Constructions #65, 2002 by Nancy Crow

I would be remiss to go very far into this Quilt Artist of the Week thing without mentioning Nancy Crow, especially now that she has a new book out. She is undoubtedly the most widely known of all art quilters both inside and outside of the quilt world, and indeed is considered the vanguard of modern art quilting.

She’s also a very active teacher, offering workshops in her studio in rural Ohio as well as incredible-sounding arts and crafts tours of places such as Mexico and France. Her workshops are infamous for requiring students to bring tons and tons of different solid-color fabrics.

Chinese Souls #6, 1992 by Nancy Crow

From her artist’s statement:
When I work on a quilt, I put away all thoughts that are not helpful and channel my energies towards relaxing and becoming one with my fabrics. Since I work intuitively, this is absolutely important. I begin to see shapes in my head and think about how to cut them out of my huge palette of colors that I have hand-dyed in my basement dye studio. Never, ever do I think about what others expect or want or what will sell, but rather I look at my time in my studio as a process of discovery. I love being inside my brain and pushing myself to think in ever more complex ways because I know the ideas are there for the taking. It’s all about being focused and disciplined and making use of one’s abilities. And about being alone, in solitude, so one can think and feel deeply without interruption. I have definitely grown far closer to myself rather than to others because I see my quiltmaking as my experience which has nothing to do with other people.

Whiptips is an advice column for readers to ask questions or offer advice by leaving your comments. View the Whiptips archive here. You can submit questions, to whiptips@gmail.com. Please include photos with your questions!

Weeks Ringle of FunQuilts who writes here at Whipup has offered to give advice to people on how to finish and makeover unwanted quilt blocks or pieces of quilts. Please submit photos of samples to whiptips@gmail.com for consideration. Weeks will post suggestions on two or three at a time. She expects a great response “since no one knows what to do with them and it’s painful to toss out”.

Thanks, Weeks! We can’t wait to see people’s projects.

I have had great fun this month checking out all the wonderful new and not so new blogs and everyones amazing creative energy and uniqueness. So this is the last day of June and of introductions. Next comes July and Bags – and some great prizes too.

JULY: For something a little bit different this whiplash – the comp will be open to entries for the first 2 weeks of July and then the links will remain up for the next week so everyone has a chance to check out the links and we can post the winners. Then in the last week of July – the links will be open for some non-competition entries.

Something else that is a little different is categories – in your post on your blog please note which category you are entering – and don’t forget to also post a whiplash badge (grab the code from the whiplash page) so we know it is an official entry.

SKILL – this for those crafters who are very skilled at a certain craft and would like to showcase their beautiful workmanship.
TUTORIAL – this is for those whose project might be quick, original or clever and have a good clear tutorial to go with it.
FANCY – a fabulous decorative touch, embellishment, original colour combination or stitched/knitted design.

Some tips for a good entry – include good clear photos, a story about the why or who for, a description or ‘how to’.
Have fun.

And Nicole has a good tutorial on how to enter.

box quilt at becka’s project journal in Minneapolis

chinese coins wallhanging at KC quilts by Katie Sue in virginia.

A crafty tree by crafty Mcgee – Rose from Washington.

Target by Lubna Chowdhary.

The tile is an excellent product to get started in ceramics (or to continue for that matter). It allows you to explore clay – it’s textures, profiles and glazes. It can be painted and printed onto and when the tiles are all made it’s all the fun of arranging them together or enjoying just the one as a piece of art.

Lubna Chowdhary makes tiles in a cascade of colour, abstract pattern and graphic lines. Her tiles are made by pressing clay into a plaster mould or through rolling out slabs into which objects or tools are impressed. Above is a selection of tiles that Lubna Chowdhary has made for Agnes Emery.

Mariana Argüelles is a tile maker and also writer of the blog Tileworld, with lots of tile links and reviews of for instance Frank Giorgini’s book Handmade Tiles.

I think it has a gorgeous cover and although I haven’t read it, I’ve read lots of good things about it! Giorgini himself is also a tile maker and on his website he shows how he press moulds his tiles.

Announcing a new feature here at Whip-up!

Whiptips is an advice column for readers to ask questions or offer advice. We were inspired by the ‘Good Questions’ at apartment therapy. Each post will include one question, and we’ll try and answer it, but we’re hoping anyone else reading Whip-Up can help out by leaving your comments! View Whiptips archive here.

Please submit questions, and photos if you can, to whiptips@gmail.com.

First question!

A reader, Jeanna, wrote to us asking for help to make something out of men’s neckties. Her husband passed away six years ago, and she would like to make something to remember him by, possibly a blanket or throw. Has anyone seen or done anything like this before? Has anyone got other ideas for how they could be used?

Blik now have a blog. I love their products, perfect idea for the renters out there….

For those of you that don’t know what is Blik?

blik surface graphics are oversized, geometric decals that allow anyone to quickly and easily create custom wallscapes in no time. The decals are self- adhesive and removable, so your blank walls have no excuse to be bare.

I’m also loving their Glass Stiks, pictured below.

New for me blog I stumbled across, Plastique Monkey. Absolutely amazing illustration with pencil, the sort of illustration and creativity that just blows my mind.

My current favourite, pictured below, “Happy Muscle Knitting”.

knitted jemima doll by knitting box

pillowcase dress by lemongardenia

knot by granma

What is Bitchin’ Mittens? Fiber art guru Dave Daniels (of Cabin Cove fame) has created this summer’s hottest craft-along. Is it wearable art? No. It’s art based on wearables. Specifically: Making a Bitchin’ pair of Mittens!

What’s the challenge? To do something different, to challenge yourself. Would you like to join along in this challenge? Basically, it’s to create a pair of mittens as ART. They do NOT have to be wearable. They don’t have to be knitted; but, they must contain the following:

1- They must be a pair (They don’t have to match, but at least compliment or be recognizable as belonging together)
2- They must contain cuffs, main hand portion, and thumbs
2a- OK, thumbs are not needed if they are for babies
3- They must contain at least 50% fiber

That’s it. They can be as out-there as your imagination can muster. They can be for infants or oven mitts. They can be as detailed and as intricate as you’d care to make them. There is no swapping, no postage, no ominous deadlines, no anxiety about anyone liking them, or fitting, etc.

Time frame? Labor Day, Monday, September 4, 2006. That’s almost three months to go crazy.

Oh, and there will be some prizes, too. That part is still being worked out. There will be categories, such as Most Innovative Use of Materials, Best Interpretation of the Theme, Prettiest, Ugliest, etc.

Check out the Bitchin’ Mittens website to join in.

You can talk yourself into anything. You’re trying to get started on a new quilt and know that the fabric in front of you just isn’t the right shade, but you’re tired, have been to three stores looking for one that’s better and just want to get going. Maybe it’s just the lighting in here, you wonder hopefully.

Eventually you come to your senses and realize that you can’t live with it and need to remove the offending pieces. It’s painful, but you tell yourself that it’s less painful than looking at that same unfortunate combination in a finished quilt.

So in the spirit of Use What You Have and Finish What You Have, Bill and I have started to tackle the basket of Ziploc bags filled with pieces of ill-fated projects. The amazing thing is that in almost every case one simple change is all that stands between a great quilt and an ugly one.

We had a bunch of pieced triangles that we had rejected because the brownish fabric had looked too muddy with the pink fabric we had wanted to use with it. So we pulled the triangles with the darker peach fabric and we paired them with some cream fabrics. The pink made the peach look brown but the cream made the peach just look like another shade of peach. We reconfigured the blocks and voila, a nice quilt.

Then there’s the second chances given to scraps. We had scraps of red log cabin blocks leftover from a quilt in which blue blocks are spliced together with red.

This is the original quilt entitled Horizon. We spliced together the red and blue blocks along the curve. Don’t try this at home!

I couldn’t bear to toss the scraps of red blocks, so I cut them up and used them in a contemporary crazy quilt piecing technique, added a few new fabrics and there’s no trace of the rigid geometry of the original blocks.

Perhaps the most important lesson here is that it’s rare to be able to turn a failure into a success or waste into resource without too much work but it’s so great when you can. Now instead of getting that sick feeling looking at all of those blocks that didn’t work out or about the time spent piecing something that then had to be trimmed down, we get to look at two fresh quilts. Best of all we salvaged all of the time, money and effort we thought we had lost.