‘Look to the Hills’ 15′ x15′ Linden Lancaster 2014

The theme for this was ‘text’.

The title of this piece refers to the Psalm 121 (v1-8) and is about protection:

I lift my eyes to the hills
Where does my help come from?
My help comes from the Lord
The maker of heaven and earth.
He will not let your foot slip-
He who watches over you will not slumber;
Indeed, he who watches over Israel
Will neither slumber nor sleep……
The Lord will watch your coming and your going
Both now and forevermore.

It was my intention to use the actual text in the piece, perhaps as stacked journaling, or typed up in different fonts and sizes. Due to time constraints, I ended up using a random collection of text papers, some actually torn from an old bible.

This is a paper quilt with two layers. The paper fabric was made following Beryl Taylor’s method which involves laying papers into a thin fabric substrate using watered down PVA glue in a similar way to collage. I found this method easy and effective.

While the piece was wet I added various paints and crayons. This is where it got overworked and muddy looking. I lost the freshness of the piece because I kept coming back and adding more paints when it was wet. Also some of the papers bled because they had ink on them which made the middle section brighter than I intended.

Mind you, it was a lot of fun!

When it was completely dry I added a piece of backing fabric and quilted it with a very sharp jeans needle using cooler colours in the background and warmer colours in the foreground. I tried to get some mystery into the piece by blurring the line between the mountain and the cloud. This was done with a small swirling quilting pattern.

I used a variety of materials including tissue, rice, pre-painted and ordinary photo copy paper that I wrote three different size of text that I could use to give the appearance of perspective. I put a simple line around the edge to frame it, but I think I will go back and add a chunky zig-zag edge.
I could revisit this concept in fabric.

Details:

Recently the Australia Wide 4 travelling exhibition was kicked off in Adelaide. I was fortunate enough to be selected in the 30 quilts by the Ozquilt judges and attend the opening. This was my first foray into a contemporary exhibition. This is the full version of ‘Michellia 2’.

These creamy waxy flowers are much like Magnolias. I have a tree that grows out my back garden that struggles in the dry and frosty conditions.

It was fun to try to capture the transparency of the glass jug.