New items @ Blue Jacaranda

I have just added some new items to my Blue Jacaranda shop on Etsy. Apart from the Dutch Houses, the Hippo Calligram is my most popular fabric design at Spoonflower and I finally had it made into a thermofax screen.



The Elephant and Bicycle Calligrams also continue to be favourites on Spoonflower so they are now available as Art Cards as well. Stretched prints will follow soon.



I tried something new - screen printing with three colours ink. It worked very well! I will definitely do that more often.



And last but not least, I have added this art quilt, Art in Motion, to the shop (find it here). Much as I love it, I really do not have enough walls to hang all my quilts in our house!

Back from Adelaide

Yesterday hubby and I came back from our 5-day stay in Adelaide. Together we visited the Art Gallery, the South Australia Museum and the Botanic Gardens, and we went on a wine-tasting tour in the Barossa Valley. On my own, when hubby was at his conference, I explored the city and made lots of photos. I love public art!



Very close to our apartment, in Hindley Street, was this transformer station. I used Picasa to transfer the picture to black and white. Love how it looks! (thermofax screen?)



More architecture photos on my photo blog, and more public art photos will be added in the next few days. Here is one more, a detail of a glass house in the Botanic Gardens:



This week is going to be very busy with work, PhD and family - my middle son has his 7th birthday next Monday (Halloween!) and his party is on Sunday morning. Sunday afternoon I will be at Inspired with my shop Blue Jacaranda - but more about that later this week.

Next week I really hope to make a start on a new quilt...!

Great news!

Here I am again - today I received the SAQA Newsletter and was thrilled to read that Speed 2, which I submitted for SAQA's travelling trunk show This is a Quilt! has been selected to become part of the permanent collection at the Michigan State University Museum. Woohoo!

Here is what gallerist Michael Solomon, who did the selection, wrote:

"When Kris Sazaki first asked me to be the juror for a collection to go to the Michigan State University Museum, I willingly accepted, thinking it would be a piece of cake. After all, I had owned a fine art gallery in Sacramento for over 10 years, and I had certainly chosen art and artists for many gallery exhibits. I faced a slightly greater challenge with group shows as opposed to solo exhibits, but I felt I had a pretty good grasp of the contemporary painting and sculpture we exhibited. I have also juried shows outside of my gallery, as well as my own photography exhibits.

For the SAQA show, I came to realize that my mandate would limit and challenge me when I faced the prospect of selecting just 50 pieces out of 268 submissions. I have spent many hours in art museums around the world, I am an avid collector, and I have formulated some ideas as to what constitutes "great art." While the quality of art may be subjective, great art is simply that which compels one to look at it, again and again and again. This is the truth, if not a truism. And that's the reason museums full of art that visitors repeatedly visit, contain great art. I can't stop looking at and admiring the art on my walls and pedestals; if I do, I end up replacing it with something better, and then repeat the process.

In jurying this show, I looked for aesthetic design, shapes, color, composition, texture, and subject matter. I am somewhat partial to figurative subject matter, so that may have affected my judgment in some respects. All of the work I viewed exhibited high artistic quality, and I found myself initially choosing way more than my allotment of 50. I then faced the agonizing task of deselecting many pieces I appreciated. In any event, I hope you enjoy my selections."

And here is the list of artists whose pieces were chosen:

1. Affolter, Regula
2. Branjord, Sandra
3. Bruvry, Patricia
4. Carrigan, Sherry
5. Chen, Yeu-Chiu
6. Chuang, Huei-Lan
7. Clover, Jette
8. David-Cohen, Yael
9. Drucker, Tamar
10. Ecob, Aileyn
11. Filatoff, Julie
12. Fingal, Jamie
13. Fitzsimmons, Micaela
14. Fricke, Rebecca
15. Henry, Susan Elaine
16. Horne, Connie
17. Huang, Ming-Mei
18. Jensen, Jill
19. Jurgenson, Jean Renli
20. Lachman, Mary F.
21. Law, Catharina Breedyk
22. Limmer, Andrea
23. Lin, Hsin-Chen
24. Lin, Mei-Mu
25. McClean, Sarah Louise
26. McLaughlin, Linda
27. Milholen, Vivian
28. Miller, Linda
29. Ortelle, Cathy
30. Owoc, Pat
31. Pal, Mary
32. Phillips, Margaret A.
33. Pixeladies
34. Puetz, Casey
35. Read, Priscilla
36. Robertson, Ruan
37. Robertus, Linda
38. Rushbrooke, Rose
39. Simpson, Gayle
40. Smith, Catherine Whall
41. Smith, Lura Schwarz
42. Stegmiller, Terri
43. Stoltz, Heather G.
44. Tateo, Tiziana
45. Themel, Kate
46. Thomas, Rosalind
47. Tunnell, Karen Reese
48. Wambaugh, Debbie
49. Wanner , Dwayne
50. Watler, Barbara

My work in a museum!!! I can hardly believe it!

:-))

What's new?

Well... not much. With the grandparents here I haven't really done any quilting/printing/sewing since the last posting. So all I have to show you is this small decoupage box that I made a while ago, using Australian stamps from letters we have received in the last four and a half years.



I really like decoupage and have a few more boxes to embellish! I'm thinking Dutch stamps (which we have a lot of, obviously), stamps from other countries, music scores, atlases...



On Tuesday hubby and I are flying to Adelaide , where we will be for five days, while the grandparents stay here with the boys. I'm looking forward to discovering a new city, shopping, going to museums, wine-tasting...

I will probably not post here before we leave, so see you all in 10 days or so!

Here's looking at you, again

Here is one of yesterday's prints stretched around an artist's canvas. I love how this looks! I have put it up for sale in my Etsy shop.

The boys' grandparents (my in-laws) are in Brisbane at the moment which is lovely but does not leave a lot of time for making new quilts. In the next few weeks these small items for Blue Jacaranda will probably be all that I can manage. Also, a friend has taught me to crochet - one of the few needle skills that I did not possess! I covet these gorgeous crocheted stones and really want to make some... I'll keep you posted!

New thermofax screens

Yesterday I received three new thermofax screens from Linda Stokes - I had my Dolphin and Walrus Calligrams made into screens:



And also the Zebra design. I printed it in white ink on black fabric, like I did with the original design...



... and got a sleeping zebra! Hahaha. Using black ink on white fabric it looks better:



What about a pink zebra?



Since I was screen printing anyway I made some Kookaburra and Robot prints as well:



Here is the first Dolphin Calligram Card, now for sale in my Etsy shop:




I have also added some Dutch Houses ATCs (ACEOs) to the shop, so if you've always wanted one but do not make ATCs yourself here is your chance!



If you do make ATCs I'm still happy to trade, just leave a comment or send me an email!

Good news

Coming back from our holiday I was very happy to find an email telling me that my Tuberculosis quilt is a finalist in the Political and Social Art Exhibit at the Infinite Art Gallery. It will be displayed on the website for the remainder of the year. You can read more about my quilt here and here.



We had a lovely holiday at our caravan at Wooyung Beach, but came home one day early because it rained so much. The photo above was taken yesterday afternoon at Hastings Point, a few kilometres north of Wooyung, on our way home. You can see the rain more or less above our caravan!



This is my favourite photo from this holiday. I am reading The Photographer's Eye by Michael Freeman, a great book about composition and design. I'm trying to apply what I read to my photography. More photos will be posted on my photography blog in the next few days.

Blue Rose

My Barcelona quilt Blue Rose is inspired by Gaudí's Rose Window in the Sagrada Familía church:


(source: www.barcelona.de)

The quilt is made using the reverse applique technique, with turquoise handdyed cotton sateen from Dyed and Gone to Heaven behind black cotton. It is machine quilted and has a facing finish.





(cross-posted to Art Quilts Around the World)

Busy

It has been a busy week here. It's the school holidays and all the boys, hubby and I have been sick with a horrible gastro bug. Everyone was sick for only one day, but the whole thing took almost a week and I was of course the last one to get it. Haven't felt so bad in years! But today I was well again and made these two cushion covers for our caravan. The zebra is one of the prints I made a while ago for the Animal Kingdom Challenge quilt - it looks good, doesn't it?



This newsprint fabric was a birthday gift from my friend Yasmin. I think it makes a great cover!



The boys did some painting today, and I decided to join in. Ernst (6) made this wonderful painting, called Electric Attack:



I polka dotted my canvas - inspired by the Polka Dots Forever Treasury List I made on Etsy today (please have a look, it really is fun!).



I am still figuring Etsy out - it is fun, but eating up a lot of my time! I have added quite a few new items to my shop, joined teams, formed circles etc... And become quite addicted to making Treasury Lists, which are collections of 16 items currently on sale at Etsy centered around a theme. So far I have used these themes: Zebra (surprise!), Rainbow, Blue and White, Stylish Screen Prints, Bicycle, Turquoise and Birthday Bash (wow, so many already!). There are so many original and beautiful items on Etsy! (and I try to add some Australian and Dutch items to every Treasury List)

On Wednesday we are going on a short holiday, to our caravan at Wooyung Beach of course. Looking forward to that! After the holidays I will start on a quilt for the Beneath the Southern Sky Challenge.

Art or Quilt?

I haven't shown this quilt yet, even though I finished it a few months ago. I thought I would enter it in the Queensland Quilters show in October, but DH and I will be in Adelaide that week (the grandparents will be here with the boys) so I am not going to enter any quilts.

This one was meant to be a fun take on the issue of 'art quilts'. The 'quilt' part is pieced, the 'art' part is the fabric I showed here - rubbed with a paintstick on a bath mat bought especially for this purpose! The size of the quilt is 43 x 56 cm / 17 x 22 in.



The letters ART and quilt are made with appropriate words cut out of selvedge strips. (click on photos to enlarge)



Initially I didn't plan to include or and the question mark. When I decided I wanted them I didn't have any selvedge words left, so I used discharge paste to stencil them.



The final (art?) quilt somehow isn't quite what I had in mind when I started it... I think it is too straight - I really have trouble making quilts without straight edges! But I had fun making it and that is what matters. Would love to hear what you think of it!

Happy days

After the last posting I received an email from Cherilyn Martin, an English quilter living in the Netherlands. She had read the article about me in the Dutch Quilters Guild magazine and asked if I would like to meet with her as she was flying to Brisbane two days later! Of course I would, and I found Kate and Alison willing to join us, so we had a lovely lunch with some show and tell on Friday at South Bank. Thanks ladies, I enjoyed it very much!



Cherilyn is now teaching a workshop in Townsville and will be in Sydney after that.



Today, on my birthday ;-), I received an email congratulating me with the sale of my Balance 3 quilt in the SAQA Benefit Auction. It sold for $150 - I am very proud and happy!

Blue Jacaranda now on Etsy!

I am happy to tell you that I now sell my handmade items on Etsy too! You can find my Blue Jacaranda shop here. I have just added The Owl Quilt to the shop - my very first quilt for sale! (apart from the quilts that have been auctioned) I will be adding items to the shop in the next few days (weeks). If you would like to be updated please 'like' Blue Jacaranda on Facebook. I am planning a giveaway when I reach 300 'likers'.

I am still exploring Etsy - there's so much to discover! My first Treasury is here, do take a look!

Some more fun news to share: the Dutch Quilters Guild's magazine has started a new series of articles, featuring Dutch quilters living abroad. I was the first person to be interviewed and here is the article:



And finally, I have been wanting to share my new business cards with you:



Aren't they cool?!



I got them from MOO and can highly recommend this company!

Russia

I have never been to Russia, but would love to go there one day. The first thing I would go and see would be St Basils's Cathedral in Moscow. You may remember I had a thermofax screen made of the drawing I did of this cathedral a while ago. I used this print in a Russia journal quilt for the Australia and New Zealand Art quilters group - I printed it on the red part of the Russian flag (white, blue, red - very similar to the Dutch flag, which I used in my Netherlands quilt). I stenciled the word Russia in Cyrillic script on the blue part. It was quilted simply with horizontal lines. Here is a close-up:



I consider this the second quilt in my series of country journal quilts. The Morocco quilt I regard as a failure and it will probably be cut up to make a postcard ;-).

I also finished the Barcelona quilt for the Art Quilts Around the World group and will post a sneak peek there soon.