Judy's Paint the canvas

Painted canvas
I kept seeing paint dripping down a canvas so that’s what I made. The yellow and green fabrics are some that I hand dyed with my friend, Ellis Bennett. We did it in her garage in JULY in TEXAS. That tells you how much we wanted to dye fabric! Nobody would do that if they didn’t have a passion for quilting and creating.

The orange, blue, and purple are Cherrywood fabrics. They hand dye their own fabrics and are the ones who have a challenge every year. Last year was the Bob Ross challenge and this year is Diana.

The other part I couldn’t get out of my mind was the paintbrush. I wanted to be able to paint with it. All of these fabrics were in my stash and it was fun to rediscover them and make a paintbrush from them. I just cut out a section that looked like paintbrush hairs from McKenna Ryan’s line called “At Home In The Woods”. I had a little piece of gray that looked like metal and then the handle is a piece that I purchased from the Waco quilt guild president when she moved to Arizona back in 1995.

The paint was cut from a fun fabric called “Effervescence” designed by Amelia Caruso for Robert Kaufman. Sometimes it is so hard to use a fabric because you want to save it for just the right project. I’ve decided that now is the right time. This week I have cut into it 2 times and I still have some to use on other projects. I sewed squares of the right colors together and fused Bosal knit interfacing on the back to prevent it from fraying too much and to give it body so that it would paint nicely.

I sewed a vinyl sleeve to hold the paintbrush and paint. Enjoy.

Carolyn: "Can't Paint the Town Red"

My quilt reflects the Covid-19 Pandemic that we are currently facing with our quarantine and stay-at-home orders.  It features a circle representing the world-wide contagion with countries all over the world.  The coronavirus moves all around the globe, signaling the seriousness of this 2020 pandemic.  A blue mask reminds us of those caring for the infected and the urgency to wear a mask when we go outside to help contain the virus.  Only one of the homes is infected with the virus.  Can you tell which one?

I used a new Spring fabric by Kaffe Fassett for the background to communicate the world-wide goal of “flattening the curve.” The globe is purple reminding us of the hope for a vaccine.  Green grass signals an eventual return to a new “normal.”  The virus particles are fussy cut from another new Kaffe fabric, which resembles the coronavirus.  The same fabric is also used for the back and binding.  Each house is “painted” vivid red, but because each is unique, individual polka dot fabric tops each roof and door.  That is, except for the unfortunate, infected household.

The entire quilt is made with raw-edge fusing.  I tried a new thread for me – Wonderfil Invisifil 100 wt. with a #60 needle in tiny stitches for the entire quilt, except for the Ricky Tims 40 wt. polyester green thread for the grass.

This whimsical quilt reminds me to honor those who battle this virus, to stay hopeful, to do my part by staying at home, and to look forward to a brighter day. 

Andrea's Paint quilt

 Emerging Daffodils

12" x 12" 

screen printed and stencilled on cotton using 

transparent fabric paint

Up until last week I had a very different design idea worked out for my "Paint" quilt.  Although I liked the design, I was not motivated to even start it.  It was when I realized that I needed to create a piece that reflected, in some small way, just what is happening in the world now, that I came up with a new design.  Wash Your Hands; Social Distancing; Wear A Mask; Stay Home are a few of the phrases we are hearing everyday now, or at least in Massachusetts.

While staying home I have been appreciating watching my daffodils emerge in my little back garden, which I can see from my kitchen window.  The process of nature returning is about the only thing that seems "normal" now.  This was my inspiration.  It is a whole cloth quilt with all the imagery created using hand cut stencils and transparent fabric paint.  The background is screen printed with a "montage" of a few of my favorite images, mostly having to do with travel.  I intended the background to be a bit more "faded" than it is, as it represents the fading of life as I have known it.

"Where flowers bloom, so does hope"

Lady Bird Johnson

Some of the stencils that I used for the imagery.

Nedra's Paint - Paint the Town Red

The theme is incorporated in two ways for this challenge using paint as the inspiration and a method.

No matter how much I pondered, my mind always came back to the "Paint the Town Red " phrase.  So what better town to do so in than Las Vegas as I and a friend did when I turned 50!!!  

 I wanted to use obvious landmarks from Vegas for the skyline at the time of a warm southwestern sunset. The background is a combination of commercial and personal hand died fabric.  The landmarks are from some of the newer Vegas hotels, New York, New York, The Wynn, Luxor, Paris and Bellagio.  They are fused on and it is machine quilted.   Fingernail polish and fabric paint was used to create the drips.        

Gail’s Paint Quilt

I can still remember the first time I heard the descriptive term “thread paint”.  I thought ahhh yes that is what I am doing with thread.   Thread painting is what we all do with our art quilts.  Fabric and thread are our paints.  We have finally been recognized as artists without brushes but with needle and thread.  I so embrace this concept and this challenge!  My quilt is a silk panel given to me by Karen Sharp, a talented quilt artist.  I’ve looked at it for months. My familiarity with my Sweet 16 sit down midarm and the many threads Karen gave me inspired this little quilt.  I have reached a level of free motion quilting I only dreamed about.  Thank you Alice and everyone for this opportunity.  I used couching with metallic threads to outline the silk embroidered panel, yarn to embellish the border, and quilting on mySweet 16 for the background.

Jane's Paint Quilt: The Orchid

From Alice:  Jane was unable to post today because she is having a medical procedure done.  She asked me to post the photo of her quilt, which I was happy to do.

About this quilt Jane said:

Paint is a very important part of my work in surface design. I use it in many different ways. 

In this quilt, I painted on silk charmeuse with Pro Fab fabric paint and Inktense blocks. Gail Bradney shared some tips from Andrea Brokenshire. She also gave me the orchid. 

Alice again here:  Jane sent me several other photos that illustrate her process.  

This was the original photo which Jane used for her painted quilt.

More "process photos"

In this photo you can see a bit of a black and white version
of the photo, useful when working with values, and then
the painting in process.

Alice's Quilt: Paint the Town Red!

In thinking about the theme for this quilt, I started wondering about common expressions using the word “paint.”  The first one that jumped into my brain was “paint the town red,” and so I decided to make a quilt that depicted a village of all-red houses.  Immediately I was reminded of the group quilt that Carolyn, Judy, Rita, and I constructed a few years ago that we called “Whimseyville."  Remembering that quilt and the fun we had in working together on it made it extra enjoyable to work on this quilt!

Just as we did with Whimseyville, I made the background first, starting at the top with an assortment of blue fabrics for the sky.  Working down, I added brown and green fabrics for the ground.  I used scraps of already fused fabrics from a bin containing leftovers of other fusing projects.  I fused these background sections onto a square of plain fabric.  I also found the perfect scrap for the sun.

Then I did fusing Wonder Under, onto scraps of red fabrics, and I free-hand cut house shapes and roofs.  I then used a tiny zig-zag stitch to appliqué all of these down onto the background.  I "thread sketched" the rays of the sun. This appliquéing of the houses, sun, and sections of the sky and ground sufficed for the quilting.