BLUE GUITAR
            My collection of twelve small art quilts inspired by famous artists.  These quilts are my original designs using mixed media techniques on fabric. Techniques include applique, collage, drawing, painting, thread painting, printing, stamping, stenciling. Materials include various types of fabric, thread, paper, fiber, sand, cord, paper towel, ink, beads, buttons. Each one measures 12” x 12”.  After studying the work of each of the chosen artists I drew my inspiration from elements such as line, color, shape, atmosphere, theme. A blue guitar or its unseen presence flows through the pieces to provide unity.

​            Blue Guitar was a special exhibit at Pennsylvania National Quilt Extravaganza in September 2019. 

SELF-PORTRAIT WITH CAT. I find Frida Kahlo’s paintings fascinating. I admire her ability to portray emotion. Her Self-Portrait with Monkey, 1940, inspired this piece. In Kahlo’s work the gaze is hostile and the monkey apprehensive. I decided to express a more positive demeanor as I took a selfie with my hair set loose, wearing a smile and a red blouse. It was my birthday. I prefer cats. Appliques designed from posterized photos using solid and printed fabrics, layered and stitched to background, accented with floss that was bobbin stitched to create the hair. Tiny guitar necklace made from photo on paper, clear mailing tape and thread.

SOMEONE LEFT THE GUITAR OUT IN THE RAIN. Georgia O’Keefe is my favorite artist. When I found this piece of red poppy fabric I thought of her beautiful paintings of flowers. Stitching on the petals of the poppy and in the center brought out the shapes, and the stippling around the flower made it pop. The title came from a line from the song MacArthur Park written by Jimmy Webb. Thread painting and quilting with rayon thread on commercial fabric. The guitar is a cardboard sticker that I painted blue, then scraped off some of the paint.

DREAM LANDSCAPE. My dream landscape got its inspiration from Paul Klee’s Dream Landscape with Conifers (1920). Klee’s work contains whimsical creatures and spirits of the earth, sea and air. He also loved music. I had the most fun with this piece as I added the embellishments, many inspired by his other paintings Forest Bird (1920), Senecio (1922), Tree Rhythm and Fish Magic (1925). The flying guitar is based on a photo I took of a friend’s blue guitar. Layered papers stitched to batting, painted paper towel, fabrics, felted wool, netting, buttons, copper cord, threads, glitter paint, fabric marker.

WAITING FOR THE BUS. One of the things I like about Edward Hopper’s work is how, in paintings such as Nighthawks (1942), we seem to be observing a private moment. I tried to capture that here, as well as the mood of stillness he often brings to his portrayals of people. Black and gray Stonehenge fabrics, batik and Kona fabrics. Black organza used for shadows.

THE MOON'S A HARSH MISTRESS. Paul Gauguin’s painting Hina Tefatou (The Moon and the Earth), 1893, depicts a dialogue between the moon goddess Hina and the earth genie Fatou from Tahitian mythology. Their dialogue concerns the eternity of matter. My dialogue here concerns the breakdown of love. The title is from a song by Jimmy Webb. Layered background stitched to batting. Tree and woman appliques contain manipulated fabrics. Her hair is dyed roving. Tree trunk and guitar are paper.

GUITARE BLEUE. The French artist Henri De Toulouse-Lautrec is best known for his drawings and posters of Parisian life but he also produced many paintings. Coffee Pot (c. 1884) appealed to me as it portrays just a single everyday object so I chose it as the inspiration for this piece. I thread painted an everyday object at my house – a guitar. It is attached to a background of French script printed on fabric, along with the title of the piece in French, as an homage to the artist. Thread painting was done with rayon and polyester filament threads. Strings are silk thread.

60. Jacob Lawrence was drafted into the U.S. Coast Guard in 1943 and was encouraged to continue his artistic career while serving. One of his works was a portrait of his commanding officer Captain Skinner (1944) which included the Captain’s medals and his ship. In honor of my husband’s 60th birthday I made a mixed media collage of his face surrounded by some of the things he likes and does. He had just shaved off his mustache. Handmade paper infused with leaves stitched to fabric, applique portrait made from posterized photo, paper cutouts painted with gloss glaze, gold and silver textured paper, mustache fabric.

UNTITLED. The art of Lois Mailou Jones (1905-1998) contains vibrant colors and flat, two dimensional, hard edged designs inspired by Africa and Haiti. I especially like her late career pieces depicting masks. She used solid colors in squares and rectangles which remind me of pieced quilts so I started with that for my background. I drew and applied the applique in layers, with the African-inspired mask added last. Kona and other solid fabrics in a variety of colors.

BEST FRIEND. This is my best friend, not my mother, although it was inspired by the black and white crayon drawing The Artist’s Mother (1882-83) by Georges Seurat. My friend’s picture was cropped from my favorite one where she is doing needlework in her lap, in a similar pose to the woman in Seurat’s drawing. I printed my photos in black and white and overlaid them with pink tulle to create a shadowy effect. The flower applique is milk thistle, a healing herb to represent my friend’s profession. Photos printed on Transfer Artist Paper and ironed to marbled fabric.

JUST GUITAR. Design inspired by Pablo Picasso’s Mandolin and Guitar, painted 1924. My still life features a photo of my husband’s blue guitar printed on fabric, layered on cotton, corduroy, denim and eyelet fabrics on a table made from textured paper. The window frame is also paper. Just as Picasso did in his painting, I mixed sand with the paint, to make the floor stand out rougher. Fabric and paper elements layered, fused and stitched. Stenciling and stamping also used.

THE BRIDGE. Before I started on this quilt I visited the Baltimore Museum of Art and saw Claude Monet’s Charing Cross Bridge, Reflections on the Thames (1899-1904). When examined up close the brush strokes reminded me of tiny pieces of fabric used for the technique called Snippets. I painted white fabric in a watercolor wash to get the variations in color for the water before I cut it up. Colors for water achieved with Derwent Inktense sticks and metallic rub-on paints for shading. Appliques made from black Kona fabric.

KLIMT BUTTERFLY. What I find most interesting in Gustav Klimt’s paintings are the repetitions of small design elements. For my butterfly I borrowed motifs and colors from Adele Bloch-Bauer 1 (1907), The Kiss (1907-08), Fulfillment (1908-10) and Hope II (Vision) (1907-08). Fabric for the wings painted with metallic paints, transparent paints and metallic markers. I meandered around the silver design on the background. Guitar is a print on fabric and the antennae are from blue painted Lutradur on textured gold paper.