by Nysha | Jan 20, 2010 | Uncategorized
I though I would share some of the work I have created over the past several years. From portraiture to abstract, from artsy to traditional there is a thread woven through it all! Make a Smilebox slideshow Isn’t SmileBox...
by Nysha | Jan 9, 2010 | Uncategorized
In an effort to increase my aptitude in drawing I thought I would turn to a standby, Contour Drawing. For those of you who have forgotten or blocked it out of your memory – in elementary school we drew our hands without looking at them. That was called a blind contour drawing. It produces weird drawings that rarely look like the object that was drawn. The idea is not recreating the object but rather to study and look at it, especially the edges. For me trying to move my eye and my hand at the same rate is the challenge. And on a domestic sewing machine so I am in effect moving my paper… If you are thinking that it looks good that is because after doing three blind contours I did a contour drawing looking at the object. Here are the first three. (above is three blind contours and a drawing) From an etching book. Three blind contours and then coloured pencil A tulip from a magazine ad. Three blind contours, a drawing and then fabric paint. Seed stitching fills the...
by Nysha | Oct 1, 2009 | Uncategorized
This Summer has been busy. A new irrigation system was installed just before the rainy season… I gave a presentation of my work to Uncommon Threads, my quilt guild in Memphis (actually Germantown) and as Challenge Chairperson I gave a class for all participants of the challenge. Amidst all this a few friends and I got together and dyed fabric. Twenty two yards is what I dyed that Saturday. Pictured at right is Marge laying her purple graduations out to rinse on Arlene’s awesome rinsing rack! What an ingenious way to rinse. One thing new I tried was a ‘parfait’ from Ann Johnston’s book “Color by Accident” http://www.annjohnston.net/ This parfait was done with first one yard of fabric in a bucket with red dye then a second yard and blue and finally a third yard and more red. Each colour sat for twenty minutes before the next was added and no stirring occurred until the end producing mottled and varied cloths. I took those three fabrics along with white and made a quilt for Quilts of Valor. They give quilts to all returning service men and women. Check out their website...
by Nysha | Sep 13, 2009 | Uncategorized
Here is the second figure that I made in our class with California 3D Quilt Artist Susan Else. She (figure) in only pinned together at limbs right now — going to play with her gesture a little before committing to a pose… Here are the creatures we made… (from left to right) my little mole guy, Jodi’s green horned creature, Christopher’s dragalope and Susan’s creature melding into the background at...
by Nysha | Sep 5, 2009 | Uncategorized
I recently attended Quilt National at the Dairy Barn in Athens Ohio. The trip overall was terrific. The whole point was to see Quilt National before it closed. I am so glad I went. Here are some links to artist work I saw and was inspired by. These few pieces out of the whole lot of awesome work spoke to me in a very particular manner about my work… Leisa Rick has a beautiful piece, “My House Is Built On Sand” whose playfulness and line drawing was very cool. http://tinyurl.com/kv8hrx Marianne Burr, “Spin Out”. I had seen her work on the cover of American Style Magazine and was captivated. Seeing this work in person made me pause. The dense hand work used to make this piece — it was humbling. And yet the impact had nothing to do with that, rather just the sheer beauty of the movement and shapes, especially the rhythm created by the repeated stitches. http://tinyurl.com/l9w4w5 Nelda Warketin, “Meadow Pine”. I am captivated by images superimposed upon each other. Her use of materials, thread and paint created a subtly undulating surface of layers to be seen through. http://tinyurl.com/mhbaet Inge Hueber takes the quilt inside out with her “High Tide/Low Tide — Broadstairs, Kent 1”. With seams meticulously created and put on display on the exterior front of the quilt her colour work not only recreates her experience of a place and time, but placement of those colours create a movement reminiscent of tides coming and going. http://tinyurl.com/kss6wl Mary Louise Learned, “Street Dance” at a distance has movement you would expect from a piece with a title...
