Quiltart Quinceanera: Celebrating 15 years of contemporary quilting on the web

The QuiltArt list is Celebrating 15 years of contemporary quilting and in honor of the event members were invited to make a 15 inch square piece to celebrate what QuiltArt has meant to them over the years.

Here is my piece for the celebration:

They ended up with 80 quilts. 
Quinceanera: Celebrating 15 years of contemporary quilting on the web, can be seen here.

Each photo on the top page links to an individual page.

Here are some detail shots of my piece.

I spent over a day hand stitching the beads

I used Scrabble pieces to embellish the piece, the points add up to 15.

The piece represents my journey from learning how to make traditional quilts, to discovering how to paint with fabric and create art quilts as my artistic voice.

Racism: A Dialogue in Art Quilts, America Fragmented

A group I am a member of has decided to put together an exhibit about racism in America called:

Racism: A Dialogue in Art Quilts.

Here is one of the pieces, America Fragmented, I made for the show.

The front

The back

I was inspired by recent events and media coverage of politics in America today.

The original sketch for the piece.

In progress

It took many hours and many small pieces to fill up the spaces to complete the images.

Once the collage part was done I had to figure out how to quilt it.

I used old laminator material placed over the piece and a sharpie to play with quilting options.

Here is an example of experimental quilting lines.

This piece is heavely quilted, as you can see from the picture of the back above, and in this close up.

I am the curator for this exhibit and in the process of finding venues for the show across the country.