Come to my workshop said the spider to the fly . . . okay, lame reference, but isn't she the cutest silvery spider made of pewter beads, Swarovski crystals and wire?
Hey, make no mistake, I’m very flattered and pleased to have gotten the call to teach at the Empty Spools Seminars in Pacific Grove, California, but like a rookie waiting for his first Major League pitch, I’m shaking in my cleats and my palms are s-w-e-a-t-i-n-g!
I’ve written about Empty Spools for The Quilt Life and The Quilter magazines and I’ve taken a couple of sessions as a student as well, but I’ve not yet strutted my teaching “stuff” in such stellar company—take a gander at that faculty: it’s awe inspiring, plus Ruth McDowell will be there! The Ruth McDowell!!!!!
Yeah . . . well . . . time to tamp down on that rookie panic and focus on preparation.
I’ll be hosting a “Flower-Powered” workshop during Session II (April 3 to 8, 2012) that riffs on a dimensional appliqué technique I adapted for a project in A Dozen Roses, a Martingale & Company title co-authored with Catherine Comyns.
Diana McClun's world-class quilting husband suggested I add a spider to my little still life study. So I made a beaded spider and found a tiny fly charm at my local bead shop. I'm hoping whimsy outweighs the buggy yuck factor.
The floral workshop theme is probably no surprise to you, dear blog readers. I have, after all, decorated an inordinate number of my posts with still-life photography. But I can’t help it; I’m wickedly attached to buds and blossoms. Some would channel such enthusiasm into gardening, but I’m omnivorous (so to speak). I want to bite into many floral experiences from botanical illustration* to Japanese watercolors and Modern Art styles and I’m hoping that there are quilters out there who want to join me at my “buffet.”
*Click the link to find the beautiful botanical art of my friend Sally Petru–an early collaborator who inspired my rosy dimensional applique quilts.
This is my sort of quilting inspiration. Instead of doing time in the garden I photograph my neighbor's roses generally at near dusk right after a rainfall.
There’s one caveat for me—no scary needle-turn appliqué. I’ve got expressionistic aesthetic goals in mind, not literal recreations of flowers. Actually, that’s a preference I’ve picked up from my artful mother who in her oil painting days splashed colorful washes across canvases and painted images suggested by the resulting swirls and drops. While I appreciate the exactitude of the purist form of appliqué, and I can see that it will take a quilter down the road to true botanical art, that’s not my objective.
So what can you experience in a Jennifer Rounds Flower-Powered workshop? The freedom to follow your own floral whims with instruction in flower-building, designing vessels, creating dimensional settings for still-life portraiture, exploring borders and unusual finishing details, and (very delicious) using luxury fabric, ribbons, and beads for embellishment.
Consider yourself invited!
