A Little Recycling

Yesterday, I dropped off this little package at the Boise Art Museum for one of my co-workers' birthday (which was actually Thursday).

The wrapping is some recycled brown paper that came in a package.  I crumpled it up and then dragged an ink pad across the surface.  I made the fabric tie from little scraps of fabric.  I saw this idea here quite a while ago and have been meaning to try it.  This gave me the perfect excuse to do it.

I did mine a little differently, as I sewed it all by machine and I only sewed down one side of the strip.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Art Opening

This evening I went to a friend's art opening: Anne Peterson Klahr - Full Circle.  She hung some of her work at Mind Body Fitness in Eagle.  It is the place where she takes yoga.  The building seemed very new and the owner had done a good job of creating a nice soothing environment.

Anne's paintings worked well with the color scheme of the walls and I think her themes tie in with the spirit of the place.  The place is bigger than it looks from the outside so there was quite of bit of artwork to fill the walls.  I estimate there were almost 20 pieces on display.

My pictures will not do the artwork the justice of capturing the texture, depth and luminosity of the paintings. Anne told me the artworks in the hallways will stay up for a while but not the pieces in the yoga room where classes are held.

If you want to see more of Anne's work, you can visit her website as well.

 The Power of the Feminine 

(photos posted with permission of artist)

 Seeking Angels

 Inner Beauty (left) and Square Pegs (right)

The artist, Anne Peterson Klahr, on the left.

Open Studio

It was a busy weekend.  On Saturday, Anna and I went to my friend Kathleen Probst's Open Studio. I had helped her get ready for it on Wednesday.

Here is one of the first things you saw as you came in the door.

 Then it was upstairs to the studio with several finished pieces and paper templates on the walls.

Some works in progress on a design board.  I can't wait to see the ones with leaves finished.

Below Kathleen is on the left talking about her work.

She happen to have her Open Studio on her birthday.  I had used some of her "signature" shapes to make this little piece with her initials as a gift.  Unfortunately, the surprise was a little spoiled because I had forgot I still had it on my design wall when she stopped by my house the week before.  She was still surprised though, just a little early.

What I admire about Kathleen is that when she gets an idea, she just does it.  I often need to think about things for a while.  So, while I have been entertaining the idea of having an Open Studio since last year, Kathleen has gone ahead and done it.

That inspired me and I am planning to have my own Open Studio in April.  (I also have been waiting for better weather since we live on a pretty steep hill).  If you would like to be one of the first to know the date after I determine it, you can sign up for my newsletter.

(Photos posted with permission of the artist.)

Leaf Metamorphosis 3

Now back to our regularly scheduled art program.

I did complete another Leaf Metamorphosis piece to go with Leaf Metamorphosis 1 and Leaf Metamorphosis 2.  This piece is not as vibrant as the other two as it represents the time from late autumn when leaves are already brown, through winter and then springtime when the leaves begin new growth.

Leaf Metamorphosis 3

hand dyed fabrics, hand stitching

machine pieced and quilted

20 x 12"

©2012 Lisa Flowers Ross

Education

I don't like to talk politics here much, or anywhere for that matter.  It's just too frustrating to me.  But I will step on my little soap box for today.

As those who live here in Boise and Meridian know (at least I hope you know),  there is a levy for each city up for vote next week to create extra funds for education.  This is to help cover some of the budget cuts made recently.  I have already sent in my absentee ballot. Please go vote next week (preferable yes, but it's up to you).

Related to that, I just read an article about costs for higher education here, and the Republican candidates' views on that.  Anna is just three years away from college.  I have a niece who started this year.  Although we have been saving for Anna for a long time, and I started a small account for my niece some years ago,  I am still very anxious about the high and continuing rising costs of college.

My niece will not escape incurring some debt.  I hope Anna won't incur any, but I don't know.  From the article, it doesn't look like the situation will be helped by the Republicans anytime soon.  Instead of trying to help America, it's politics as usual.

New Work

I finished this piece last month and have been trying to come up with a title for it.  I think I have something, but will take suggestions.

This is also a little bit of a departure from my usual "thing."  It is all hand stitching on linen (from an old pair of pants).  I also went in and added some colored pencil.  I had intended to mat it and frame it, but all the mats I tried seemed too stark against the linen.

So, I decided to put a fabric border around it.  What I did was create the blue border as an entire separate piece.  I quilted it and then attached the linen piece on top (like machine appliqué).

 hand dyed fabric, hand stitching on linen, colored pencil

16-3/4  x 15"

©2012 Lisa Flowers Ross

$75

detail of stitching

Yard Work

Yesterday, we had a few visitors come help us out with a little mowing and pruning.  Four helpers all together.

March

March came in like a lion.

Today, the snow is mostly gone in the valley.

It's the beginning of a new month.  Hard to believe it is March already.  I have set myself a big challenge (for me) for this month.

Those who know me very well know that I am a fan of diet Coke. It is my "comfort food."  But knowing that it is not the best thing for me (with constant reminders from my teenage daughter),  I am attempting to give up drinking any kind of soda for the entire month.

That might not sound too hard for some people.  But I don't drink coffee or iced tea.  I like juice, but don't like to drink it too much because of the calories.  Of course, I try to drink lots of water, but I do want some variety.  (Yes, I do drink milk, too.) I suspect I will be experimenting with different drinking concoctions this month. If you have any great low-cal drinks you like, feel free to leave recipes or links in the comments.

One day down, thirty more to go.

Something Different

In the midst of the color block appliqué frenzy that has been going on here,  I also finished another piece that is very different than my usual stuff.

13-1/4 x 12"

hand dyed and commercial fabrics,

fused appliqué, hand stitching,

machine stitching

©2012 Lisa Flowers Ross

I had paper cuts on my mind when I started this.  I was thinking what if I could do something similar in fabric.  Well, I put way too much time into this piece for the results.

For the first attempt I tried using fusible web on the back of the fabric, tracing the pattern onto the fabric and cutting it out with an exact knife.  That didn't work too well as the fabric was still fraying because everything is a curve.

On the second try, I used Terry Grant's liquid fuse method and cut it out with scissors.  The black is all one piece except for that center piece in the flower.  I thought I should still "finish" the edges of the flower and couched a black perle cotton thread around the edges with a zigzag stitch.  The piece was really too small to do this (but I did).

Then, there is a lot of hand stitches on it.  The center part of the flower has lots of french knots.  I should have also taken Terry's other suggestion of using paint dots instead of french knots.

Last, but not least, I finished the background with machine stitching.  There is a wider black border around the red one.  It's bright and fun, but I will not be doing anything like this again, unless it is 3 feet tall.

Color Blocks #3

Here is another of the small fused pieces.  I can't decide if I like it or not.

Color Blocks #3

hand dyed fabrics, fused appliqué

machine quilted

12 x 12"

©2012 Lisa Flowers Ross

Fusing

Since I did the first "quilt along with Melody" quilt, Color Blocks #1,  I have done a series of these small fused quilts.  That is good and bad.  It's good because they are fun and quick to make (especially good when I am working at the museum).  But it is bad because it is distracting me from some of the other artwork I should be concentrating on.

After cutting up some of the fabric for the first one, I had extra bits leftover which I just stacked on my ironing board.  Every time I would walk into my studio I could see them and I would just start playing with them, which would lead to the start of another piece.

I now have three and a half completed and one more on the wall to quilt.  I finally decided to gather up all the bits and put them together in a bag and put them away so I could move on to something else.

Below is the second completed piece.

Color Blocks #2

hand dyed fabrics, fused appliqué

machine quilted

12 x 12"

©2012 Lisa Flowers Ross

Before getting started, Melody had suggested putting the fusible web on several larger pieces of fabric so they would be all ready to cut beforehand.  I chose a handful or two of fabrics and fused maybe half a yard each.  It is a limited color palette I have to work with, which is why the series, so far, has the same color scheme.

Cutting Edge

For all of those in Idaho who get the newspaper and actually read it, you may have noticed an article in the Scene section today about the exhibit, Cutting Edge.   That reminded me that I went to the opening a few weeks ago and had wanted to write about it here.  But I forgot to get the artists' names.

I think this is one of the best exhibits I've seen in Boise in a while.  I am probably biased because I really like paper cuts.  Only some of the pieces were what you might consider the traditional paper cut.  The others explored using cut paper in different ways.

These first two pictures are artwork made by Beatrice Coron.  They are made with Tyvek, a sturdy non-tearable, easy-to-cut material made by DuPont which is used in construction, in envelops and other applications.  Coron's pieces are narrative and intricately detailed.  I enjoyed discovering the different scenes within each piece.  The small scale really draws the viewer into the piece and Coron's world.

The next photo is a woodcut, I believe.  This confused me a bit as it wasn't cut paper.  But the title of the show is Cutting Edge: Contemporary Paper.  I can see that carving the wood could be the "cutting edge" and it is printed on paper.  I'm sorry I don't have the artist's name for this piece (but you will go to the show and find out, right?).

One of the things that attracted me to this artwork is that all those white marks inside the circle look like hand stitches to me.  The concept of this piece is the viewer is in the bottom of a well and looking up toward the light.  A companion piece showed the view as if looking down into a well from above, a reversal of the other. The visual texture of these pieces is amazing.

This last picture is just a small section of an artwork by my friend, Amy Nack, called Whitewater.  She created six paper circles, each with a different pattern of cutting, that hang away from the wall.  By creating that space, Amy created extra depth - physical and visual, by allowing the viewer to see the shadows cast on the walls.

These are just a few of the artists and ways they used paper as a medium.  If you are in Boise, it is worth your time and effort to go see the show.  It is at the Hemenway Center on the BSU campus and is open until March 23rd.

New Look

I thought I would freshen up the blog with a new look.  Also new is a newsletter sign up form in the column to the left, if you are interested.

What do you think?  I think it still needs some tweaking.  Maybe I'll add a few things.

Broad Spectrum

I guess it has been a few days since I've posted anything.  Things continue to be busy here, especially since I have been working almost full time at the Boise Art Museum for the past few weeks helping to install a new exhibition.

Speaking of exhibitions,  our regional Studio Art Quilt Association group currently has an exhibition at the Ryniker-Morrison Gallery in Billings, MT.  The exhibition will be up through March 30th.  It will also travel to Denver and be on display during the Mancuso Denver National Quilt Show, May 1-3.

If you cannot attend one of these locations, Cynthia St. Charles, the organizer and curator of the exhibit, has posted some pictures on her blog.  There are 17 regional members with pieces in the exhibit, including myself as well as my friends, Kathleen Probst and Linda McLaughin.

Happy Valentine's Day

Here's a little bit of pink and red to brighten your day.  This is another in my series, Bits & Pieces.  When I am working on a project, I will have bits and pieces of fabric leftover that I just leave out on my table.  Sometimes I will take the bits and pieces and start playing with them to create another artwork.

This has parts from my Summer Breeze piece and some of my Color Fields pieces.  This one was a struggle.  It has been cut and sewn, added to, disassembled, resewed, cut into, rearranged, sewed again and finally completed with hand stitching and quilting.

Bits & Pieces VI

hand dyed fabrics, hand stitching

machine pieced and quilted

16 x 15"

©2012 Lisa Flowers Ross

$125