Come See "What's For Dinner?"!

My friend and partner-in-crime, Jamie Fingal, and I have a long-running conversation about what we are cooking for dinner.  This lead to a cooking (and restaurant-appreciation) blog, and eventually Jamie began asking her Facebook followers, "What's For Dinner?".  Last fall, we discussed the idea of creating a unique quilt exhibition with this title.

This amazing pan was hand-painted by Desiree Habicht

and given to Jamie for her 60th birthday!

Each piece was created inside a 15"L by 24" W format, something about the size of a placemat (or a cafeteria tray).
We are very excited to debut this exhibit at the International Quilt Festival in Houston.  Jamie and I had a difficult challenge because there were so many wonderful submissions.  Please stop by and take a peek at this fun and creative exhibit at the festival, and I hope you will stop by the blog and let me know you saw it!
I gave my curator's piece a great deal of thought.  I like the idea that we eat for sustenance, but we also have a lot of traditions surrounding food that are handed down in families.  I have a ritual of making my grandmother's English Date Pudding and my late sister's recipe for Southwestern style dressing each year during the holidays.  There is something comforting about the creation of these dishes and remembering the women who taught me how to make them.
It was with these thoughts that I created my piece, called "Nourishment and Tradition".

I started out by making color laser copies of some of my mother and sister's old recipes.

I like that they have splatters on them.

I laminated the papers to a piece of silk organza with matte medium.

Once dry, the excess paper on the back of the recipes was removed.

Since my husband and I eat a great deal of fish it seems 

appropriate that I would have one on the plate.

And...I never pass up the chance to use a googly eye or two! 

We generally eat a lot of salad or some other type of greens.

I wanted them to be dimensional.

To make the flatware I used my own stainless and made drawings on gray silk

and thread painted the reflections.

The napkin is held in place with a few stitches.

The plate fabric, a piece of lovely Kaffe Fassett cloth, strongly resembles 

my Tracy Porter dishware.  It works!

"The Coffee Break"

"The Coffee Break" is my curator's piece for the upcoming special exhibition, "Rituals", which debuts at the International Quilt Festival, Long Beach, in July 2012.  After honing down which ritual theme I wanted to work with for this exhibition, I started and stopped several times.  I even changed the cloth on the coffee cups at the very last minute (see last image).

This ritual has to do with a long-running email conversation with my friend and teaching partner, Jamie Fingal.  When I see "coffee break" in the subject line, I know to get my cuppa and put my feet up, because it will be a long conversation in print.  We discuss business items, personal issues...you name it.

The coffee break has been a long-running habit which is often more of a lifeline.

I took quite a number of our email exchanges, printed them on paper, then cut them into small rectangular strips.  The strips were laminated onto polyester sheer with matte medium.  This was subsequently fused with Mistyfuse, cut into "vapor-like" shapes and fused to the surface of the quilt, along with the interior of each cup.

I wanted the quilt to have a mirror-image effect, so the background shapes and the coffee cup are inverted at the top.  The vapor was appliqued onto the surface, then more vapor was added by free-motion thread-painting.  The background shapes, though rather abstract, are created to reference portals, doorways, windows.  

Creating this piece was a joy.  I hope you like it, too.

Finished size:  60 inches long by 24 inches wide.

emails, cut into small rectangular pieces

after laminating to polyester sheer

looking at cast shadows.....

Here is my original cup (which I adore!). 

I changed it because I felt these got "lost" on the surface of the quilt.

I'm still sad about them....

...but they just didn't work as well as the black and white ones.

Also, the vapor looks too "vine-like" here.  

Picky, picky, picky.

Quilting Arts TV Series 900

Available for pre-order here

Pokey and I on the makeshift "set" at the Cincinnati quilt festival

In Series 900 I did a demonstration of paper to cloth lamination, and showed some of the uses for the resulting imagery.

Sheer Imagination: A 2-day lamination workshop

Jamie Fingal and I will be teaching a 2-day workshop in Costa Mesa at CREATE! retreat.  Our workshop is featured in the daily Cloth Paper Scissors email blast:

Sheer Imagination: A Paper/Cloth Lamination Adventure Jamie Fingal and Leslie Jenison In this 2-day workshop, you will learn to create unique laminated cloth using their own color copies of any subject you choose (travel, art, cooking, funky imagery, sewing, family, and text if desired). We encourage you to create an artwork using a theme and to create your own mixed media apron.  Jamie and Leslie will provide a vast variety of tools and materials for you to experiment with and add unique layers of imagery to your laminated cloth. Color, design, and free motio machine quilting will be discussed as everyone will be fusing their laminated images and sewing them down. This is our interview for CPS CREATE!: Meet CREATE Instructors Jamie Fingal and Leslie Jenison     1. When did you start creating art individually? Leslie:  I've been interested in art my entire life. I fell in love with quilt making in  the late 70s. When my family moved to San Antonio in 1997, I became interested  in surface design and mixed media, and combining these passions has consumed  me ever since. Jamie: I've been making art as long as I can remember, first as a graphic  artist, then decoupage boxes and suitcase with fabric and paint.  I made my first quilt in the early 80's, onto art quilting in 2001, and wrote  a book in 2007. Now we are team teaching and we bring a variety of strengths to the working  relationship that compliment one another quite well. We are both passionate  about what we do and bring fun and laughter to the classroom.       2. What can students can expect out of your workshop Sheer Imagination  at CREATE Costa Mesa? Separately from each other we have been experimenting with laminating paper  and cloth together. This is a very interesting way to create a unique material  which can be used for a wide variety of textile, quilt, and mixed media  work. It is a technique that is not taught very often, because of the many  supplies that are needed. Since one of us lives locally, we knew it could be done,  and we are thrilled to offer this 2-day workshop!  Learn more and register now.         3. Where did you find your inspiration for this workshop? We felt that we wanted to look beyond the art quilt and create an art apron that  expresses any theme the student desires. The aprons are totally wearable  and will be one of a kind works of art that are sewn.  Jamie has made 3 unique mixed media aprons. I love the symbology  of the apron as a means of expressing an idea. We have both created  a number of mixed media pieces using the lamination technique and are  very excited to share this with our students.         4. What other hobbies to do enjoy besides making art? Leslie:  I am an avid photographer, reader, cook, blogger, and gardener.  I am also a private pilot.  Jamie: I also enjoy gardening, reading, writing, photography,  have a few blogs and love to cook.         5. What are you most excited for at CREATE Costa Mesa? We love the whole atmosphere of this retreat! The students are really  enthusiastic and focused, yet we have a blast with them, and we love  seeing the other instructors, many of whom have become close friends, and  meeting the new instructors and getting to know them.  Costa Mesa has a lot to offer CREATE attendees because of the close  proximity to a wide range of shopping, restaurants, the beach, etc. It is going to be  a great place for this retreat!!          6. What is your favorite memory of CREATE 2010? That is a tough one to answer because there were so many great memories! One that stands out for us is that the students and instructors were so inspiring. One of the best moments for us was seeing the Student Showcase at the end of the week and looking at the amazing  things everyone had "CREATE"ed during the retreat. Truly, it was astonishing.

Come Join Us At CREATE! in Costa Mesa California!

CREATE! Cloth Paper Scissors is offering not one, but two, locations in 2011:  Costa Mesa CA in May, and Chicago in August.
Jamie Fingal and I are excited to offer something new in Costa Mesa:
"Sheer Imagination:  A 2-day paper/cloth lamination workshop"

Image in paper

same image, laser-copied, then laminated to sheer, fused and quilted

My apron as "personal armor":  it is all about the journey.

apron detail

Jamie and I have been exploring this method of creating custom imagery on cloth and are excited to have a 2-day workshop to share this method!  In the workshop students will use their own personal imagery to create a mixed-media apron.  Please consider joining us for this workshop on Friday, May 20th, and Saturday, May 21st.  Class registration opens online February 8th.  Sign up here for email updates.

3-D Architecture

I just completed a 3D structure that will be part of a collaborative installation with several other artists, spear-headed by Kathy York.  Until the entire work has been photographed and the jurying finished I am not at liberty to show the entire piece, but I WANT to!  Here is a little peek at the back doors of my structure.  I'm calling it Warehouse 104:

Sold!

What a thrill:  my piece, "Heartland:  A Scattered Landscape", has been sold to an architectural firm.  I'm very honored that this work was chosen.  Since my father was an architect (as well as a structural engineer) I'm especially pleased that it will reside in this type of setting.
Here are images of the piece:

Front of the 2-sided piece

dimensions:  80 inches by 24 inches

Back

detail of front

Images from the Fiber Artists of San Antonio juried exhibition opening

I was thrilled to have two mixed-media pieces juried into the annual exhibition by juror Maggie Weiss, from Chicago.  A special thrill for me was that one of the pieces is a length of art cloth using laminated shredded paper.  The best thing of all was that I had my husband Tim, my oldest daughter and one of my dearest friends from Kansas, Billie, attend the opening!  This was a rare moment, indeed.
The exhibition is hanging until the first week of November at Gallery Nord in San Antonio.  If you are in the vicinity of San Antonio I encourage you to check out this wonderful exhibition.  I'm honored to be a part of it!

Father and daughter

My small mixed-medial "mail art" piece, "Love Me Tender"

My oldest daughter and I pose in front of "Heartland:  A Scattered Landscape"

I was thrilled that the piece, which is two-sided, was hanging freely in the center of the gallery.

Dimensions of the piece are 24 inches by 80 inches.

The piece is hung from a hollow-core acrylic rod, which allowed monofilament to be fed through it.

A view from the upper level of the gallery.

My friend and daughter are standing just left of my hanging installation

Left to Right:  exhibition chairs Linda Rael & Lisa Kerpoe, juror Maggie Weiss

(Please click the links to visit each of their websites)

The upper level of the gallery

My daughter poses in front of "Heartland"

Gallery Nord is one of the most beautiful galleries in the city of San Antonio, and a PERFECT venue for fiber art.  The vaulted ceiling adds the perfect note of drama to undulating cloth, garments, and the lush colors and textures of all that is fiber art.

Cool new (for me) gel pens

I took a journal workshop in Chicago @ CREATE with Dawn Sokol.  In the class we learned how to make our own books from old hardcover books by removing the original pages and stitching in our own page stock.  I made a book with two "signatures", meaning two sections of stitched pages.
Of course, I had to make it complicated.  I used a variety of oddities:  watercolor paper, maps, old pattern sleeves, and even some polyester sheer that I laminated with paper through a thermofax screen.

In addition to learning how to construct a book, which thrilled me, Dawn introduced me to Sakura gel pens.  The ones we were given in the workshop were the souffle pens.  The ink behaves as puff paint after you write on a surface.  Very cool.
I ordered a couple of additional packages when I returned home, and just got around to playing with them a few days ago.
One of the pleasant surprises was the set of opaque pens:  I found that I could write on a boarding pass that I "ruined" by heating and turning the paper black.  No problem now:  I wrote on the page with my white pen!  The other happy surprise is that I can write on the laminated areas of my sheer and the script shows!
I tried various other types of pens and markers and the script didn't show up.
Take a look:

Here is a page with writing using the Sakura Souffle pens

Here is the laminated sheer, turned to left

Here is the laminated sheer with Sakura opaque pen scribblings.

Pretty cool stuff

collaged paper lamination on sheer, followed by metal leaf lamination

I've been struggling to find a way to interpret a particular element for a quilt I'm working on.  After taking several different paths to achieve what I want, it suddenly dawned on me that laminating a collage of papers onto a sheer might be exactly what I need for this piece.

I sliced pages from several design magazines 

and positioned them under sheer fabric

For the first step I used matte medium

and a wallpaper brush

Cloth was pinned to my work surface.

I swiped the brush repeatedly across the surface of the sheer with matte medium.

Eventually I was pouring matte medium directly onto the surface and pushing it around with the brush

Pins were removed and the piece was allowed to dry thoroughly.

After drying, I heat-set it between two sheets of teflon.

The entire piece was immersed in a bucket of water to soak for a few minutes.

Then I rubbed off the excess paper (outside, because it is messy!)

After drying, I screened heavy gel medium through a thermofax screen

on the opposite side from the paper lamination & allowed it to dry for a few minutes.

Then, I positioned sheets of black metal leaf over the screened medium.

After waiting a few minutes, I heat-set the leaf.

Using a paintbrush I gently removed excess leaf from the surface.

Very messy!

Here is what I have:  I don't think I'm finished

I may brush even more of the leaf from the surface.

I'll wait until tomorrow to push this forward because I need to think about it a bit....

Also, I need to look at this piece next to my other sections of pieced cloth and see how they look together.  I will do this with fresh eyes in the morning.