The week before Christmas!

 

Has been a rather busy 3 months, culminating in the lead up to Christmas. Every year it seems to get worse. Dealing with Covid the past 3 years, not only at work being busier with covid PCR tests but the impact it has had on letting our parents see their family. This week after 3 months of planning, we spent a wonderful day in the Park under some shady trees, spending time together as a large family group. Last year we had planned a Boxing Day event but covid lockdown of Mum's care facility meant No Go. Same thing happened at Easter time. We have been successful in wheeling Mum down the street to their house for a birthday celebration  (mind you a week later they were back in a lockdown). The nurses have worked out how to get her in and out of a car, last week she went on a driving tour of the district. This week we managed to get her down the park getting her out of the car without their help. We had all 3 children plus spouses, all 8 grandchildren and all 4 partners, all 12 great grandchildren present for an early low key christmas celebration, a BBQ in the park for lunch. This photo is pretty special, 9 years down to 9 months is the age span for the great grand children.  It  actually was pretty easy to organise, but, with quite a few of us dealing with shiftwork rosters, you have to start early in the planning for such an event.

Hope you all have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. I will be back with some art and quilting news soon, got a stint of night shifts to work through first and it seems covid is still on the rise. Hopefully for not much longer.

More Winter Art

The Tangled Threads group selected   Alchemy as the theme for our exhibit as part of the Winter Craft Festival in Kingaroy. I am undecided as to whether this was a great idea or not. Alchemy seemed to be an issue for some of us. I read about trying to make gold out of other elements. Trying to make the best of a bad situation. Trying to solve lots of issues with simple methods. I made two pieces to exhibit, this one is called "Is there Gold in There?"

I had a polyester piece with gold flecks, black felt and used this as an overlay over a strip pieced landscape. I did some hand stitching meandering throughout. 

The second piece is titled "Endlessly Searching"

A single piece of grunge fabric with 3 inserts overlaid with a vertical patterned batik fabric. I did extra vertical machine stitching in places.

During my work leave, I have been learning to use my camera better. I have struggled with focus, keeping the darn thing still when clicking the shutter button, trying to look through the viewfinder is better without glasses. It is annoying to have to keep putting the glasses on and off though. I think using the viewfinder is better than relying on the fold out screen.

 I had invested in a quilt stand previously, so I set up the lights, the stand and spent hours working out how to take slightly better photos. In the process I now have a decent ( or slightly better ) photo of each piece and they are now stored away. I also used the camera tripod and the self timer button to stop the jitters. I also managed to get Belinda's alcohol ink paintings framed and have kept one for our walls and returned to her  the rest . I thought since I bought the yupo paper, inks and frames , I could keep one. She proudly showed them off when her guests turned up for her recent birthday celebrations. They are poster size and great to look at. We are encouraging her to pick up the brush and straw again and paint some more, but work and staff shortages keeps her busy. 

I started this piece in July inspired by rocks.

This is a quick photo taken using the flash instead of my lights as they had been packed away. I have to start the quilting next. 

Working out, whether to overlay? Add some small strips? What next? I remembered the time spent on sewing an overlay for a recent commission which saw me, making 2 because the first one was not quite the best colour, I thought I have a Wacom cintiq HD13 drawing tablet sitting idle, so I have spent the past week re learning how to draw with it. This gives me an idea of maybe the next stage using an actual photo of the underlay. I have now managed to remember a bit of photoshop, as drawing in Word doesn't save the changes to the original photo.

An example of a possibility. I can change colour/size/shape and get an idea without wasting fabric and lots of time. I can also do this while away from home and a sewing machine.

Learning about my camera, I tried taking photos of the orchard welcoming spring ( a bit early). I managed to understand how changing the Aperture changes the Depth of Field and am happier with my skills. 

Hoping that severe frosts don't come along and damage the stone fruit. 

The plum trees in flower were an absolute delight, the bees were very busy. 

The nets in the background are protecting the late mandarins from the birds. We are trying to be partly self sufficient in our fruit supply. The vegetable garden is back on the agenda, just waiting for some warmer weather, hopefully it is here soon. Spring is always an inspiring time of year for me, hopefully it is for you too.
 

Winter Art

 Our local Kingaroy Regional Art Gallery holds a Winter Craft Festival each year during June and July. As mentioned in my previous post, I was busy working towards this earlier this year. I sold 6 pieces of work, managing to speak with 2 of the buyers whilst I was present in the Gallery. One buyer purchased 3 pieces, I am blown away with that, and am happy that someone else obviously liked my work enough to purchase it, but also am surmising that they enjoyed their experiences when walking into the gallery to see all of the pieces there.

This piece is Tracks- Mundubbera, an abstract landscape of the rows of ripe citrus you can see from the southern entrance to the town Mundubbera. 

This piece is Tracks- Pt Vernon, the beach where I spent my childhood holidays. Both of these pieces now have a new home. Thank you to the buyer, I hope you are enjoying your purchases.

This small piece- Anthills 1, sold on the opening night, where I had a good conversation with the buyer about this piece and also my artwork. Wonderful to be able to speak with a buyer.

June rolled into July, my exhibition came down, and the Tangled Threads Group's work went up. I had 2 pieces in there based on the theme  Alchemy.  I have shown photos of my main piece previously as this exhibit was delayed due to covid lockdowns. Last year we had The Road Untravelled in Kingaroy ( a year late).

Art wise, this year I have continued on with the Incubator and Mastermind program. I keep promising that I will blog more often but life, weather seems to interfere. I have been attempting to learn more photography skills but still there is room for improvement. My goal is to have a decent photo of each piece in my records.

I started a new piece, a few weeks ago. A geological landscape, using organza in a different way.

One more month of winter for us, I have 2 new themes to work with for Tangled Threads next year. Spring always seems an inspirational season for me, so hopefully the ideas get a chance to happen. Over winter, for the house renovations I have been preparing for painting our bathroom. Patience with dodging round the yellow platform in the middle of the room is wearing a bit thin for the other household occupant, so maybe by Christmas, it might be out of the way.  Will post a photo when it is completed, by then I might have made more art too! Will keep you all informed.

Kingaroy Regional Art Gallery June 2022

 I have been quiet with blogging the last few months. I have been steadily working on an exhibition in a local gallery. I had decided to make an exhibit of 3 series of my textile art. This involves a bit more than just making a few more quilts. I have also been working on my Incubator and Mastermind program with Lisa Call hoping to grow as an artist, so been a bit busy. Having IT issues which necessitated a new laptop didn't help either. The exhibition is called SHUTTERS: Looking Out. I am trying to convey the images of landscapes that people trapped inside might see when looking out the window which usually has blinds or shutters for privacy. My mother is currently residing in aged care and this is her usual view, and then when covid-19 "trapped" people inside, my artwork ( to me) has taken on an increased relevance. 

For the exhibition I decided to join the modern world and have a postcard made with a "'dreaded" QR code, yes, I can not see the need for signing in when the contact tracers are overwhelmed in a pandemic. This QR code takes an interested person to here, so hopefully they enjoy the experience and read more about my art.

On the back of  the card are my contact details, so you can contact me directly if you manage to pick up a postcard by visiting the gallery or scan and visit and leave a comment.

I made a few new pieces for the Exhibit. Here are a few examples of the series. This piece is Yellow Glimpse. I have been adding layers and just wanted to make a bright hopefully cheery  piece. I started this in December 2021 before Putin invaded Ukraine. I am sure many people will have their own interpretation about it now.

This piece is from the Tracks - Road  Untravelled series. Jungle Eyes. 

This is a familiar one, Drought from the Landscape series.

This is Remnants- Detritus from the landscape series when Tangled Threads had remnants as their theme. 

These are from a series designed for this exhibition. I was inspired on a now not so daily  walk through our paddocks, when I saw a busted anthill on the road. I think our bobcat blade had partially destroyed it when it was racing down the track one morning. I saw the openness of the inside structures and thought WOW! Shocking for the tenants, because they had to rebuild which they had already started to do. I thought about the similarity to coral. I decided to make 6 small pieces using a holey overlay technique over my strip pieced landscapes. Some overlays are batiks, some are organza, some stitching using 12 wt polyester thread, no longer am I scared of people seeing my stitching. Some holes have been created with a fine tipped soldering iron on crystal organza. 

I think there may be more to come in this series. After spending the last few months, working on it, I will wait to see where it takes me next.

This bright one was the first, the pink one is the current last. Am thinking of combining the crystal organza with the solid overlay in a few more pieces when time allows.

Family wise, we had the birth of a seventh grandchild in late March. Exciting and eventful, we welcomed a little boy into the family. All are doing well now. 

Australia wise, we had our triennial election for our government. Seems like we are becoming a more divided nation with heaps of nastiness. With our preferential system of voting, we have ended up with a Prime Minister who nearly 70% of the population don't want and he ends up with the top job. Wait and see what happens I suppose. Was interesting to read today, his pet dog now has his own twitter account. Maybe I need to modernise and get one too, so I can waste more time reading all his news. 

I think I have enough time constraints keeping up with my selected activities. Hoping for more spare time shortly, particularly with winter approaching. I also have my Tangled Threads group exhibit in July to complete yet. The Quilt Trail is on July 23/24 so have to help with that. Hope some of you can get to see my art there.

Where did Spring and Summer Go?

Where did Spring and Summer disappear to? I did promise regular blogging. That kind of disappeared into a fog. A fog of grief, anger and lethargy. A few factors involved. The sudden death of my mother in law and the circumstances around that and the farewell for her, seemed to carry over for awhile. The impacts of vaccine discussions, mandates about who can do what and how, every time you are brave enough to turn on a TV. I also had to have further vaccines to be allowed to work. This also added to the lethargy, to the extent that I can fully understand why more people are saying No. 

Summer did bring some rewards. We managed to beat the drought, fruit flies, birds and dogs ( yes working dogs love fruit) and were rewarded with some fruit to eat and bottle.

 

Even better, 2 of our young lychee trees gave a small crop in January. 

We did score some rain, the Stuart River did get some runs in it. The water did go over the bridge. This was early one morning as it was still rising. 

I did manage to do some art work. I have work being exhibited in 3 galleries this year. 2 as part of the Tangled Threads group. We are putting our Road Untravelled work in Wondai Gallery for March.

This is Regeneration- After the Firestorm. My artist statement mentions the green shoots, broken fences, swirling emotions like the firestorm itself, trying to pick yourself up and climb out of the disaster. I would like it to be hung along side Firestorm- Which Way Out, so the viewer can study both together. 

This is Urban Tracks as part of the Road Untravelled series. The freeway on the left, fenced off from the urban jungle is part of the artist statement for it. 

Pathways to Hope, arrived back in my mailbox today, after spending 2 months in Victoria at Box Hill as part of the Australian Quilts in Public Places Exhibition. 

This is a snippet of Alchemy, to be completed for Tangled Threads in Kingaroy in July 

2022. A long way to go on this one yet.

We were very thankful for our rain this year. I drove through the area south of Ban Ban Springs  when the roads opened again after severe flooding. There would have been 2-3 metres of water flooding through here during the heavy rains. Sadly loss of life did occur from the sudden fast rising water along the Burnett Highway. I was supposed to drive home that Friday night, and then back to work Sunday night to do extra night shifts and had decided to stay over.

This is the Boonara Ck Bridge at Murgon turnoff from the Burnett Highway.

For my next solo exhibit of my work, I am thinking of including some of Bindy's alcohol ink pieces. She likes trying to manipulate that ink into abstract floral arrangements. I think they are worthy of being exhibited despite her lack of confidence.  Am trying to decide. See how we go. We decide by June so time is fast running out.

I had also signed up to Fibre Arts in April at Ballarat, with Lisa Call. Sadly covid uncertainty stepped in and it has been postponed. I am back doing her Incubator and Mastermind this year, so am hoping to make some progress on my confidence. 

I also signed up for IT support  with Business Station. $44 for 7 hrs support, all you need is an  ABN, funded by our federal govt. They help you choose webinars and videos for assisting you with aspects of IT which may help you in small business. I really need to learn spreadsheets better. And photography, and better time usage and ...... really a few more things yet.

Next time, I hope to show you more of my new work for my next solo exhibition.