July 26th, 2009
The final figure is one that means a lot to me, as our oldest son is named after him: Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain. He also means a lot to Mainers (only we didn’t know when we selected the name that we would end up living in Chamberlain’s beloved state!). Chamberlain was a professor at Bowdoin College here in Maine at the outbreak of the Civil War. He asked for leave to fight, and was denied. So he asked for leave for a sabbatical, it was granted, and he promptly enlisted.
At the Battle of Gettysburg, he was in charge of the 20th Maine. That small group of men held the outermost position (the left flank) on one end of the union line on Little Round Top, a hill at the end of Seminary Ridge. On July 2nd, they took a wicked battering from Confederate forces; by the end of the day, they were out of ammunition and engaged in hand to hand combat, but they held the line until darkness fell and fighting stopped for the night. Because the 20th Maine held their position, the other Union forces were able to hold their positions. Because the Union held the line on July 2nd, the tide of the battle changed in favor of the Union, and by nightfall July 3rd the Union had won the battle. The Union victory changed the tide of the war, and the nation remained one.
SO…. when it came time to pick historical figures, and one for Maine, the choice was clear (at least to me!).
Here’s a drawing based on this photo:
And the rendition in cloth (before I colored the eyes):
And on the quilt top:
Posted in Art, art quilting, Drawing, Inspiration, Machine Quilting, Maine, Techniques | 2 Comments »
July 24th, 2009
I also worked on Barack Obama…. Initially, we had stipulated that only people from 20+ years ago would be allowed, because they would have stood the test of time for importance. Then the 2008 elections happened. SO…, the principal and I decided that Obama will clearly go down in history as the first non-white-male President of the US, plus his inclusion places this quilt in 2009. I used a picture of him giving his inaugural address. Because he is contemporary, however, I decided to make his figure a bit smaller…..Here’s the sketch (sorry the tracing paper is kinda transparent, making it harder to see the sketch):
And the close up of the fused figure (down to the red tie!):
I am not entirely happy (even now that the quilting is done) with his face…something is a tad off, but so be it… it is done! I’ll share the quilted pictures next week or so….
And here is the panel so far:
Posted in Art, art quilting, Techniques | 2 Comments »
July 22nd, 2009
Next came Jackie Robinson who is widely regarded as the African American baseball player who first really made it in the major leagues. Using a black and white photograph, reference information about the colors of the Brooklyn Dodgers uniforms and such, I created an image of him sliding into a base…. I decided not to try to simulate the cloud of dust! Here is the tracing/sketch from the photo, with shadow lines:
And the fused figure:
Then the panel with Robinson pinned to it, sliding into base from the upper left corner….
Next post: Obama!
Posted in Art, art quilting, Inspiration, Techniques | 2 Comments »
July 20th, 2009
To return to my progress on Be Inspired, the next figure I tackled was a teacher. In our selection process, we realized that some professions inspire: doctors, nurses, teachers. Since this is for a school, of course we had to include teachers (and on the first panel, please!) as inspiring figures for kids. Using a photograph of a classroom, I modified it to have the whiteboards in use in the middle school, wood floors (in the old 5th/6th grade wing of the building), and look sorta like a Camden-Rockport Middle School classroom. On the blackboard, I will quilt “I touch the future, I teach” which is attributed to the late teacher-astronaut Christa McAuliffe, but I expect is a phrase that has been around a while.
This section took forever to complete…there were so many little pieces, and during the quilting so many thread-color-changes, that it took a full day to just do the fusing/collaging in fabric. Here is the initial sketch/tracing:
And with the classroom pinned onto the quilt:
Posted in Art, art quilting, Inspiration, Techniques | 6 Comments »
July 17th, 2009
Woohooo….. a while back my contact at Janome America (I am VERY fortunate to have a loaner Janome 6600 from them, thank you Janome-America for your support!) called to ask if she could interview me about thread. It turns out she moonlights writing for The Quilter magazine….
I had thought I would be one of several people quoted in a longer article, as she had also spoken with Bob Purcell, co-owner with wife Heather, of Superior Threads (which also happen to be some of my favorite threads…I must, literally, have several hundred spools!). Well… it ended up being a 2-page profile!
In the magazine’s machine quilting section are an interview with longarm master quilter Renae Haddadin, the profile of me, an article (I’m guessing this one is also by my contact) on “choosing the Perfect Thread: a Machine Quilter’s Product Guide” and one by Morna Golletz of the Professional Quilter Magazine on a machine quilting career.
Thanks A. for calling, asking me, and turning it into a whole article (and bless you for mentioning the book up front!)!
Posted in art quilting, Machine Quilting, My Book, Professional quilting, Published! | 9 Comments »
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