SAQA Oceania Blog Hop 2016

This year I entered a piece in the SAQA (Studio Art Quilt Associates) Benefit Auction of Art Quilts (not that I consider myself an Art Quilter but rather a player) - in the Oceania Collection
36 people from Oceania took part - the auction begins on September 16th and there were over 430 quilts submitted.

 A full list of all participant artists can be found here on the SAQA Oceania blog

My piece is titled Kimberley Dreaming inspired by my often r and r trips to Broome and the Kimberleys. Many people who read my blog will know that we go to Broome at least once a year and since day one I have been inspired by the colours. First time looking out of the plane I couldn't believe it - now I know it. We relax - swim - read - and I play with a pile of stuff. I always put down newspaper for working on as I spray everywhere and I use local newspapers. It gave me the idea to use newspaper in my work. Once you have sprayed lovely colour with mica all over newspaper there is no way you want to abandon it.

My work is always personal and relates to things which matter to me so I have done a lot of work on this theme in many other textiley ways. I do not have working details of how I made this particular piece but this is the general idea.

 I bond sections of newspaper to fusible webbing - taking the bits which appeal and including text. Then I bond this to scrim and soak it and rub the back of the newspaper off to leave me with a new fabric. I spray colour over the top and on this particular one above I have twin needled over the surface for a background.

On this particular one I have created this new 'fabric' and then coloured it with mica and dye spray and printed a screen over the surface of the boab tree and machine stitched.

This one has the features of above but I have layered chiffon scarves over the top, twin needle stitched over the surface and zapped it with a heat gun. I have stamped letters onto a newspaper surface bonded to kunin felt, carved them out and hand stitched them back onto the surface. The piece for the SAQA Benefit auction is very similar to this.

This is one of the ways that I enjoy working and I hope someone when bidding at the auction is intrigued as well. Everyone who loves colour should visit the north west of Western Australia if they can.

Don't forget to check  the next posting in this Blog Hop by Catherine McDonald on 19th August