Hepworth inspired stone quilts

Version 1

CQ, the contemporary group of the British Quilters' Guild had a call out for A3 sized pieces inspired by a favourite artist for their new suitcase collection.  
As I love art and the size was not painful, it seemed a good thing to do, although choosing an artist took me ages - who actually is my favourite artist? I like the work of so many.  Should I choose someone instantly recognisable or go for a contemporary artist no-one would have heard of or, or, or...  Too much choice.  So I prevaricated, until one day I opened an old sketchbook and found a photo of a sculpture by Barbara Hepworth and thought it would make a great starting point for a quilt.  It was a piece I had seen at the Hepworth late 2015 and it reminded me of the many drawings I was making of stones.  I liked the idea of choosing Barbara Hepworth - well known, but not too well known and also a female artist as the majority people have heard of are men.  
I had got very excited when I saw her sculptures for the first time at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park of shapes with holes, especially as I was making images of people with holes at that time.

Computer drawings

From my initial drawings I tried out some colour combinations on the computer to fit in with some ideas I was working with.

Trying out the fabrics

I had some left over fabric from another piece, which was breakdown printed, discharged out some colour and added some gorgeous kimono silk I had purchased from Susan Briscoe.  

Quilting pattern sketch

I liked the way the colours were working but couldn't decide on the quilting pattern, so did a number of sketches.  I liked one, R preferred another. 

Another quilting pattern sketch

In the end, I made a second, smaller version for the SAQA Suitcase Collection, so got to try out two quilting patterns.  Which one do you prefer?

Version 2

Featuring on the SAQA blog

My work was featured over on the SAQA Europe blog last week – have a look and see.  It’s a lovely blog and at the moment is showing the work of UK members as well as the quilts made for the SAQA Benefit Auction.  Talking of which, my piece is coming up for sale at the International Quilt Festival in Houston in a few weeks.  But you can buy it online in advance, from 27^th October.  There are lots of other amazing little pieces for sale too – all for a good cause and you can see them here.

Out & About: SAQA Wide Horizons at EPM

Sue Payne with her quilt Roofscape

Whilst at the EPM in Alsace, I spent a very pleasant hour and a half manning the SAQA stand with Sue Payne.  I hadn’t met Sue before, but she was lovely as was her quilt, which you can see with her in the photo.

Berlin Reichstag by Hilde van Schardenburg

The SAQA exhibition was called ‘Wide Horizons’ and I had entered a piece which hadn’t been accepted.  Naturally, I was disappointed.  Often I have heard people say that “it’s not your work, it just didn’t fit in with the exhibition and to make the exhibition work well, there needs to be some kind of cohesion”.  Although I understand the sentiment, it wasn’t until I looked at the Wide Horizons show that I realised how true it was.  The piece I had submitted would have stood out like a sore thumb besides these works.  For once in my life I had used bright colours – and guess what? – most of these were beautifully subdued.  Size-wise too, mine would have taken up a lot of space and that would have restricted the numbers of other pieces that would have been on show.  It was very interesting to see.  And whilst I’m not saying that was the reason my piece was not accepted – it may not have been good enough, the jurors may not have liked it etc – it helped me realise why sometimes you get rejections. 

Gillian Cooper Chaos

In the meantime, here are some more of the lovely quilts that were on show.

Stretching Time I by Pirjam Pet-Jacobs

Drift by Sue Hotchkis

Thoughts by Elly van Steenbeek

Aftermath by Khurshid Bamboat

Silence 2 by Karin Oestergaard

New Work: New Life for the SAQA Benefit Auction

New Life by Gillian Cooper

Some people work well with a schedule of what they need to do by when and will finish things well in advance so that they will be organised.  Others of us, well, let’s just say I’m the queen of the last minute.  Without deadlines, I can struggle.  Of course, life would be less stressful if I was always ready in advance, but where would the fun be?  The kids wouldn’t recognise me if we didn’t arrive up at school right at the last minute.  However, I do want it to be noted that in seven years, we haven’t been late once... yet!

And so it is with my artwork.  Deadlines can help.  I decided that I wanted to make a piece for the SAQA Benefit Auction months ago and when did I make it?  The week before the deadline.  Luckily, given that it had to posted internationally, the deadline was extended by two weeks.  Even better for SAQA, the deadline was extended after I had posted it or it still wouldn’t be finished now.

I decided to make something a little different and experiment. Circles keep cropping up at the moment so I thought I would just go with it and do circles.  I hand-dyed lots of different types of fabric to make the circles to add to the texture.  It’s finished with recycled glass beads from the African Fabric Shop – I just couldn’t resist them at the Loch Lomond Quilt Show.

Anyway I think it is a bit different to everything else I’m doing and I’m not sure it will be more than one off – but what do you think?  Do brighter colours work for me?  Does it look like my artwork?!  If you really like it, it will be auctioned raise funds for SAQA in September - even if you don't want to buy this piece, you should have a look at some of the others.  SAQA has lots of talented members.  

Good news and even more completed work

9.29 in the morning by Gillian Cooper

Please don’t collapse, but after last year’s almost complete lack of finished work apart from PomPoms, this year I’m on a bit of a roll and here is yet another!

 

9.29 in the morning (detail) by Gillian Cooper

I’m really pleased with this piece of work for a number of reasons.  Firstly, because I almost gave up on it, but didn’t.  It felt like it was taking way too long and that it just wasn’t going to work.  This was partly due to the (very) slow production process.  I only have one silk screen and it covers any area roughly 30cm square at a time.  I had to get the pattern onto the screen, wait for it to dry, then print the fabric, wash the screen, wait for it to dry and then set off again.  Oh and fabric generally needed to be printed twice.  The stitching didn’t take too long, but whilst I was doing it, all I could see was the blue fabric: it was a piece that only came together at the very end: after the squares were sewn together and the orange and other wool tops added.  So I almost stopped.  However, with a little gentle encouragement from R (and some childcare too!), I finished it in time to enter it for the SAQA juried exhibition ‘Redirecting the Ordinary’.  Having had a number of rejections the week before I entered, I didn’t hold out much hope – you seem to get into a pattern of them for a while.  I know that rejections are all part of being an artist, but it isn’t always an easy part, especially when you seem to get nothing else...  But guess what?  To my amazement, it was accepted and will be jetting off to America in the summer to go touring with the exhibition.  I’m really chuffed and waited to tell you until I got these lovely photos of it that Alan took last week.

9.29 in the morning (detail) by Gillian Cooper

It’s surprising how much better you feel after an acceptance, especially as the sun is now shining and the daffodils are out!

New work: Facing the Past

Facing the Past by Gillian Cooper

The last few weeks have been very productive for me.  Perhaps it is the coming of spring which always makes life seem easier or perhaps it was the successful use of a self-imposed deadline.  Today, Alan McCredie was over photographing some of my work, to go onto my website, which is in the process of being updated.  Alan’s a great photographer – check out his blog for the Scotman newspaper on 100 weeks in Scotland to get a flavour of some of his other work.  This week's photos reflect the 30 year anniversary of the start of the miners' strike.  I can't believe it was 30 years ago - it was a significant event of my teenage years as the strike-breaking lorries hurried in convey past my house carrying coal to the steelworks. 

This is a little piece I finished last week – only 6½ x 4½in, postcard size.  Unfortunately, it wasn’t photographed by Alan today as I had to send it off on Saturday, so don’t hold the photo against him – it is entirely my fault and when I show you some of his photos of my work over the next few weeks you will appreciate the difference!  This work is for the SAQA Spotlight Silent Auction at the SAQA Conference at the start of May.  I particularly wanted to make a piece as I am going to the Conference.  I’m hugely excited (and a bit nervous) at going to the States for 12 days.  It is a big trip and I really need to get on with planning the details.  I’m going to the big quilt show at Paducah, having a couple of days in New York, then going down to Washington for the Conference.  If anyone has any tips/ideas for things to do in New York/Washington, please let me know.  It is years since I visited.

Anyway.  Back to this piece.  I found it quite challenging to create such a small piece, especially one with straight edges.  I made another couple of pieces, but liked the shape made by their raw edges, that they have been kept for other things!  Over the top, I used an embroidery pattern I created a while ago from the remains of one of my ancient figure patterns and, of course, I’ve stencilled a figure on top.  I’m pleased with the results, so much so I might try small again.

Another completed piece - for the SAQA Trunk Collection

Forgotten title by Gillian Cooper

I’m in shock – it’s only January and I’ve completed two pieces of work already this year.  Okay, the other one was a bit of cheat as I had done most of the work last year, and this one is only 7x10in, but still...

SAQA (Studio Art Quilts Associates) has a call out for pieces this size for a Trunk Show, to let people see the full spectrum of the wonderful world of art quilting and all it encompasses. 

For this piece, I used some of the printed fabric I have been making and it is basically a sample for a bigger piece that is now underway.  It is rather time consuming as with only one screen, I can’t get many prints in one go (three to be precise) before I have to clean it, let it dry, re-ink, let it dry before printing again.  It may be a while before you see the large piece!

I sent it off last week to the States for the Trunk Show and before that spent ages pondering the title, which I promptly forgot and didn’t write down anywhere.  I’m now spending some time setting up a proper list of my artwork so I don’t do it again and so I don’t have to keep re-measuring everything every time I send off details of my work... oh to be organised!  Anyone got any good organisation ideas for me?