Deconstructed screen printing

Last weekend I attended an ATASDA workshop with Lin Wilson teaching us deconstructed screen printing.

It was a fun day with lots of really interesting screens being made and that wow factor when the print was pulled. It is amazing the different effects that can be achieved with such ordinary things - placemats, string, rubber bands, a shirt! (This was a really fantastic result).

Today I have been washing out and rinsing the fabric after batching in the sun for the last couple of days. They are now hanging on the line drying:

   

I really enjoyed this workshop and am very happy with the results. I can see a couple of pieces being used for a future challenge entitled "Nature's Trail" with my group "Frayed".

I still have a screen ready to put into fabric but I think it will have to wait until after our holiday.

Lesley Rippon Retrospective

Today I went to Lesley Rippon's exhibition at the Royal Art Society's gallery at North Sydney, together with members of my ATASDA group Frayed. We have been meeting together for three months now and decided an excursion would be a great idea - an opportunity to get out and about and also to get to know each other a little better.

Lesley's exhibition was a wonderful display of her art work and how she has developed and changed over the years. Her early work was from the 1970's and her pieces progressed through to the present day.

There were watercolours, oils, mixed media, textile pieces and combinations of all of these. Her work is still developing even though she is 79! It would seem that Lesley sees no boundaries as far as art is concerned. She uses old and new techniques and is constantly experimenting with new products, thanks to contacts she has made throughout her art career.

It was a refreshing exhibition and also encouraged me to look further into using different techniques in the one piece. It was also great to be able to get up close and look at the finer detail of her work and she the different techniques used.

After our visit we walked up to Blues Point Road and found a lovely cafe for lunch. All in all a great way to spend a day with friends.

Sydney Quilt Show

SYDNEY QUILT SHOW

I was very surprised and excited to receive two awards at the Sydney Quilt Show for my quilt Red Sherbet. This year the Quilters' Guild of NSW Inc had a special category for Red & White quilts. I received 2nd Prize in the Red & White Category, Contemporary/Art. This was truly amazing to me, but even better than that was the Excellence in Domestic Machine Quilting Award! This award covers the machine quilted quilts for the whole show. It was really hard for me to accept that the judges thought my quilt was good enough for this award. Even harder when I looked at the other quilts at the show. I am now settling in to the idea that it's ok for ME to receive this award - I worked hard to quilt it and enjoyed the process immensely.

Red Sherbet

The quilt was designed by Cheryl Arkison and was in her book "A Month of Sundays". Cheryl was excited about my award and I thank her for giving me permission to exhibit the quilt.

Now to think about what to enter in next year's show - it seems like a good time to tackle some of the UFO's I have in my cupboard!