Begin Again ... 2020 COVID Projects

Another post reflecting on the year ... seeking out the positives! 

I have been involved in two projects that were initiated in response to the pandemic - the idea  was to create a record of the impact of lockdown and subsequent restrictions on us all.  Both involved creating squares for a quilt.

The first of these projects was launched by OVADA (a contemporary art space in Oxford) - The OVADA Covid Quilt Project .  The brief was to create six inch squares using embroidery, stitch, applique, weave, sew, knit or print - as long as the base was fabric.  It would be a virtual quilt initially but once lockdown was over the submissions would be stitched together to make a quilt to provide a physical record of the times ... this would be exhibited at some point in the future.  Inspired to join in I thought I might create a couple of squares ... I ended up creating quite a few:

Quite an eclectic collection from hand embroidery, to machine applique and the final panel of boats is based around sashiko technique.  The two squares with hands on were both lino printed.

The final panel leads on to the second quilt project that I have been involved in - 'Same sea, different boat'.  This project was the brainchild of Sue Brown a printmaker based in Cheltenham, in the UK, in partnership with Littleheath Barn Studio and Hope and Elvis.  This time the squares were smaller and the idea was to combine collagraph printing with stitch or just stitched.  Sue offered to print a collagraph plate that others had created which would then be returned for further embellishment - again the brief was to design something to reflect our experience of the pandemic to become a social document of our shared experience. I created two squares ... the first a collagraph print enhanced with stitch:

After stitching:

The second square was just stitched:

Over 300 squares have been created and combined to make a number of quilt panels which are already being exhibited in the Museum in the Park, Stroud.  I managed to visit before the current lockdown began, hopefully these photographs will give you an idea of the scale of the project:

These are two projects that I never imagined that I would be involved in - they involve real artists.

I do hope you have found this interesting and hope you will pop back and check out what else I've been doing.

Stay Safe

Begin again ... 2020 Quilts

The upside to having time on your hands free from work obligations - is time to complete some of those projects that have been on the go and 'almost' finished.  Years ago, 2012 to be precise, I created the top of a quilt - it was the first time I had attempted a machine quilt.  That was as far as I got until this year when I was determined to finish it and I did!  I layered it up with wadding and a backing sheet and then machine quilted it - nothing fancy just stitching in the ditches, I found this quite a challenge on a domestic sewing machine as the quilt is large enough for a double bed.

For years my Mum has spent many an hour cross stitching pieces ... and for almost as long she has been trying to decide what she could do with them (there were in excess of 250!).  I thought that I might be able to incorporate them into a quilt - and that is exactly what I did! 

This shows the work in progress - I started by edging each of the pieces before then stitching similar sized panels into long strips which in turn were then stitched together.  I had to 'audition' the layout on the lounge floor as it was the only space big enough! Some of the cross stitch pieces were on two inches square!  Once the top pieces had been stitched into one piece it was layered with wadding and more of the cream calico and then machine quilted.

Here is the final quilt (double bed size) with the edges all bound and the loose threads removed.

So that's another two positives from 2020!

Keep well!