it. Glad it didn't get rejected.