Festival of Quilts 2012

Where does the time go, its been a week since festival and I'm only now catching up! Although I spent 2 days at Festival this year I really only managed to do justice to about half of what I had intended to see!
The most interesting galleries to me this year were: European Art Quilts; PB Retro; Masters 2; CQ @ 10; Anne Worringer and Kate Findley. They were especially interesting as my personal focus for this year was the surface treatments of the quilts, decorative stitching and quilting. In these galleries I saw work that was mind boggling; stunning in its simplicity and complexity in surface decoration.
This focus meant that I outside theses and the Art and Contemporary open sections I saw very little. I think that I am a great deal more selective about what I spend time in front of, preferring to educate myself rather than just gawp!
I was really interested in Angela Schenz's Dancing Leaves with her use of small rectangular tablets quilted and embroidered with a flurry of red organza leaves hovering on top.

Close up with details

 I have come away with some real food for thought the following is just a sample of the techniques that I'd like to experiment with in my work in the furure:

• Using short randon stitches to quilt, creating new shapes on the surface.
• Frayed edges to quilts
• Grids stitched on soluable fabric or paper and partilly removed
• Leaving abstract shapes unquilted, draws attention to these new shapes
• Shibori elements as surface decoration
• Use of regular repeated rows of simple hand stitches
• Using linen backgrounds
• Using markal paint stick on already quilted fabric.

I thought that the individual exhibitions at this year's Festival were of an exceptionally high standard and showcased some really exciting work. Having entered a piece for the CQ @10 challenge I was stunned by the exhibition and can so see why mine did not make it to the show! The curating worked so well to create a cohesive visual flow with such disparate creations. Well done judges and Hilary for doing such a wonderful job.