Tribute

As I mentioned in my last post, I have been posting about scrunch dyeing techniques at "... And then we set it on Fire", which is a group of fiber artists who specialize in surface design techniques.  After dyeing several pieces of fabric, I challenged myself to use some of it in an art quilt.  I played around with various methods of using the fabric combined with some of my other fabrics (stash buster!), and put the finishing touches on the piece just this morning.  Here's how it ended up:

I hung it on a cafe rod in my bathroom, next to a sunny window to highlight the quilting.  As I mentioned in my post on the other blog, I got some smudges on the center panel when I mistakenly used a graphite pencil instead of a lead pencil to trace the leaf and vine design I later embroidered.  So I decided to finish the piece, then launder it to remove the graphite.  I remembered how I love the three-dimensional quality quilts get when they have been laundered, which in this case, added to the visual interest. Then I went back in with a lead pencil, drew the vine and leaves, and embroidered... just right!  

 In the closeup above, I had a piece of fabric I dyed by covering a button with the fabric and tying with string.  The button had a raised daisy pattern which transferred to the fabric, but it was very faint.  So I embroidered the petals, then used french knots to create the center.  I free-motion quilted the white area around the flower.

This is a closeup of a square I made using some of the scrunched fabrics I dyed for the blog posts.  I used free-motion quilting to highlight the design.

Here I tried to get a closeup of the border, which was created with more of the scrunched fabrics. Again, I used free-motion quilting to meander over the patterns of the scrunch.  And this gives a little better view of the embroidered panel in the center.
I mentioned in the other blog post that I decided to call this piece "Tribute", as a tribute to my Mom, Step-Mother, Grandmothers and Great Grandma, all who were very gifted in various fiber arts, and who inspired me to work in fiber.  But it is also a tribute to the many wonderful fiber artists I have met in the past several years online, who have so generously shared their techniques with the world!  I have learned a great deal from you all, and hope to be able to share what I have learned with many more!