Rita's Lenten Art



I thought I should include a brief note to explain why you are seeing this unusual quilt out of sequence and not “on topic” with our other challenges. As you may know, I’ve been frustrated with computer gremlins lately. Alice Baird has been my ‘go to gal’ and we think we have the problems solved. This post is something we are doing to check our work, and that’s the first part of the story.

The rest of the story:

Our church (St. Paul’s Episcopal, Waco) has never had formal “stations” to celebrate the path of Jesus’ passion for the season of Lent. This year various artists were asked to create a piece of art that represents in some way the story of a single station. Most styles of visual medium were invited to participate – quilting was specifically mentioned in the list, along with painting, drawing, sculpture, and photography. My work with Material Mavens made this challenge an easy walk down the path.  I chose Station Two, “Jesus takes up his Cross,” and this is the result.

This is somewhat a reverse appliqué technique.  The original inspiration was a small, copyright free clip art image in stark black and white.  I chose fabrics for the white areas and fused them onto a large square of black fabric.  Each piece is stitched around with invisible thread and then this stitched piece was placed on a square of batting and was quilted in black thread around each appliqué.        

It is a 17 inch by 17 inch quilt on a stretcher frame.