new inspiration

Published 6. april 2020

Corona and spring

Two weeks ago, I were supposed to be in Stavanger for the annual meeting for the Norwegian Quilt Association. I had sendt in two quilts for the exhibition and one to the competition. Then came Corona and everything shut down. The meeting has been postponed and my two quilts for the exhibition are on their way home. My entry for the competition now awaits new time for the meeting, hopefully somtime in the autumn.

I cannot show you my quilt for the competition, but the two for the exhibition I can

This first one is called «Light and Backlight». It is in two parts, Cotton and silk, machine and hand quilted. It is a rather personal quilt, because the danser is ME! Way back in my youth!!! But still a part of my history, I danced classical ballet for about 18 years, back in the 70’s. The last years in one of those little «free» dancing groups which appeared outside the established companies at that time. I used an old photograph and traced. The grey cotton fabric, a reused sofa-cover, together with a little too soft wadding gave me some troubles. Even if the quilting is rather even it was almost impossible to get those clean straight bindings. It is too soft and I have to live with that.

My other quilt is a re-use of one of my very first, and not so good quilts from 2002.

Originaly it was my first attempt at Barghello. Last spring I decided to sacrifice it, tried first to bleach it, but the fabrics didn’t want to give up any colours. So instead I painted the background, machine-embroidered and painted the dragonfly and handstitched the background. It is based on a haiku by Matsuo Basho:

This dragonfly

can’t quite land

on that blade of grass.

We had an early spring this year, and March was filled with beautiful crocuses, so of course my March book had to be filled with crocuses. As I started by drawing, stencilling and printing.

Cut it all in pages and made myself another book:

Now I have to find a theme for my April book. Wait and see….

I hope you all are well wherever you are in the world, we shall manage this. Take care!

Published 4. mars 2020

Looking at old ideas with new eyes.

In february I have been visiting an old friend, the beautiful Oseberg Viking ship. Here in the Viking Ship Museum in Oslo.

Following the building of the copy they made in Tønsberg some years ago, named Saga Oseberg, from the start

until it was finished

I have collected quite a lot of inspirational photos and other materials, and now I want to look at it all with new eyes. I made some new stamps,

collected some of my old stampa as well, printed them randomly on a large sheet of paper, cut it and made myself another little sketchbook:

Now as we enter March I will continue working with my Viking heritage, but I have some other plans as well.

Published 31. januar 2020

New year – new inspiration

Last day of January already! I started the year by finishing several projects. First, I made the last pieces for my internationel group project with TexNet2. Our first exhibition will be at the European Patchwork Meeting in Sainte-Marie-aux-Mines in September.

Next I made the finishing touches on some quilts for the Norwegian Quilters Association’s meeting in March. Unfortunately, I can not share these with you yet.

But I have also been working on some new inspiration, first, just playing around with scraps and thread, some Slow stitchhing:

I don’t know where this will lead me, time will show.

And I spent most of january studying stones in my garden, at the beach and in the neighbourhood, drawing with Fineliner and Inktense pencils. First I just filled a large sheet with random drawings: