The International Quilt Challenge: October 2011

Saturday, 22 October 2011

The Idea...

...is set in my mind and now the materials are ready.

I'm combining three photographs altogether - two of them are windows taken in Lacock Abbey - a fascinating National Trust property. I've taken a photo of one window with an interesting wall around it and the objects from the windowsill in a different photo to create my own window. The view outside is going to be a textile piece created from a photo printed on silk from the garden at Dyrham Park - another favourite property which we visited this year.

I can't wait to get started - I'm really excited about this! It's been great seeing how my wedding quilt is developing but I really do need an artistic diversion after all that quilting!

Tuesday, 18 October 2011

PROTEST - A WORKING TITLE

This projected work had its origins in the almost unbelievable events of this August. It will become part of a series on this theme. I was horrified, as everybody was, by the destruction and looting which took place but I was equally angry at the draconian sentences passed on people who hadn't really done that much. It is influenced also by Ralph McTell's greatest song 'The Streets of London' and this will probably feature in the future.
The following pictures represent only 'pegs to hang my hat on' at the moment. I have several possibilties for the window element. The picture below is from a series taken at the de la Warr Pavilion, Bexhill.

I am influenced as well by the fact that Armistice Day occurs during the course of this Challenge. I know that dates are meaningless when looked at as curiosities but it is interesting that in this year it will be 11,11,11,11. This will not occur again for a century. I hope to use this as my background as I think about Kipling's lines which I shall paraphrase as 'was it for this they died.
I am experimenting with a combination of photographs taken in my local churchyard and poppy pictures. I am thinking of overlaying them and probably laminating the result.

These are some of the ingredients. I must collect the rest and make the recipe.

Thursday, 13 October 2011

more windows...

seen at Burleigh today. First, the blocked up windows in this wing of the house; windows were taxed in Britain in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and it is not uncommon to see houses of that period with bricked up windows. That said, it seems unlikely that was the reason here...there are an awful lot of windows in this wonderful building. Remember to click on the images to get the larger view; the blocked ones are near that annoying car in the foreground. The second was a window in a partition overlooking the Garden Of Surprises. Isn't it gorgeous? I love the contrast of colour and vibrancy in this image.

And...I have thought of a way of expressing the loss of contextual information in translation in a visual way... I suspect that might well be my quilt for this challenge... Watch this space, as they say...

Sunday, 9 October 2011

Windows...

I'm in two minds about this one. The sensible option would be to go with the images I've taken through car windows over the years... in fact, come to think of it, some of the images of Slochd (a mountain on the way to Inverness...sadly, one you have to drive up/round) would be ideal. And there are some more recent images taken in a traffic jam (Norfolk doesn't usually do traffic jams, but it was summer and there were tourists...), of fields seen through the hedgerows and trees at the edge of the road.

But then there's the intangible option. I wrote a dissertation in Russian about the translation of Burns into Russian. I wrote that reading a translation is like looking through a window; you can see what's going on, but there are elements of the action that you can't experience, because you're held away from it by the glass. To be honest, I have no idea how to approach that particular idea, but it seems to be lurking, anyway. Perhaps I'll go with Slochd, and take it from there...