Introducing Deirdre

I'm Deirdre Abbotts, I’m 55 and I live in Westport, CT (50 miles east of NYC). I have several friends in this group and I'm thrilled to be able to participate. My mind seems to be flipping through ideas for the Light & Shadow challenge, sorting the ideas into Yes No and Maybe piles.

I've been married for 20+ years and have a daughter in college who loves the weather in NC and my a son who likes it cooler lives in VT.

The last few years have had too much day-job and not enough creative expression. I was on the board of my quilt guild but found the politics to be overwhelming and under-appreciated. So this year I have stepped back and will let some of the other members step up, while continuing to maintain the guild website.

I did make a commitment (to myself) this year to learn printmaking, and have been using my membership at Center for Contemporary Printmaking to experiment and try new techniques. I really like using the presses and it's great to be in a place where there is so much talent on display. CCP has great classes and exhibits, and I'm lucky it is only a few miles from my home. I'm hoping to learn ways to try some of the techniques I'm using on paper and see what I can do on fabric.

I have several quilt projects in various states of completion. And I'm looking forward to finishing a few of them!

Like the rest of you, I'm sure I have more ideas then time. But that won't stop me from thinking of the next project... no matter what the medium. Fiber, painting, photography, printmaking, web design, drawing, beading, the list could (and does) go on and on!

I NEED ART in my LIFE! Without it - I'm Incomplete!

:-D eirdre

PS – Thanks to Annabel for sending me another key!

Introducing Annabel

Blank page trauma.

Thinking. Thinking....


What to say, what to say?  Well, I'm 55 so sort of in the middle of the group age wise, so far anyway. I am married to Graham and have two beautiful wonderful daughters, that sadly don't live very near me. I was born in Somerset but I moved so many times as a child that I'm left with a permanent feeling of not having a place where I can park my heart. Warwickshire does for now.

I've been quilting for about 12 years and painting for about 4 years, and just recently the two have sort of melded together. I'm on some sort of happy journey but don't quite know where my destination is. It might be that I will continue to change and not have a style...ever!  I have no artistic background whatsoever and have come a little late to such things, so feel I need to cram lots in before I get too old to hold the scissors.

Whilst I'm painting, I think I'll never sew again, and whilst I'm sewing, I think I'll never paint again. I need to do both in some form.  I have a room which is the back half of a double length garage, which has been converted for me to use as a studio. It has huge glass doors which open and let the summer in - when we have any of course, and am free to produce whatever the mood fancies. I also like to work on a large scale - I like the impact large quilts make in a gallery space.

It's important for me that what I produce is meaningful in some way, and I'd love for it to be called art. That would make me happy.  I have a sense of humour which sneaks into pieces as well, without being asked! I don't know how it does that; it's magic.

I'm looking forward to seeing what everyone does. Have fun everyone.

Hello from Jane

Thank you Annabel for forming this group! I'm really looking forward to the challenges and to getting to know you all better.

I'm Jane Davila from Connecticut in the US. I live about an hour north of New York City which gives me the best of all things - a quintessential New England small town that's just a short train ride away from Broadway and the biggest art scene in the world. I've lived in a lot of different places (Miami, Dallas, Woodstock, Lima Peru, etc) but I can't imagine living anywhere else now. Of course it was 104F in NYC yesterday, so somewhere cooler sounds lovely in this second, lol.

My mom and I opened a quilt shop in 1990 and I learned to quilt and began teaching quilt classes there. In 2003 a friend and I developed a series of art quilting classes that grew into 2 books with C&T Publishing, Art Quilt Workbook and Art Quilts at Play. Since then I've written another book for C&T and another will be released in OCtober 2012.

Two years ago we closed our shop (after 19 years) and now I work as a freelance teacher, traveling all over the world, author and designer. In January I accepted the position of freelance editor of the digital emagazine Quilting Arts In Stitches. My husband and I continue to sell all of the fun art quilting, mixed media and surface design supplies that I used to sell in the shop but as vendors at quilt shows and online, so we do a fair amount of traveling for that too.

My husband is an artist also, working in oils and in sculpture. He emigrated to the US from Peru and is from a family of artists. His father was a well-known abstract expressionist in South America and one of his brothers is a surrealist. Our daughter lives about 15 minutes away from us and is super creative also (she hasn't embraced the label "artist" yet) and is a whiz at etsy and online selling of her crafts.

Because I started out as a printmaker, a lot of my fiber work incorporates printmaking techniques and I tend to work fairly small. A lot of my recent work has been for deadlines (books, magazines, teaching proposals) and I really need a place and a reason to do some work for fun and just for me. I am so looking forward to our challenges here and seeing what we all come up with!