Costumier and textile Artist!

I found the little quilt above while tidying up my sewing room. It won a prize at Coast to Coast Open day last year and is called ' Going to Nana's at Christmas'. In New Zealand we leave for our summer holidays at Christmas and it is always sad to have to leave the Christmas tree, presents and decorations and go off to some other part of the country. I have made Christmas cards using this image on Snapfish.


So I've graduated from the Drama School costume course. I feel like I only went through orientation week a few weeks ago but I started  in March and finished last week and the year has flown by.

So now of course I am looking for work and I have my first little costume job. I am  making some little  capes for  pre-schoolers.

So now I have to make decisions like - do I gather the cloak at the neck or make a half circle cloak and what fabrics can the client afford while still paying me actual money to make them?

Whew, so many decisions...

And then I am designing some quilts for exhibitions and writing my Websearch article for New Zealand Quilter for the next edition.

One of my quilts is on the cover of the last edition. I can't find a picture of the magazine online so here is a picture of the whole quilt. On the magazine cover they have the quilt on the table as a table cloth.

It is called Granny Smith's Airing Cupboard and is made of doileys and placemats.

I have also spent the last 3 days tidying up my sewing room. There is a big wide bench in there which I haven't seen in a couple of years. I usually end up working on about a 30 cm square area because I can't find any more space. The photo makes it look quite cluttered but there is enough space to actually make something now.

Tokyo Quilt Show

I managed to miss a week or so, with no access to the internet or limited access via Ipod touch. So this is a catch up. My kids and I flew back to Tokyo where my elder son went missing for three days while he attended 3 Jazz gigs and went to 7 Jazz bars (despite being under age in Japan). His brother tells me that he came home at midnight and was still in bed when I got up.

I caught up with  Chris Kenna from Wellington and the 'Toerags' from Lower Hutt and we went to Tokyo Quilt Show. I first tried to go on the Saturday but after seeing the  queues to get in, went off with my son to the Hakone area (near Mt Fuji) for the day. I finally got to the quilt show on Monday and it was amazing. Although the Japanese quilters are not so hot in the non-traditional 'art quilt' area and some of the machine quilting was pretty bad, the hand applique and hand quilting sections would blow us out of the water. Here are just a few that caught my eye. I'm doing a talk for Cotton On quilters in Wanganui on saturday so will add more photos as I get myself organised.

Here is a picture of the inside of Tokyo Dome with the booths in the middle and the crowds of people. The main people to watch for are the little older ladies. They are a head shorter than me so about 4ft nothing and their elbows are at kidney height. They have no qualms about bulldozing their way through.

Here is the winning quilt - Twelve Days of Christmas' by Osami Gonohe. Most of the day, you couldn't get closer than 4 metres because of the crowds but I stayed till closing time one night so I could get a shot of it without the crowds.

Above is what it normally looked like.

Above is 2nd place winner which was even more amazing in my opinion. Unbelievable points!It is by Emiko Yoshino

But what about this quilt in the Tradtional quilt category which didn't get a prize? The pieces are smaller than my fingernail (don't worry, I'm not touching it, my finger is about a cm away). I'm sorry, the catalogue name is in Japanese.

I think this is based on Ainu decorative work. The Ainu are a tribe from Hokkaido.

This is made using a lot of antique indigo cottons

I think I like the detail even more

This looked like a prizewinner till you see the one that actually won!

 This quilt is incredible - it is - Scherenschnitte (Chris Kenna told me) - like a papercut.  It didn't win a prize!

Centre of the Scherenschnitte quilt. 

There were also a large number of amazing quilts from famous Japanese quilt makers who were invited to show their prizewinning quilts. The one below is called 'Nostalgia' and is by Tsuneko Shimura.

Books, kids, Symposium, exhibitions

Hi everyone
If you are in New Zealand don't forget to enter your quilt for the Quilt Symposium exhibitions. I had completely forgotten about them till someone mentioned that the deadline for entries is 14th of January. This is right in the middle of the New Zealand Christmas break so it is easy to miss.

Minerva Gallery still has the Cash and Carry exhibition 'Something Special' on till Christmas Eve.

This year's participating artists include Ruth Meier, Melissa Anderson, Jill Maas, Helen Back, Sue Tyler, Lesley Rawlings, Anne Buckell, Michelle Irving, Lou Nicholl, Rosemary McLeod, Angie Cairncross, Chloe Keylock, Maureen van Dam, Anneke Cottle, Clare Smith, Bridget Sanders, Janet Ryan, Rosie White, Nancy Millichamp, Anne Scott, Eloise Evans, Elizabeth King, Anne Weinbrenner, Marie Walters, Marge Hurst and Barbara Hercus.

I've been finishing off quilts to try and see if I have anything suitable for the Symposium exhibition but got distracted by this book:
 A Glimpse of Eternal Snows by Jane Wilson-Howarth.

It is the story of an English family and how they brought their children up in Nepal. One of the children had severe medical problems and I found it fascinating to see that this seemed less of a problem in Nepal where people accept that not everything can be cured, than it had in the UK where doctors were constantly trying to test for various 'syndromes'.

Music and Bike rides
It is school holidays here till the end of January. Number one son is into free jazz, Japanese Noise music and is currently experimenting with trying to wire up a bell to make nasty twangy noises which he can record. I just hope he is using batteries and not mains power. Then I have to transport his whole drum kit into Wellington for a 'gig'.
Number two son is preparing for a major bike ride for the Duke of Edinburgh award, and I get to be 'shadow party' so for three days I have to follow them around the Wairarapa in the car. Hope it stops raining soon.

Due to my employment as a taxi driver, very little is actually being made...

Quilt Symposium , Queenstown 2011

I haven't made a quilt all year. I probably need to start thinking about quilts for the New Zealand Quilt Symposium exhibitions next year.


I am really looking forward to the Symposium in Queenstown . The last Queenstown Symposium was probably my favourite ever Symposium. It is such a beautiful spot. Dijanne Cevaal and I got very brave and flew down to Milford Sound on a light plane. VERY SCARY but amazing.


The committee have asked me to teach a fabric printing and painting class, a sashiko class, a design class and a class using recycled materials. I don't want to spoil the fun for everyone of seeing the registration book which should be due out fairly soon.

On sunday I helped Sue Wademan pack up her exhibition wall at the New Zealand Art show (used to be the Affordable art show) in Wellington. She reminded me about exhibition opportunities such as the Silk Road Exhibition in Queenstown and the symposium exhibitions.

For details of the Silk Road Exhibition in April 2011, please email Sue Wademan wademan@xtra.co.nz

Clare

Saturday 6th March

Today I have been sorting out the garage to try and find all my different dyes and inks and material which has been dumped in there over the last year. Sometimes I teach a class and then just don't get round to putting everything away again afterwards. I have found all sorts of weird screenprinting experiments from the past , they are in the washing machine as they smelled mouldy.

This is a link to the website for an exhibition which I am involved with which is in Germany at the moment. It is called 'Southern Lands'. Unfortunately it has turned out to be quite an expensive exhibition for me as the postage was NZ$150 and then I got hit with 169 Euros customs duty for Germany which a friend has paid for at the moment but I will have to repay. The exhibition looks very nice from the photos though and it looks like my quilts fit in well with the others.

I have also got a quilt in this book '500 Art Quilts' officially launched today. The publisher is Lark Books. The quilt pictured in the book currently lives near Adelaide.

I'd rather see windmills...

Back to cooking dinner, tidying up the garage. and ironing all the fabric I washed today. Good job the weather is nice.