To cut or not to cut?

 Actually, that isn't  the question. The black on white quilted piece shown in progress last week, is now finished. The question is, how do I cut it up?

I admit, I am very nervous now. If I get this wrong, a lot of work will to to waste, so for the moment I am still working with my paper layouts. Here are some more.

The shapes are quite nice, but the layout gives a very boring negative space...

so a couple of different arrangements...

a few more with a kind of 'zipper' effect, playing around with the amount of separation between the right and left sides...

or in alignment...like this one, interesting negatives spaces...

could this be the one???

thanks for dropping by...

Hilary Florence

P.S. I am linking this to:

Linky Tuesday at Free motion by  the river­­­­ @ http://www.conniekresin.com/  

Fabric Tuesday @ http://quiltstory.blogspot.co.uk/    

Sew cute Tuesday @ http://www.blossomheartquilts.com/ 

Show and tell Tuesday @ http://ihavetosay.typepad.com/randi/

Let’s Bee Social @ http://sewfreshquilts.blogspot.co.uk

WIP Wednesday at freshly pieced   @   http://www.freshlypieced.com/

WOW = WIPs on Wednesdays  @ http://www.estheraliu.blogspot.co.uk/  

WIP Wednesday at TN + TN  @ http://needleandthreadnetwork.blogspot.ca

We did it Wednesday @ http://www.sewmuchado.com/

Off the wall Fridays @ http://ninamariesayre.blogspot.co.uk/

Fabric Frenzy Friday @ http://fortworthfabricstudio.blogspot.co.uk

Friday linky party @ http://www.confessionsofafabricaddict.blogspot.co.uk/
Do go and have a look at some of the other fantastic quilts and quilters there.

Black and white layouts - playing around

I showed this piece in a post last week and said when it was finished (there is about twice as much still to quilt) I would cut it up and applique it.  I have some hand-dyed charcoal material for the background which I will quilt in black - probably in pebble or some other overall pattern.Quite a few visitors were very curious to see how I chop it up. Well, so am I!!

I got out some black and white paper and started playing with layouts. For the next few posts I'll show you some of the ideas I have come up with - although I haven't yet decided which - if any - of them I will use. Today's layout is mostly squares, starting with just a few...

These just landed on the paper like that as I was cutting... so I added a frame...

but it is very basic, so I added more squares...

again framed, playing with strips of different thickness...

felt it still needed more squares...

more or less happy with those square, so now trying out different frames. Elements to play with are thickness of strips, weight given on each side by thickness/number of strips and the negative space between strips.

I'm not quite sure about the thick strip on the base...

and then if you turn it on it's side the whole thing looks different again...

These are just ideas. What is black might become white and vice-verse. The only reason it is this why around is because I have bigger sheets of white paper than black!

Thanks for dropping by...

Hilary Florence

P.S. I have linked this post to:

Off the wall Fridays at http://ninamariesayre.blogspot.co.uk/#

Show off Saturdays at www.sewcanshe.com

 Do go and have a look at the other quilts and quilters there.

Design Workout 3

just managed to de-glue my fingers from the latest 'design-workout'. You'll notice a change in colour scheme and an A4 format. There is no reason - again, I'm just using up old photocopies.Though  the odd word showing through adds interest don't you think?  Maybe is could double up as a workout for the imagination as well!

Just as a reminder, if you haven't seen previous posts, the idea here is to create a series of designs out of collaged squares and rectangles - not too much thought, just playing and producing.

More Design Workouts

Here is the next batch of my Design workouts. I've chosen a different colour scheme, but still kept the colours close to each other.

You can see quite clearly that there is a lot of text. As much as text is popular in collage work at the moment, this is not a great design element. I am simply using up a load of photocopies, which I have given thin layer of cheap acrylic paint using a gelli plate. 

I haven't added any texture, or done any fancy printing. The name of the game here is quantity - cheap and cheerful, done quickly without much thought - but above all done!

Enjoy

Thanks for dropping by...

Hilary Florence

Design workout

As much as I love free motion quilting, it is very time consuming. Even a small piece can take several hours to quilt and so doing trials and playing with ideas can be a long, slow process. I, as many others, find I learn best and get my best ideas from doing. Research also shows, that quantity, not quality (in other words, just producing work) in the end gives the best results.
With this in mind, I have given myself a design workout - in paper!

I've painted paper with acrylic to chop and stick, giving myself the following parameters.

• For the moment, I'm working with colours near to each other on the colour wheel.
• The shapes must be square or rectangular - ish. Any mathematician is now screaming at the screen that squares and rectangles - unlike my pieces - have 90 degree angles. Cutting free hand with a rotary cutter gives charmingly mild curves rather than mathematical precision - just how I like it!
• I've avoided diagonal lines.

The idea is to work fast without thinking to much and without being too bothered by the result. I have to admit, I struggle with this a bit and find myself pondering, trying out and changing. I know of an artist who does this exercise as a warm up - creating 15 collages in 15 minutes. I haven't got that drastic yet, but I hate to say I think that is just what I need to try.

Here are the first batch. (You will notice 5, not 15 and it took me much longer than 15 minutes!)

Enjoy.

Thanks for dropping by...

Hilary Florence